#cause i see some interpretations of what the werehog would be like if he was feral

[wereh0gz]

Thinking about Archie comic's werehog

[neurotypical-sonic]

what are some of your favorite sonic fics as of late?

Here are some of my all time faves from the top of my head!! I simply can't include everything I want to, it'll get too long, but I might do more themed fic recs in the future asdfjkf

Super Sonic Speed by Mobbo

An unfortunate, tiny change in the workings of the universe means that Sonic never meets Tails. Years of fighting Eggman alone start to get to you after a while.

You Aren't Even That Fast by Mobbo

Sonic, through sheer pomp and circumstance, manages to keep his speed a secret. Here’s how that goes down.

Interpretive by ToFightOrToFlee

Most nights, Tails would be more upset about being woken up in the middle of the night when Eggman isn't looming on the horizon, threatening world domination. He values his sleep, thank you very much. Tonight isn't most nights.

Guardians by Speed1236

Knuckles sticks to doing his job that first night after they defeat Eggman.

Dude, When Do You Even Sleep? by Kaddi

Sonic kind of wants to crash. Preferably into bed, but anything will do, really. Now that he's a werehog, he's nocturnal at night - but still diurnal during the day, and it's messing up his sleep. And now Knuckles and Amy are leaving, too, like he needed another thing to keep him up at night! Why is that bothering him so much anyway...? ("needing cuddles" isn't a transformation side effect he anticipated)

It's not an easy road, but now I'm not alone by Sylvalum

A terrible illness in Silver's time causes him to do the unthinkable: use a Chaos emerald to go to the past, seeking the help of the legendary hero, Sonic the Hedgehog… But he's not the only one.

If We Close Our Eyes, It'll Go Away by couchHouse

Fleet is certainly a kid with a lot of problems. The whole "turns into a murderous demon when exposed to chaos energy" thing is just part of it. But Ebony is determined to do right by him. No matter how dangerous he has the potential to be, he's still just a scared kid, right? Unfortunately, we know how this ends. A handful of stories adjacent to the canon issues as Ebony struggles to fit a chaos-powered ball of trauma into her life with as much love and care as possible. And what happens after she fails.

Febuwhump 2022 Day 5: "Let Me See" by Hextoons

Sally confronts Sonic over hiding his injuries. He's such a bad liar.

Displaced by benignmilitancy

"Shadow?" He doesn't know what they're running from. "Are we dead?"

The Lost Prince by LeDiz

So it turns out Sonic is the Lost Prince of Mobotropolis. That's a thing. When the kingdom demands him home for a celebration, Sonic and his friends have to deal with the fallout, while Sonic's family begins to realise they maybe never knew him at all.

Tomb by OctoberSpice

Even Sonic is afraid of the dark.

and honestly anything by PhantomEmeralds, somemarinagirl, skimmingthesurface, chaox, gayemeralds, SageNebula, and sketchjii. oh my god I've missed so many but once again this is already long. might do more later

[welcome-to-green-hills]

So first off, I really love your breakdown of Sonic's possible age. Not only did I have a lot of fun reading through it, it was very informative but still very easy to understand, and I was invested the whole time while reading.

Although, your brief mention of the Werehog did get me thinking about something, and it may or may not have inspired me to do some speculation about the possible biology of the form. It's honestly mostly off-topic, other than agreeing that the Werehog is (physiologically) over 17, and it's VERY long. I mean like almost as long as an essay -- I have a habit of overelaborating.

That being said, would you be interested in seeing it?

It's also technically for an AU, but it still applies to the canon/in-game Werehog -- it's just about a breakdown of what might be hormonally going on during Sonic's transformation, and what might genetically cause him to appear the way he does once it's complete. Or at least, my not-a-scientist interpretation of what's possibly going on.

Synth, honey, YES! NO KNOWLEDGE IS WASTED! Share your headcanon with me!❤️✨

[kaiserdingus]

The Return of Classic Sonic - Part 2 - Sonic Generations/Sonic CD

Over the past couple of years, and especially recently with the release of Sonic Mania, we’ve seen a resurgence in media depicting the classic version of Sonic the Hedgehog from the 1990’s. He’s shorter, he’s voiceless, and he represents a simpler time in video games from before voice acting and cinematic cutscenes.

In recent games he’s been offered as an alternative to the modern aesthetic and play-style that’s been the standard since Sonic Adventure. How did we get to this point? How has Sonic changed over the years, and why are there now two Sonics?

In this series I plan to observe the time period in Sonic history where SEGA decided to shake things up and make what was once old new again. This is The Return of Classic Sonic.

Sonic Generations

In April of 2011, after the success of Sonic Colors and lukewarm reception of Sonic 4 Episode I, Sega announced Sonic Generations. A new game made to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise featuring modern Sonic teaming up with classic Sonic on a time traveling adventure where we revisit old levels remixed for both modern and classic playstyles. Sonic 4 might’ve been an easily forgettable snooze fest, but after how great Sonic Colors wound up being there was confidence in Sonic Team again. This was one of the definitive hype moments of the Sonic fandom.

To prove they weren’t bluffing with this game, and perhaps to gauge fan insight, Sega released a playable demo of the game on June 23rd, 2011, aka Sonic’s birthday. The game wouldn’t launch until November, but now fans could spend the next two weeks playing the classic Sonic version of Green Hill Zone. It was obviously a demo of a game still in development, but I knew it was going to be good. Sonic was back, and this time no werehogs or swords or any gimmick.

For Sonic Unleashed, the excuse as to why they forced the player to become the slow, clunky werehog for several 20 minute levels was to make the game longer, since the 2D day stages took a long time to produce. They ditched that idea in Sonic Colors by replacing the werehog with shorter stages in-between longer stages. For Generations, they made optional missions for each stage. Classic Sonic could be argued as filler, as his stages wouldn’t need to be as complicated as Modern Sonic. That could be a solid argument for Sonic Forces (which we’ll talk about later), but I feel that Classic Sonic felt important to Generations rather than something shamelessly tacked on.

Generations was released in November of 2011 and it was amazing. Finally, a Sonic the Hedgehog game that felt like it was prepared with love and care. It was a love letter to the series, as well as to the fans. At least, that’s how it was marketed.

Time and age have made me cynical, and I admit I was excited as hell for Sonic Generations when it was announced up to its release. I played it, I loved it, I still revisit it every year. But now I can safely admit that the game was not perfect.

The biggest argument, which nobody would’ve really picked up on if it wasn’t for Sonic 4, is Classic Sonic’s physics. Sonic 4’s god awful physics have made fans keen to pay attention to how every Sonic game plays now, and Generations definitely has better classic physics than Sonic 4, but it still doesn’t come close to the feeling of momentum you experience when playing the classic games. Sonic Team’s excuse is that they were building Classic Sonic off of the ground work they had for Modern Sonic, and so they couldn’t implement exact Genesis physics. Either way, the level design and less-than-stellar physics keep me from proclaiming this as the second coming of Sonic.

Except, in a way, it was. The game was released almost a year after Sonic 4 Episode I and was able to make us forget all about it. Sega re-established Classic Sonic as part of the Sonic franchise as a separate character all his own. Though the producers said Generations was simply a one-time thing, and they warned there would be another reboot of Sonic in the near future (cough Sonic Boom), they still showed the fans they were listening. We’d been asking them for years to bring back Classic Sonic in some form or another, and they did it in a way that showed they cared. 

The Classic Sonic shown in Generations, through his design, to his animations, to his lack-of-voice and pantomiming, Sonic Team have crafted a loving interpretation of a character that has had more interpretations than most video game characters. Classic Sonic’s levels were charming. The one’s from the Genesis games were nice to see again in 3D, while the classic variations of Modern Sonic’s levels were a lot of fun.

Generations is probably my favorite Modern Sonic game, as they’ve tweaked some ideas and mechanics from Unleashed and Colors. Of all the “boost” games, this version of Modern Sonic is probably the most fun to control with the best levels. The key to good Modern Sonic gameplay is cinematic levels that make you feel like you’re running through a movie, which can easily be said about Chemical Plant and City Escape.

The boss fights in this game are probably the weakest of the series. Classic Sonic gets a cool re-imagining of the Death Egg Robot from Sonic 2, as well as the race against Metal Sonic from Sonic CD. Modern Sonic, on the other hand, gets Shadow and Silver as mid-bosses, and Perfect Chaos from Sonic Adventure and Egg Dragoon from Sonic Unleashed as area bosses.

The final boss features both Sonics going super before flailing wildly at some wild Eggman creation. For a series famed for its epic boss fights, this was a little disappointing. Boss fights aside, the game itself is really fun, especially for longtime fans of Sonic the Hedgehog.

Sonic CD (2011)

For years fans had wished that Sega would offer a proper release of Sonic CD on a modern console. Unlike the widely re-released Genesis titles, Sonic CD was only ported twice - once to PC, which in turn was ported to the Gamecube and PS2 by way of Sonic Gems Collection. The PC version was good, it even had a higher resolution version of the opening animation, but it still only had the base regional soundtrack with no option to switch to the alternative soundtrack.

In 2009, game developer and Sonic fan Christian Whitehead created a proof-of-concept demo of Sonic CD running on an iPod Touch. This wasn’t a port or emulation, but rather a complete remake of the original game in Whitehead’s new proprietary engine - the Retro Engine. Sega ignored his proposal at first, but once the Sonic fan community caught wind of this remake there was high demand to see it through.

The perfect way to close a successful 20th anniversary, especially after the release of the highly anticipated Sonic Generations, was the re-release of Sonic CD for modern devices. Whitehead’s remake of Sonic CD finally saw the light of day and it immediately stood out. Previous Sega re-releases were poorly done emulations with next to no enhancements, but Sonic CD was loaded with enhancements.

Knowing how Sonic games work like the back of his hand, Whitehead crafted an engine that could successfully recreate the gameplay of classic Sonic games, but also has optional modern features such as full 1080p or 4K HD, smooth 60 frames per second animation, and secrets such as Tails being a fully playable character.

Sonic CD plays exactly as it did 25 years ago, except now there are a few extras. As I mentioned before, Tails is a fully playable character who carries over his moves from Sonic 3. You can unlock Tails by completing the game once with Sonic. There’s also an option to switch between the US soundtrack and the original Japanese soundtrack. One neat little bonus was the option to switch between the Sonic 2 version of the Spin Dash, or stay with Sonic CD’s less… animated version.

Whitehead also hid some more secrets within his enhanced remake of Sonic CD. A mock-up image of a proposed new level called Desert Dazzle was found within the game, as well as a new true final boss called Final Fever. A combination of lack of time and budgetary concerns, as well as the possibility of trying to respect the original game, may have caused these new elements to be scrapped.

Those scrapped levels would eventually lead the fans to speculate about more potential collaborations between Whitehead and Sega. Maybe they would have Whitehead use his Retro Engine to remake obscure games like Knuckles’ Chaotix or SegaSonic the Hedgehog. Its possible they could have him remake the Genesis games for similar releases, or even games from other franchises like Ristar. The biggest pipe dream of them all, though, was Sega hiring Whitehead to make a new, original Sonic game in the classic Sega Genesis style.

Where to Buy

Sonic Generations (PS3, Xbox 360, PC, 3DS)

Sonic CD (Android, PC)

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