#honestly man FUCK Sega

[clockwise-works]

Sega Forever is actually such a fucking scam on God. For those who don't know, back in the day around 2011 they released Sonic CD on mobile, and then Sonic 1 and 2 in 2015ish. These were paid purchases, about 2-3 bucks each. Apparently, a few years back they rolled out this Sega Forever rebrand, which made all the games free!!! ...with ads. Now the games HAVE to have an internet connection at all times, and will play ads at literally every moment they can. Start the game? Ad. Died? Ad. Game over? Ad. Beat a level? Ad. Fucking PAUSE? Ad. You gets ads BEFORE EVEN STARTING THE DAMN GAME.

But hey! You can pay to remove the ads! And even better, if you owned the paid version before Sega Forever, you can reinstate your original version! Horay! Simple navigate to the Google Play button at the top button, sign into the account you made the purchase on, and then your good to go! So I boot up Sonic 2 to do just that.

"Unable to connect to Google Play Services"

FUCK.

Ok so I mess around with my Google Play account. Clear my cache, my data, sign out, sign in, all the works. ...it doesn't work.

...OK, that's odd. Luckily, I had bought Sonic 1, CD, 4 ep.1 and 2 back in the day, lemme just test those too.

"Unable to connect to Google Play Services"

So now I'm lost. EVERY Sega Forever game having the same issue? OK, let me download some other paid game I bought years back and see if it connects to Google Play. So I'm scrolling and scrolling, looking for a game I've bought that was also still available. And after some time I find two! So two quick installs later and I boot them up...

Connects without any issue. OK, so it's a Sega issue. And at this point, I'm giving up. The whole injecting ads into 30 year old games to the degree they did is already bad, but it not even functioning properly?!?! This is a fucking scam, I can SEE them in my purchase history!

[56childreninatrenchcoat]

justice for sonic 06

[httpsserene]

𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐨𝐰𝐧 - 𝐥𝐬. 𝟏𝟖 | 𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐨𝐫 𝟒𝟎𝟒: 𝐏𝐍𝐅 |

𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐨𝐫 𝟒𝟎𝟒: 𝐩𝐥𝐨𝐭 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝 - 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐞

summary: after all of the trials, tribulations, and failed relationships of your life, you deserve your happy ending. content warning: soft launch and hard launch. sibling dynamics (bullying). reader's mom. puns. happily ever after. elden-ring dlc spoilers! (ik it came out very recently but we’re pretending it’s older in this universe). profanity. a couple suggestive lines. attempt at humor. alcohol (reader gets drunk on nye). pairing: lance stroll x fem!black!reader

from serene: the insane amount of work i did to make fake clips of a twitch stream…there’s most definitely an easier way to do it. unrelated: i did not think a lewham win was in the cards this year, but i'm so fucking happy that he did win silverstone! of any race, i'm glad it was that one. finishing up toasty part two today, so expect it to drop tomorrow or the day after that! and most importantly, enjoy this final installment of error 404: plot not found xxx

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twitter • ynplays • december 27th

instagram • ynfanaccount • december 27th

liked by lancestroll, user35, user12, and 11,376 others

ynfanaccount: the three most popular clips from yn's twitch stream today! can you see a theme?

tagged ynplays

view comments

user1: lance liked this!!!

➥ user2: do you think he watched the stream :(

➥ user3: girl. i think he watched IRL. that was definitely a man's voice in the third clip! you can kinda hear him at the very start!

user4: don't know what's worse: yn lying to us about having a date for nye or yn gaslighting us into believing that was her sister smh

➥ yoursister: i'm not even at her house rn 🤔

➥ ynplays: whaTCHU OUT HERE BEING MESSY FOR??!

➥ user4: exposed by your own sister

➥ user5: L + ratio

➥ user6: ynnnnnnn who was thatttttttt

user7: so we can all agree that she was talking to lance in that last clip :o

➥ user8: um no. he's still in canada. yn seems like the type to have already moved on to a different man 🙄🥱

➥ user9: who the fuck are you? you must be new around here if you're deciding to talk crazy.

➥ user10: and how TF do you know that lance is still in canada? r u stalking him or smth? last clip, turn up your volume, clear as day you can hear yn almost say his name

➥ user11: worst take i've heard so far @/user8 delete your account 🤡🤡🤡

igstory • ynplays uploaded!

[caption1; when he gifts you flowers just because >>>>] [caption2; wild baby sega posing pretty in the snow 🥺]

yourbestie: answer my fucking facetime neOWW YOU WHORE

yourfriend1: "he" as in lance stroll, the f1 driver that flew all the way from canada to see you and prove that a long distance relationship with him is worth it and he also begged for you to cuddle him live on your twitch stream, gifted you flowers just because? ynplays: he *allegedly begged for me to cuddle him. you couldn't really hear it on the stream 🤓☝🏽 youfriend1: OMG ITS ACTUALLY HM INN YOUR HOUSE U LYING SNAKE yourfriend1: oh your sister is going to kill you rip 😔

yourfriend2: oh wow lance...i didn't expect him to be a returning love interest at all (sarcasm) yourfriend2: put my niece on the phone 🥱 ynplays: sega is not your niece ynfriend2: PUT MY FUR-NIECE ON THE PHONE BEFORE I STEAL HER 👺

yoursister: omw. ynplays: m not opening the door yoursister: okay? lance will open it for me ynplays: not if he doesn't want me to die he won't ynsister: if he wants to live, he will. also you gave me a key ✨

lilymhe: can't wait to see you in the paddock next year 😘 ynplays: wtf. you know who i am😨 lilymhe: alex gossips VERY loudly with george liymhe: also i love the unedited skincare & makeup videos you make, they feel like girlhood honestly ynplays: going to faint rq brb

instagram • lancestroll • dec28th • where i'm supposed to be ⚑

liked by estebanocon, chloestroll, ynbestie, and 675,432 others

lancestroll: reconnecting

view comments

estebanocon: seems better 😁

➥ lancestroll: yes you were right okay thank you

➥ user12: right about what?

➥ user13: think it's a refrence to esteban's reply on lance's previous post!

fernandoalonso: that pizza looks mid.

➥ lancestroll: what

➥ user14: IJBOL 😂😂😂

➥ user15: it feels like i just heard my parents using slang

➥ user16: that's my favorite rookie 🙂‍↕️

user17: okay yn's best friend liked!

➥ user18: soft launch radar: SCREAMING 🔊🎚️

➥ user19: does this count as a sl? it's more like a deluxe edition to an album

➥ user20: it's giving album repackaging

➥ user18: i think it's cute that he's still doing a sl !! i'm just happy they're getting back together 😌

user21: LANCE the bouquet you gifted her was sooo pretty!

➥ user22: my boyfriend has to step the fuck up (the location on this too 😭😭😭)

➥ user23: bro there's no conformation he even gave her those 😒

➥ user24: are you blind 🤨? you need to get your eyes checked fr @/user23

➥ user21: ain't it funny? how the non-believers have fallen so low into their delusion...

twitter • december 28th

instagram • ynplays • dec 30th • happy ⚑

liked by estebanocon, lilymhe, yoursister, and 179,674 others

ynplays: yes, i have a date for my new year's party: it's the 31st! 🥳🥳🥳

view comments

alexandrasaintmleux: i can treat you better than him 😩

➥ lilymhe: she's mine 😡

➥ ynplays: but pookies :( don't fight

➥ alexandrasaintmleux: okay kitten whiskers :(

➥ lilymhe: hmph. as long as you don't forget that you were daddy's first 😤

➥ user25: if i didn't know the shrek reference i'd be calling the cops

yoursister: you will send that poor man to an early grave

➥ yoursister: at least you're raising his blood pressure and not mine

➥ yourbestie: i'm just happy i'm not getting the video game rage texts anymore

➥ ynplays: haters (i love you both)

➥ yoursister: it takes the same amount of energy to love or or hate and i will always chose hate when it's you (i love you more)

➥ yourbestie: it's a consequence of cutting my hair off when we were three (ditch your man so we can have a sleepover please)

user26: lame ass dad joke in the caption

➥ ynplays: i thought it was funny 😕

➥ yourfriend1: it wasn't 👎🏽

➥ yourfriend2: should've asked the gc b4 you posted 🤷‍♀️

user27: so we all just ignoring her asking him for nudes…

➥ user28: and what about it???

➥ user29: you're just mad you don't have anybody to send you smth naughty

➥ user30: you notice how he didn't say no tho 👀👀

user31: nonchalant boyfriend core

➥ user32: nonchalant boyfriend & gamer girlfriend >>>

➥ user33: like, he just always in his own world, he rly quiet fr unless he know u

➥ user34: he funny asl tho if he know u type shit

user35: adding this to my lance stroll x reader fic

➥ user36: you couldn't WATERBOARD this info out of me 😭

➥ user37: lance stroll boyfriend aesthetic

➥ user38: ...aye dm a link to that fic LOL ☠️☠️☠️

igstory • ynplays uploaded!

[caption; ui i Lov myy bfrikenddd!!!?! happy new yrsss, ocme give me a KISS labbceyyyy]

lancestroll: i leave you with your sister for 2 seconds to use the bathroom lancestroll: you're super adorable when you're drunk lancestroll: i'll get you some water and come give you a kiss mon coeur lancestroll: you're so pretty

user39: something tells me you will not be able to stream tomorrow

user40: PUT THAT DOWN !!! ts is bigger than your HEAD GIRL

instagram • lancestroll and ynplays • january 1st • my heart ⚑

liked by lewishamilton, landonorris, twitch, astonmartinf1 and 3,492,125 others

lancestroll and ynplays: you guys haven't seen us together since last year 🤪😅

view comments

📌 lancestroll: yn's still passed out from last night but she wanted me to tell you guys that she will still be streaming tonight

➥ lancestroll: (you didn't hear this from me but she is definitely not going to be able to 🫥)

➥ user41: LMAO tell her to rest well

➥ user42: make sure she drinks lots and lots of water

➥ user43: thank u for the update messenger bf lance!!!

lewishamilton: happy it worked out for you man

➥ lancestroll: me too 😁

➥ user44: ik lewis mad as hell he didn't find yn before lance LMAOO 😭😭😭

twitch: now when are we seeing you two play overcooked on stream?

➥ lancestroll: she gets mad at me in animal crossing so i don't think it'll be in my best interests to play overcooked with her

➥ user45: yeah that game tears marriages apart

nhl: can't wait to see you guys rink side together - admin

➥ user46: nhl admin is one of us

yourfriend1: WHAT A HAPPY NEW YEAR 🙌🏽🙌🏽🙌🏽

➥ yourbestie: glad to start the year knowing i will NEVER have to sit through another vacation fling ever again

➥ yoursister: well,,,what if i want to find love on vacay?

➥ yourfriend1: NO

➥ yourfriend2: UH UH

➥ yourbestie: H-H-HELL NAW ❌❌❌‼️‼️

user47: i love when soft launches only last for a few days

user48: i saw this and smiled like i had anything to do with them getting together

➥ user49: nodded my head like i know them personally 😌

instagram • ynplays • january 1st • where love grows ⚑

liked by lancestroll, nhl, estebanocon, lewishamilton and 2,582,991 others

ynplays: yeah yeah yeah stream is cancelled tn (my head is about to combust) to make up for it, canada vlog is premiering tonight 💁🏾‍♀️

tagged lancestroll, segagenesisthedawg

view comments

lancestroll: do i get vip on twitch yet?

➥ ynplays: i'll teach you how to mod too

➥ user50: modern day love story 👩🏾‍❤️‍💋‍👨🏻

➥ user51: discord mod and kitten ts

➥ ynplays: 🤢🤢🤮🤮

lilymhe: i got early access to this video, we are NOT the same xxx

➥ alexandrasaintmleux: i got it too, so we are the same x

➥ user52: damn they really tussling over yn???

➥ user53: can't blame them, i would do the same 💆🏾‍♀️

yourbestie: i feel like i should've gotten more screen time in this vid 🤔

➥ yourfriend1: speak on it bc when she wasn't with lance she was with us being annoying asl🥴

➥ yourfriend2: are we losing the friend group leader to a man? never thought she'd fall so far from grace...

➥ ynplays: friend group leader is CRAZY n y'all just happy to use me for clout huh 😤

yoursister: didn't realize we were returning to clickbait storytime yt era

➥ yoursister: sucks to see how unreletable you've become 😔

➥ ynplays: im going home and stealing ALL my clothes back

➥ yoursister: i misspoke, i apologize for my words *plays ukulele*

➥ user54: believe it or not this is love 🤓

yourmom: lance, thank you for giving my daughter the love and care she deserves x

➥ ynplays: mom this is my post???

➥ lancestroll: of course ma'am. i'll love her tirelessly

➥ ynplays: i'll love you endlessly baby 🥹

user55: HAPPY NEW YEAR YNNNNN

➥ ynplays: thank you my love! i wish you the best year everrrr

➥ user56: happy new year yn stans we up haters stay down

user57: i didn't think we'd get a vlog!!! ilysm ynnnn

➥ user58: best content creator out rn hand down

© httpsserene2024

[areyouafraid]

My post about whether or not i think eggman would smoke

sega robotnik: honestly split here. i could see the old-timey classic eggman that was based on roosevelt having a smoke once in a while. as for post-adventure robotnik im not sure if a. he would smoke because cigarette smoke is a pollutant and he fucking hates the environment or b. he would be vehemently straight edge because he's a Man of Science and scared of side effects

aosth robotnik: aosth could cut to a scene of robotnik doing a line of coke and i wouldnt think it was out of character. not only do i think aosth robotnik would smoke i think he would have multiple cigarettes in his mouth at once like that old tf2 meme

satam / underground robotnik: he would only smoke like cartoonishly large cigars he would make snively roll them and he would intentionally blow smoke at him constantly

[disabled-battlekukku]

If you were given the chance to write for a new Sonic, featuring the return of the kuku empire, what would you write? Where would you add world building and who of the main cast, and others, would you feature in it?

SLAMS TABLE. BIG BREATH.

(Biiiiiig thread comin' ahead!)

First of all, if Sega had ever had the balls to bring the Kukku Empire back, it would probably be a Mania-inspired game. And if it did, I think it would have the same, if not very similar plot points and ideas to it.

Old and new stages, with the old ones being from Game Gear and Master System games (y'know, Tails' home console!). Instead of focusing on speed, it would be much more on the exploration aspect, as that was also a great aspect of those. Maybe focus more on the "high flying" aspect. It would be interesting to see how more grounded characters like Sonic and Mighty would deal in this sort of environment.

If we REALLY pushed our buttons farther, the Witchcarters would be there as well, although probably as mini-bosses. Sega seems to favor them anyway. Limit a little of Eggman's appearance, though. Maybe let him cameo at an ending cutscene.

For story? I don't think the Kukkus would be that interested in pursuing the Chaos Emeralds after that, erm, first attempt, hehe. Maybe the Warp Topaz to keep the "modern-trinket-goes-to-classic-world" gimmick they did with the Phantom Ruby. If not, then either the Chaos Rings or Time Stones! Keep the same old shit of Speedy as the "Metal Sonic" of the game and Great Battle Kukku as the typical final boss.

If I was in COMPLETE charge?

I probably wouldn't take it. I can't code a game, hehe.

In all seriousness, I'd probably try some things that the fans wouldn't like it all that much. After all, I love it when Sega tries to experiment and go a bit off the rails with Sonic gameplay (Tails Adventure and Knuckles' Chaotix are my favorite games, after all!)

Sticking to what I said earlier, exploration is kind of an important aspect of Tails Adventure, and I'd proooobably bring back some classic trinket or thingamajig, like the previously mentioned Chaos Rings.

One thing that CERTAINLY wouldn't make the fans happy, judging that I was a massive Pokemon gen 5 fan, is that I'd probably limit gameplay to only Tails and Speedy. Make it a godamn Sonic Adventure 2/Riders split story thingie! And since Sonic Frontiers happens to have Tails implying to be going on an adventure of his own, maybe the game would happen right after that!

For a setting, I don't really know what I would put it. Probably an entirely new setting, as Flicky's Island was already taken by the Witchcarters in the IDW comics! A new place that the Kukkus decided to conquer, but their luck is just used to attract foxes, huh.

While I said that I'd limit main gameplay to Tails and Speedy, there could be a Sonic 06 thing and find others of Tails' buddies to play as. I'd prefer the child characters like Cream, Charmy, and maaaybe Ray since they all seem to focus on flight anyway. For Speedy? Fuck it we ball, introduce new characters! Give my mans some friends, godamnit!

I'd pull a Rush Adventure, where we would be focused on finding resources and building things to maneauver through the place, kind of replacing the need for a shop like most modern overworld Sonic games have.

Honestly, if I had to say everything I'd think for a Sonic game (or a Tails game, as it seems to be getting like here), we would be here for HOURS!

[rabbithaver]

ok i originally just deleted this ask when i got it but i HAVE to post it now because like... fucking look at it. it's the funniest thing i've ever seen.

"people who are spiritually white women" WHAT DOES THAT MEAN. PLEASE EXPLAIN. HOW DOES ONE BE "SPIRITUALLY A WHITE WOMAN"??? LIKE?? what kind of White Woman Wonder Bread statement...? do you think there is something inherently wrong with being a woman? bro. it's not that deep. genuinely this is hilarious, and i think it's my favorite anon i've ever received

and like. to address the Ian thing, because i feel like i should, given that i like the man's work and have happily paid him for his time via the BumbleKast:

there are absolutely valid reasons to critique Ian Flynn's work! i do think he makes Silver a little bit too soft in IDW, but like... it honestly does not bother me that much. because i interpret Silver's softness as a choice. Silver grew up in a dangerous environment, yeah, this is true. he has absolutely seen the worst of humanity, and it's because he's seen the worst of humanity that he makes the choice to be kind and gentle and sweet with people he loves. he has seen brutality, he has seen violence, he has seen hell, and it hasn't let it change him. in the face of indescribable horrors, he chooses to be something different. i think that's powerful! i think it's neat! if you disagree, that's totally fine! you are allowed to have a different interpretation of the character than me. :)

as for the Archie thing... eh? i admit i haven't read enough Archie to fully have an opinion, but i loved seeing Silver in Preboot. i think Archie's Silver is a lot more rough-around-the-edges than IDW's, but i think that's more of an indication of the writing direction that SEGA has given as well as the fact that IDW stories tend to have more downtime than Archie did. but again, just my opinion!

anyway yeah i'm not even mad this was just really fucking funny to me and i haven't been able to stop laughing about it

[goron-king-darunia]

Annon-Guy: What do you think of the Sonic Adventure 2 Songs?

All of them are bops. Sonic's theme takes the original lyrics, bumps them up to fit a faster paced and more upbeat song. Improves upon the original in every way. The original from Sonic Adventure is already a 9 out of 10, but this pushes it up to a 10/10, and the opening whistle sound is iconic, honestly. Tails' theme is, musically, better than the original. The arrangement fits with Tails' character growth as he becomes more capable and confident, even though he botches the main mission at the end and almost gets Sonic killed because, well, he's an 8 year old kid. Or he used to be. Sega seems to be scrubbing up the lore and trying to make his age ambiguous now which I literally just found out about because I couldn't remember whether he was 6 or 8 or 10 and apparently he's been depicted as young as 4 and a half in some materials which is wild. Like, I love the child genius archetype in fiction but dear god 4 is definitely too young. If he wants to be meddling with machines that can crush his little bones in his own house I guess that's fine but running around and destroying Eggman with Sonic at age 4 is insane. Little buddy you should be sipping some juice and making sand castles. Sonic's already too young to be fighting villains like Eggman as a teen (though to be fair I aged wildly out of the target demographic so EVERYONE in that series except maybe Eggman and Shadow are too young to be doing what they're doing! XD) Tails fucking up a grown man at age 4 is just insane to think about. Like yes yes child genius but FFS, 4 is just a baby. And they did it again with Cream and Cheese later. I understand that in a lot of lore it's all the animals against Eggman because he's literally a terrorist and they have no choice but come on, when you can walk around station square and see grown adults who aren't doing jack shit to stop Eggman, it should not fall to fucking prepubescent kids to fight back. AUGH!) Rant aside, Tails' theme also increases the pep as Sonic's new arrangement does, but the flaw is that the lyrics don't flow as well. The chorus absolutely cranks it up to 20/10. That slow and yearning "I want to fly high" is absolutely killer. The first verse absolutely bops too. But when it gets to later verses, the lyrics fall apart and just don't fit the rhythm. Also, they lose out on the absolutely killer bit of "there's things that only I can do, No one's Alone!" from the first arrangement. Now it's just smushed together into some unrecognizeable word salad due to trying to fit the original lyrics in an arrangement where they don't vibe well. I think it would be possible to take the best parts of both arrangements and make a 12/10 song, but as it stands, they're both about equally good at 8/10.

Knuckles' theme improves. The softer voice for the rap fits much better with the lyrical vocals they ported over as a backdrop from the first arrangement, but the sound mixing is poor so that it's difficult to parse the lyrics if you don't already know them. But then again maybe that's just my auditory processing disorder. That said, I do think the contrast of the rougher rap and the softer vocals being kept separate in the original was thematically on-point. If they had kept the rap in the new arrangement distinct from the vocals they took from the original and kept it as a refrain between verses, it would be absolute fire. Still an improvement. The scratching lends a hip-hop quality to it that I definitely jive with. Absolute fire. Original was a decent 7/10, the new version manages an 8.5 out of 10. If the sound mixing was a little better and they kept the original vocals as a refrain, I think it could be a 9.5 out of 10. Shadow's theme is, sadly, the weakest to me. It absolutely fits his character, but the vocal performance is weak. Say what you will about the game "Shadow the Hedgehog" but that had absolutely baller themes for Shadow and the lyrics absolutely added to it. I understand that theoretically Shadow would have actually permanently died at the end of SA2, and they only brought him back because he was insanely popular. So setting him apart with the harsher techno-rock-metal soundtrack where the lyrics aren't the focus sets him up as an intimidating foil to Sonic's more cheerful and upbeat personality and the contrasting themes absolutely reflect that. But I feel like they could have done a little more to reflect Shadow's ultimate conflict of realizing that revenge doesn't change anything and that Maria wouldn't have wanted him to destroy the world for her. Honestly I feel the same about Richter's theme from DotNW but in a different direction. While Richter's theme does try to telegraph his more complicated feelings and motives by setting up that harsh, rhythmic bass line and bringing in the sweeter violin, it sounds too dissonant to me. I think they could have had more synergy. Shadow's theme is a bit of the opposite. I think there could have been more contrast. Honestly the lyrics come in so late and so low that I forget this song even has lyrics. 8/10. I prefer more of the themes from the Shadow the Hedgehog game.

Eggman's theme is absolute fire. No notes. Massive improvement from the first game. This song has everything. The mechanical noises reminding you of who he is, Ivo Robotnik, and how that ties into the grand scheme of things. The self-aggrandizing lyrics. The droning rhythmic synth track that just oozes "factory assembly line" energy. It sounds cool but intimidating, with just an edge of "how fucking goofy, who does this guy think he is?!" While I absolutely adore the toothless joke villain Eggman gets set up to be in a lot of the newer stuff, namely the Sonic Boom series and games, I love this intersection where Eggman has just enough over-the-top zazz to make you raise an eyebrow. It sits right on the precipice of "either this guy really knows what he's doing and is so confident about it, he doesn't care if he looks goofy doing it or he's an ABSOLUTE idiot who just happens to fail upward." And it's right in that sweet spot where he can be the butt of the joke while also being intimidating. Absolute peak of both camp villain and cartoonishly evil while having just enough power and wits to be a genuine threat. The main chorus literally begins with "I am the Eggman" which, in spite of all odds, makes the name that Sonic gave him as an insult out to be a genuinely threatening moniker. As if to proclaim, yes, go ahead, think of me as a joke. Underestimate me. It won't matter in the end. He is not just Eggman. He is THE Eggman. The one and only. And he's going to build his empire over the bulldozed remains of your city whether you put respect on that name or not. And his theme song encapsulates all that while being a genuine bop. 100/10. Genuinely one of the best themes ever written for the Sonic Franchise.

And that leaves us with Rouge. And for a new character BOY OH BOY, did they hit it OUT OF THE PARK with her theme. That soft jazz, the soft, sultry vocals that ramp up into confident high heady notes. Absolute banger. Tells us everything we need to know about Rouge as a character. A spy, a theif, a sneak, and a Woman with the uppercase W. She knows who she is, she knows what she wants, and she will use everything to get it. Overtly sexualized, but in a way I don't necessarily mind, even if it's right on the cusp of being inappropriate for a game meant to be played by kids. She was a lot of young mens' (and young womens') sexual awakening for a reason. While noting in the canon of the game shows her actively using her body in a sexual way to get what she wants, I don't think it's inaccurate to extrapolate from her theme and her way of speaking and walking that she absolutely would if this was a game for Adults. The parallels to Catwoman are not an accident. And her theme song does a masterful job of indicating all that without actually treading into inappropriate territory. Even Wild Canyon's theme explicitly references her as an object of desire and that Knuckles being that shy guy that doesn't know how to deal with pretty women is absolutely affected by her. I think part of the reason it's easy to forgive Rouge being sexualized is because she's an active, intelligent character who is at all times, using the people around her. She is not some sexy lamp that you can upskirt for sick thrills whom the narrative has to repeatedly assure us "don't worry, this isn't skeevy, she definitely likes it, we promise." This is a woman with steel-toed high heels that breaks into bank vaults and could kill the average man with a single kick. She's hot, she knows she's hot, and she uses that to her advantage to wriggle into positions of power and advantage. And she's fine with being that way. Her arc isn't about some condescending narrative about how she shouldn't have to behave that way. If anything her main arc is that she's absolutely stellar being exactly as she is and provides valuable skills to the team to help save the world. She's a stereotype, but not actually one that I mind. Because she's not just a sexy woman who loves money and jewels and has nothing else to her. I would classify her as a witch archetype despite not having supernatural powers other than sensing gems, which is a gimmick Knuckles also has and is never explained as anything other than a game mechanic. She has power and talent in her own right and while she is a direct foil to Knuckles and works alongside Eggman and Shadow, she isn't defined solely by how she relates to the men that surround her. She's an absolute beast and I love her. One of my favorite Sonic Characters of all time. Even with her damsel in distress moments, I never got the sense that she was incapable. Just overconfident. But not in a "LOL, how stupid of a woman to think she can tangle with the big boys." but "She is literally walking among titans, she's bound to trip up a little." The only time it felt forced was in her final confrontation with Knuckles where she falls off a beam. I understand the idea was probably "she's tired from fighting and can't right herself immediately, which is the reason she fell in the first place." so it's ambiguous whether she could have saved herself, despite having wings. But even if all the nitpickers are actually correct and she was never in danger, Knuckles reaching out to save her is more about the kind of person he is than the kind of person Rouge is. That said, yeah, her theme is a fucking banger. Second best track from the character themes, for real. 20/10 at least. No notes. Absolutely accomplishes the goal of distilling who Rouge is into a single song. Absolute queen.

[antirepurp]

One thing I think Sega has really missed out on is reminding everyone that Shadow is the same age as Sonic. Like, okay, Shadow is more mature because trauma has a way of maturing people but he is still a teen like Sonic. What's more uncomfortable than everyone realising that Sonic is just a kid? Everyone realising that Shadow is just a kid.

G.U.N comes marching into the local hospital because they have reports on having a man down and want to check him out to take him to their military hospital, they search up and down all the different wards in search of him only for a doctor to to lead them to the pediatrics ward were they see Shadow sitting in a brightly coloured room with a plastic mobile over him and a pair of neon coloured cast on an arm and leg. He looks so out of place but also so small in that bed.

i think a lot of why that hasn't gotten highlighted recently is because shadow just. hasn't been in a lot of games after 06. he was only in forces and that game is already a bit of mixed bag in many ways so it's hard for me to say anything concrete on shadow's portrayal there especially when it's not fresh on my mind. on the contrary i think shadow 2005 did a really good job at showing shadow as the teen he is, i talked about it before when i was hot on my playthrough that i should resume at some point honestly, and that game does it in ways that remind me of the way RoL did the same with team sonic. shadow acts all edgy to the point it goes a bit over the top the way a teen would do it, he swears excessively like a kid who just learned that saying "fuck" might not get them grounded anymore would, and despite the tone of the game shadow sometimes says some absolutely goofy shit from what seems like nowhere ("this is like taking candy from a baby, which is fine by me!" among others) that often comes across as him trying to make some clever remark that doesn't quite work because his sense of humor is immature and also the amnesia beams probably don't help the cause. i think there's a similar flare to sa2 and heroes, though it's perhaps less in-your-face since there are other characters to focus on, and 06 is an overall a more serious game so naturally it would focus more on the way shadow has grown over the last few games as opposed to highlighting his childishness

i know that the mysterious writing guidelines sega has for these characters have most likely evolved since and i feel like their current stance is to focus on shadow's apparent maturity in comparison to his friends, and i think that's probably fine, it fits in with his position as the resident edgelord anti-hero "im so evil and fucked up but my heart is in the right place and i only hurt people who deserve it and my rival sometimes maybe but not for realsies" type character. i definitely wouldn't mind a good old reality check that hits you like a brick while reminding you that the dark and mysterious hedgehog that enamored you is actually 15 and going through his most emo years

[heroictoonz]

Thoughts on the sonic movies?

SO FUCKING GOOD

I adore the Sonic Movies they do a REALLY good job and retelling a very well known story in a whole new way. I've never been the biggest on the new really weird need companies have to make everything live action, but I have to give the credit where it's due that the Sonic Movies LOOK BEAUTIFUL the animation is so good and like admittedly I never thought the OG Sonic design everyone hated actually looked that bad. He wasn't like overly cute or anything it was like alright ya that's IRL Sonic anyways time to go watch Satam for the millionth time. But I didn't like overly hate it the way other ppl seemed to. But the new one is AWESOME. The Sonic design we ended with looks AMAZING and also it was super cool for them to listen to the audience like that!

The movie original characters are also SO FUN. Obviously I know the inherent copaganda where it lay whether it was intentional or not but Tom RULES. Tom and Maddie are an ADORABLE couple and they are PARENTS to Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles. I love them so much.

Also! The Sega characters are done SO WELL. Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles were so so so perfect. Now I haven't seen the Knuckles series yet but I'm p sure it's out. So I'm only talking about the first two movies but MAN the characterization for these guys is fantastic. Also Eggman was so fun. Like they really made him such a fun villain for the movies.

Also the voice casting is AWESOME. Ben Schwartz is one of my top favorite VAs and I was SO excited when he was first announce for Sonic. And just as I suspected he BLEW IT OUT OF THE FUCKING PARK. Sonic is so perfect for his usual voice casting like Rise Leo, 2017 Dewey, and of course Randy Cunningham. Sonic, especially this version of Sonic, fits PERFECTLY. And of course Colleen O'Shaughnessey did amazing as always. Admittedly, I was kinda disappointed at first when she was announced as Tails. If only because everyone else was getting a new voice cast so then why not Tails? But I wasn't disappointed for long because, as usual, she fucking killed it. Now, admittedly, I had no fucking clue who Idris Elba is before Knuckles and still kinda don't (he is an actor! that's all I got ^^;) but MAN HE DID GREAT!!!! Also the reports that he started reading the fucking Knuckles comics to get in characters?! 1) Hot damn the dedication 2) I'm so sorry for his loss if he spent actual time reading the Ken Penders stuff

And of COURSE I can’t talk about actors without talking about Jim Carrey as fucking Eggman GOD what a choose. I’m convinced that when they were writing the script for Eggman that they wrote it a FOR Carrey I’m really not sure if anyone else coulda done all that. Maybe Tim Curry but also I think Tim Curry and Jack Black can do anything they want every and for always acting wise

I also LOVE the easter eggs from the movies I think thats one of my other favorite parts is how may Sonic details are in the movie and how much the ppl working on them clearly love the franchise so so much

I could probably say so much more but this is so long and I honestly haven't seen them in a hot second lol but MAN they are good fucking movies

[zaddyazula]

gaiden ramble below cut - major, major spoiler warning (for the entire game)

i genuinely feel ill over gaiden but like in a good way. honestly can’t even remember the last time a game made me feel like that. i was having the same giddiness and excitement and pure fun i was having playing 0 which i think is why 0 has now been dethroned as my favourite yakuza game. IT TOOK 8 GAMES but 0 was finally dethroned.

before the list was this (so basically just this time yesterday to 2am this morning):

1 - yakuza 0

2 - yakuza kiwami 2

3 - yakuza kiwami

4 - yakuza 6

5 - yakuza 7/ like a dragon

6 - yakuza 5

7 - yakuza 3

8 - yakuza 4

but now gaiden is top of that list which is crazy. (didn’t include dead souls because i haven’t played it, but i have watched it, so if it was on this list, it would be between 3 and 4).

it was so nice not having turn based combat after 39 hours of 7 like i was hitting combos these fuckers didn’t know existed.

i really liked how it took place at the same time as ichiban’s story, that was really cool and it is so evil of sega for not having kashiwagi being at survive. another thing i found really interesting was how kiryu touched on yumi, kazama and kashiwagi. kashiwagi is mentioned like once in the chotddt akame mission (yumi is also mentioned) and kazama is mentioned in another akame mission. him still having the ring after 24 years is mad, and how that very last scene links in with 8 is cool.

KAZUMAJI 😭😭😭😭😭😭 that entire scene was tragic, i almost started sobbing then, there were tears in my eyes. the entire end of the game was really cool, and the final boss theme was crazyyyyyy. the scenes at the temple were my breaking point though. as soon as taichi started talking to the camera i just fucking lost it. kiryu crying like that broke my heart, and then the picture haruto drew took me out even more. the poor man.

kiryu is just so horribly tragic throughout the entire game. i really missed playing as him, but god almighty in the last two chapters it was just fucking miserable. i thought that i was gonna cry at it, but i didn’t realise how fucking depressing it was gonna get. my heart was breaking for him throughout the game but the last few scenes were traumatic.

i am still not over the ryuji fishing as well. i was desperate for him to come back i love him so much, but no!!!!!! going back to a previous point, i found it really interesting how kiryu spoke about his past life, particularly with ryuji. there is an entire akame mission about looking into leads about ryuji goda turning up, and kiryu’s reaction was very interesting to me.

i feel so horrible for him. he reminds me so much of snake, and that ended painfully enough. i am not looking forward to 8.

also hanawa is nakajima right??? that’s not just me? at first i joked about him looking like the guy from the kingsman but after he said those lines at the end of the game he really looks like nakajima who’s lost a bit of weight.

coming back to this quickly because they were so evil for using amazing grace in the credits. rgg i’m fighting you. you’re really gonna end the (most likely) last ever kiryu game with the same song you started the first ever game with????? 🥊💥🥊💥🥊💥💥 i’m not having that

i think that’s all of my thoughts, for now at least.

[turtlemagnum]

so it turns out that the steam version of the sega genesis classics collection has steam workshop support, where apparently you can just... upload roms, into the official steam workshop, and it just works because at its core it's just an emulator that you paid for the right to play them legally. fucking mario 1 is on here. i can't believe i can play mario 1 on steam without any actual piracy on my end, it's fucking amazing. honestly wish nintendo would release their old games on steam, though frankly i can only see that happening if and when someone like me (or just me) becomes a rich asshole with more money than geoff bombos and buys nintendo just so they can force them to actually make their older fucking games available, like jesus christ nintendo just let me buy mario 1 on steam normally i'd pay at least a dollar for it, probably more like 5 dollars given how that shit tends to get priced. let me buy pokemon red and just put up pokemon bank on steam. just have that shit use the standard steam cloud save infrastructure or something, i don't give a shit man. i wanna play ocarina of time on PC and have my saves be backed up online so i can pick up and play from device to device and never lose progress!!! it would make you guys sososososoososososososoooo much money, and yeah it'd technically make piracy easier but piracy of nintendo games is already piss easy, which is why i DEFINITELY DON'T have hundreds of gigabytes worth of nintendo games on my PC, do NOT sue me i believe copyright infringement is a VILE EVIL and everyone who does it is DEFINITELY GOING TO HELL. my copy of ship of harkinnian uses COMPLETELY LEGALLY DUMPED VERSIONS of ocarina of time, and you can't legally prove otherwise. hey did i mention that i've slept about 2 hours in the past day? like from around 5 to 7 this morning i tried to sleep and woke up and went to mcdonalds because i was so fucking hungry, like god dude i was starving by 5 but mcdonalds only opens at 7 on the inside so i had to wait until then. since then i've essentially been running off of my ADHD meds and the moderate amounts of caffeine i've drunk 2day. like me saying "moderate amounts" isn't me doing a little haha funny misnomer i only drank like two full cups of pop today, once at mcdonalds and once at dinner with my grandparents. side note but i'm glad that i had the sense to look up the actual BDS website and see that mcdonalds either stopped being boycotted or never was in the first place, because apparently they're a lot more selective than social media people about that sorta shit, who'd'a thunk. anyways i'm glad because it's the only food place in the area open that early and what i order is relatively inexpensive, at least by modern fast food standards. i'll never understand people who get mcmuffins with egg when the ones with just the sausage are half the goddamn price and the egg is nasty anyways. like i'm not an egg hater or anything i'm just pretty sure fast food eggs are less so Actual Eggs and moreso solidified sulphur given marginal nutritional value. i xhould Fucking sleep. good nigh.....

[munchboxart]

Hi it's another post of me talking about whatever the fuck I want, this time it's about the Sonic 3 movie and how afraid I am for it

Uhmm every Sonic spoiler ever I guess

Ok so it's gonna be so easy for them to fuck this up and I'm so scared because I am #1 Shadow fan ever (if you know my side account then I have mostly drawn only Shadow there).

The Sonic movie's are pretty simple, especially 2's (I don't remember that much of 1 because I don't care about it), so I'm gonna guess they're gonna simplify Shadows too because he has like 2-3 games about his story.

What I imagine they're going to go with, is that they hit Shadow with the amnesia beam yet again, he's angry and wants to destroy the world because he only remembers Maria (I don't even think they're gonna bring up Maria) and works with Eggman because he manipulates Shadow's amnesia to his own benefit to destroy Sonic. OR he works with GUN or some shit.

It's either that or they do some shit to relate with the stupid Owl side story, I don't know man. To be honest, I think that if they go with the SA2 route and bring up Maria, I don't think they would not bring up Rouge and Omega because that already has so much lore for a simple movie.

If they do bring up Rouge and Omega (honestly maybe just Rouge because I don't know if they give a fuck about Omega nowadays), they might just have them form Team Dark and go against Team Sonic for some reason. Though to be honest, realistically, I'm like, pretty sure Shadow alone can beat Team Sonic because of how inexperienced Sonic is.

Other ways they can fuck up: - Giving Shadow the fucking emo smoker voice like in Boom - Taking the Shadow 05 route and giving him a GUN (this would be so funny, though) - Imagine they play P!ATD music for Shadow instead of any Crush 40 song ever (I am so scared) - Making him the edgelord that everyone hates oh my god please -TAKING THE SONIC X ROUTE AND MAKING EVERYONE THINK THAT SHADOW IS SONIC OH MY GOD I FORGOT ABOUT THAT

In conclusion: if some shoe company doesn't make another collaboration with Sonic but make Shadow's jet shoes something will happen OR a massive ass Shadow the Hedgehog plushie that's way bigger than 20 INCHES

Real conclusion: I am fucking terrified because Shadow is one of the characters Sega fucks up with the most. And considering how watered down the past 2 movies are to make them normal for the general audience. God help me.

[arcplaysgames]

Okay before adachi, a quick summary of Slinks

COMPLETED: AEON

I admittedly like Marie's arc a lot, though it does suffer from feeling very inorganic, being added after the fact in Golden. But given the point of her, that almost suits her? She is the constant spare, she exists in a room that lives in the subconscious mind, she has no memories of before. Like, of course she has a strangeness to her, like a hanger-on to creation.

I am still unsure who the fuck she is since it wasn't revealed in her max scene, but she feels like a by-product of creation, like the leftovers of some alchemic process that was needful and necessary, and has the baggage of not having been part of that necessity, if that makes sense?

Anyway, her resolution is realizing she is making memories, so even if she started with nothing, she is far from that now. Good for her! Thanks for the comb. I'm gonna donate it to a cultural museum.

ONGOING: FORTUNE

Over in Naoto's link, this Phantom Thief person keeps stealing stuff from the Shirogane Estate and planting the items to be found around Inaba.

Because, yanno, it's probably Naoto's grandfather who is trying to get them to reconnect to the passion of their youth and remind him that he's allowed to be a child still. I mean, if its not that, I will be fucking stunned.

Naoto's link is surprising me in how.... meh it is. I was really geared up to either be really angry or really relieved (like I was with Kanji's) but Naoto is giving me nothing! He's way more interesting in the main scenario, honestly, why he gets to do stuff.

But maybe there will be an upcoming turn. Admittedly, I think the entire idea of Naoto's arc revolving about this little sideplot is just Meh. I'll try to finish it out but who knows.

COMPLETE: SUN

Oh my GODDDD I almost ended up dating her just because THIS CHOICE was so fucking brutal. Like, yanno? Power to her, doing her confession in such a powerful way. "Either stay and be my boyfriend or please leave," I have tremendous respect for that kind of ultimatum. No nonsense.

BUT MAN, OOF, IT HURT!!!!

I haven't been recapping her because I was waiting for it to take a turn and become great, but this is a weak Sun route imo. I dunno if anything is going to beat the really deep, dark nihilistic take on the Sun from P3P, like that shit was amazing.

Anyway, good luck to Yumi, I think she should go into politics.

ONGOING: STRENGTH

for real i only did some strength bc I had more days to burn before Dec 22 and there was NO ONE ELSE AVAILABLE to hang out with, so I figured whatever I'll take the juice for fusion

but oh my god Strength is so fuck boring. Koromaru was a dog who could not talk and was so much more compelling than the sports boys. i am soooo booooooooored. i miss Rio.

Some more fun bits:

NAOTO'S ASSIST MOVE IS A FUCKING DRIVE-BY SHOOTING WITH A SEMI-AUTO ON HIS FUCKING BIKE WITH THE LIL BASKET IN FRONT I'M CRYING

Naoto is amazing, shame their Slink sucks

This outfit for Kanji feels like a reference I'm not getting, is it a Yakuza thing? That's also published by SEGA.

It's not his cutest outfit tho so I put him back in Gekkoukan. HEY ALSO, I HAVE THE GEKKOUKAN UNIFORMS FOR THE BOYS BUT I CAN'T GET THEM FOR THE GIRLS? I talked to Kashiwagi after the December tests and no luck. 8C 8C I wanna see them in in Gekkou.....

also i love kanji, did i mention that? have i perhaps mentioned that i love kanji? also that yukiko is best girl? i'm just wondering if that came up.

I GOT THE SPACE BUNNY!

also dang satan ur tiddies

[dany36]

now that i've S-ranked every stage in the DLC and also completed the map, just have some final junk thoughts from the sonic frontiers dlc (plus me raving some more about the music) before i move on to another game :)

i know i mentioned that playing as amy is the best out of the new playable characters, and i still stand by that opinion, but MAN is tails' MAX rings cyclone flying ability fun as FUCK. like, i kind of have a hate-love relationship with it. on one hand, who the hell doesn't like flying around the island at max speed? like, oh, there's something all the way over there, let me just ZOOM right over in a few seconds!! AND the fact that you can control its height unlike knuckles' flying is just insanely cool. on the OTHER hand though, yes it cheapens tails' flying ability because honestly once you get the cyclone ability, you don't even have to do any of the set-paths that the game wants you to follow to get to the map kocos or skill kocos. you can just fly up to them and boom, didn't have to do the set path. which is kind of sad because those can be really fun and satisfying to complete, so what i'd end up doing was get to the area where the map koco would be, and instead of just flying up to it, try to follow the path and get the map that way to not just suck the fun out of the entire thing

but also, that one M-puzzle where it lit up 3 or 4 red beams of light all across the island and you had to reach all of them under a time limit??? MAN i think that was my favorite puzzle of all!!! i first bumped into that one when i was playing with amy, and at first i thought i was gonna have to come back to it with sonic since i didn't think i'd get another character that would be as fast as him (also didn't have the spin dash ability yet since this was early in the game). but holy shit once i unlocked that ability and saw just how fucking fast you could fly around the island (skells from xenoblade x my beloved), i immediately went back to that puzzle and just completed it as tails. just so damn awesome!!

and SPEAKING OF the spin dash....wow. amy, knuckles, and tails may not be as fast as sonic, but they become just as fast as him with this skill. and i can't believe i went through the entire main game without using the spin dash more often. spin dashing around the island and abusing the hell of its physics was just something that never got old, even in the sonic stages. i don't think i ever used the fast travel with the portals since i mean....spin dashing everywhere the island is just like a damn dream come true: it's always something i'd do in sonic adventures' mystic ruins but at a smaller scale, but this time? the ouranos island is fucking huge and gorgeous and then with that beautiful music playing in the background and just rolling around everywhere at high speeds AAAAAAAAAA this game is honestly just the perfect sonic game!!!!!

i think i already talked about this earlier but the new stages were super fun and actually challenging to S rank, unlike the main game. there were some i wasn't too fond of (like that one where sonic's speed as "gears"?? what was that lol) but overall they were a joy to replay over and over and try to bring my time down. i think my favorites were definitely 4-A (with the rocket boosters and beehive-looking things) and 4-B (the one with the hologram tails and the falling platforms).

the music. GOD how does sega keep doing this!!! every single new character theme is just so on fucking point, but i gotta say amy wins this one as well: there's something just so hauntingly beautiful about her theme that just honestly fits the overall mood of the game. but honestly, all just so good. i neeeeed to get my hands on the ost, especially since i'm late to the party and realized that now they have a GORGEOUS BEAUTIFUL AMAZING remixed version of the windy and ripply (emerald coast 2) song AKA a song so dear and beloved and nostalgic to my heart that just thinking about it makes me want to cry tears of joy. like, running around the islands with that music playing in the background is just so freeing and beautiful and exciting that just makes you feel glad that you get to experience a sonic game like this.

oh shit got sidetracked talking about this game's overall out-of-this-world soundtrack again um um um what else. i mean, i really don't know what else to say except frontiers just knocked it out of the park and surpassed my expectations in every single way possible. as i was playing the game and would just be exploring the island and completing puzzles/paths, i'd just keep saying to myself "this game is fucking amazing" every once in a while. sega just fucking nailed the 3d sonic formula and any doubt i had about an open-world sonic game was just thrown out the window: i couldn't stop thinking about this being a MUCH larger, more fun, and more gorgeous version of running around mystic ruins than i could have ever imagined, and it's exactly the type of exploration freedom that i had been itching for in a sonic game.

and it goes without saying that sega bringing back amy, tails, and knuckles as playable characters was just soooo fucking good and refreshing to see, and my god did they do them justice. last time they were all playable was, what...sonic adventure?? really?? like, holy crap. sonic frontiers really was a love letter to 3d sonic games and ughhhh i just can't stop saying good things about it. EVERYONE NEEDS TO PLAY THIS GAME!!!

anyway!!! can't wait to see where the sonic 3d series is headed after this, but for now, time to wait for sonic superstars (holy shit that's soon!!!) since that looks fun as hell too, and that's me saying it as someone who prefers 3d sonic vs 2d sonic!

[archoneddzs15]

PC Engine - Ninja Ryukenden (Ninja Gaiden)

Title: Ninja Ryukenden / 忍者龍剣伝

Developer/Publisher: Hudson-Era H.K. / Hudson Soft / TECMO

Release date: 24 January 1992

Catalogue No.: HC92052

Genre: Action

Format: HuCard

First, we had Sega's Shinobi. When I was 9 years old, I spent many a quarter on the arcade version (and much of my allowance, to my mother's dismay (^O^). Why? Simple: ninjas are the video game world's greatest and most versatile heroes. So how do you 1-Up an awesome game like Shinobi?

I found out that Christmas in 2010 when I received Ninja Gaiden for my PC Engine, developed by a Hong Kong-based joint venture between Hudson Soft and Era Communications Inc. I popped that box open, grabbed the HuCard, and bashed it into my PC Engine CoreGrafx so quickly it nearly choked on it. I flick on the power and sit back. And THAT'S when it caught my eye... HOLY CRAP!! CUT-SCENES!! CUT SCENES ON MY 8-BIT CONSOLE!!

I was floored: I almost thought I was watching a movie; I had NEVER seen this high-quality look on my system! So I watch one ninja fall to the ground, and then I see the guy who would be the hero: Ryu Hayabusa...Ninja, Ladie's Man, Professional Ass Kicker.

I didn't even hit Run (PC Engine lingo for "Start") yet, and I was too impressed already! Anyway, Ninja Gaiden's got it all. Ryu's quite fleet-footed, quick on the draw with his sword, and slices and dices like no one's business. He listens to your every command (read: dead-on control). He does about 50 flips in the air during a jump. He's got cool Ninja Arts to aid him on his quest, including shuriken, Windmill Shuriken (they boomerang all over the screen!!), the Spinning Blade (jump and slash in a circle), and the Invincible Fire Wheel (TOASTY VILLAINS!!). And he'll need them, too...I'll explain why later.

Although I did explain the cut scenes already, I think I should go into a bit more detail and cover the in-game graphics, sound, and music while I'm at it. The cutscenes in this game, for 1988 on the Famicom, were amazing. For 1992 on the PC Engine, it looked even more so.

They conveyed the story in such a way that it almost seems like an anime OVA (incidentally, there was a Ninja Gaiden OVA in Japan, but it was poorly written and animated, and Ryu was only a bit character in it. BLASPHEMY!!), and you get such a feel for the characters that you would think that they were alive and for real. The story is nothing short of excellent, and the game plays it out perfectly, breaking the action up into six acts of 2 to 5 stages each, for a grand total of 21 stages. The difficulty level in the game slowly progresses from very easy to hardcore gamer tough, but it progresses steadily from stage to stage. The bosses fall in the same category as well, with a very easy first boss to a hair-yanking hard final boss. More on the difficulty later.

The graphics in this game are pretty good, albeit a little grainy. Everyone is of a decent size but oddly drawn, but the animation in this game is just stunning; it's so fluid that you wouldn't think at first that this is still just an 8-bit console competing in the 16-bit console wars. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, has at least 3 to 4 frames of animation; even little details like Ryu throwing a weapon look awesome in motion! The sounds are pretty good for a PC Engine HuCard although a few sounds are a little odd like the "FWP-SPLSH!" sound enemies make when they're killed (sounds like an explosion splashing into water!), and Ryu somehow makes this blasting sound when he gets hit. Is he laden with nitro or something? ^_^

But never mind that, the big draw in the sound department? The MUSIC!! Mark my words: MUSIC MAKES OR BREAKS THE GAME!! In this case, it doesn't just MAKE the game, it's the BLOOD WORK!! The music in this game is just TOO FUCKING GOOD!! The composer made some excellent use of the PC Engine's sound processors, which is just a miracle, honestly. It's so awesome that I used to use the Sound Test code, then tape all the tunes off the TV with a portable tape recorder held to the speaker, just to listen to it later. It's THAT GOOD!! Every single tune, even to this day, rings in my head for all eternity, and out of every track, my personal favorite, the track from Stage 4-2 (Bazlisk Mine Field) just RULES! Thanks to emulation (and the Internet!), I now have the entire soundtrack in MP3 format, and I still can't get over how amazing the music is!

[sonic-hot-takes]

Remember when everyone wanted to roast Pontac and Graff over a fire like a marshmallow? That’s how a lot of people treat Ian, except Ian is an actual tried and true fan of the series

I’ve critiqued Ian’s stuff on here before; which, to be fair, is kind of the point of this blog, I’m not sonic-lukewarm-takes and it wouldn’t be revolutionary for me to say “uh, actually Ian’s the best writer the series has ever had,” but it’s absolutely true. Ian is the best writer the series has ever had. Maekawa is up there, but Ian’s dialogue has consistently been much snappier and charming (though this may also be a localization issue).

I don’t understand how people can hear these random Bumblekast clips and claim that Ian just “doesn’t get” the characters or enforces the mandates himself or blah blah blah. If you took one look at Ian’s work with Archie, especially post reboot, you’d know right away how wrong that is. Freedom Fighters are there, characters like Shadow are well written, and honestly anything that could be perceived as “““woke””” is more subtext than anything overt (I’m honestly kind of surprised the intent was to make Sally and Nicole a couple post reboot since outside of a couple scenes in Spark of Life I struggled reading it that way).

As always, if fingers must be pointed at anyone it should be at Sega themselves. Even without memorizing all the stated mandates to heart, anyone who’s read both comics can tell that they clearly have IDW on a much tighter leash than Archie. Which I don’t think is necessarily a bad thing since it’s meant to keep the series more accessible, but none of those creative changes are Ian’s fault. If Ian wanted to axe the Freedom Fighters so badly, he would’ve done it when he had the chance in the Archie reboot. Instead he not only kept them around, but also gave them new designs to help their outdated 90s Disney Channel lookin asses fit better into the Modern Sonic style that they were legally forced to go all in on. You really think that Sega advocated for a bunch of characters that had been made by some random foreign artists over two decades prior and never appeared in any of the mainline games?

(Spinball doesn’t count, fuck you)

This pattern continues. Sega wants to keep IDW accessible to new fans, so callbacks to previous games or older Sonic media are off the table. This is also why the worldbuilding is so bad in IDW, because they want to keep everything nondescript to avoid confusion. Sega is more concerned with branding than narrative, so Shadow is stripped of his nuance and just made into the edgy competitive Vegeta ass rival because that’s what his design and character archetype would entail (the general tone and aesthetics of his solo game don’t help). Same with Amy, who has slowly degraded from hyper fangirl to just girl. So on and so forth.

And it’s really sad to see Ian take so much crap for this shit, since you know he’d change it at the drop of a hat if he wanted to. Once again, post reboot Archie is proof of that. As a licensed writer, one of Ian’s biggest strengths is revitalizing and recontextualizing old characters and concepts in a new way. Literally one of the first things he did in Archie Sonic was put in Bark and Bean with the narrative role and personalities we know them for today. He took a random side character from SatAM that most people only barely remembered and turned her into a legitimately interesting antivillain, simultaneously filling a void left behind by the lawsuits. You know he’d kill to keep doing that kind of thing.

Once again, Ian’s not above critique. I took my big dump on Frontiers’ story when the game came out, and I’ll probably end up doing it some more if I can find it within myself to get any further in the DLC. Not all of his comics have been bangers, like some of his early early Archie stuff, some of the Metal Virus arc, and honestly quite a bit of the Mega Man comic, but overall his writing is overwhelmingly good. But some of y’all need to stop really need to stop crucifying him just because he says something like “maybe we should make Blaze a more accessible character” on his podcast

Help me out here: Why is there so much Ian Flynn hate going around lately? I thought everyone loved that he was contributing to the games. Now suddenly they aren't. I guess that's par for the course for this series but I don't get it. He isn't perfect but I like what he's done. Am I a weirdo?

Ian Flynn has always had a lot of fans, but any creator putting their work out there is going to have detractors as well. That's just the nature of being an artist. To some extent, it's no big deal. He's not a perfect writer. Nobody is! I consider myself a fan of his work, but I've criticized plenty of individual writing decisions from him on here.

But Ian doesn't just have critics. He has his own obsessive hatedom. And the specific nature of Ian's hatedom is... interesting.

A decade ago, Ian was only the guy writing for Archie Sonic, meaning any debates over his work were quarantined within that tiny niche of the larger Sonic fandom. Only people who kept up with the comics month to month had any real reason to have an opinion on the guy, which means we're talking about merely thousands of fans as opposed to millions.

Within that group, he had some haters. You had the people who were mad about story changes made during his run, particularly things like ancillary characters getting killed off (although over the years we've learned that most of those were editorial mandates from Mike Pellerito). You had the people mad that Ian didn't push their favorite ship, with feuding SonAmy and Sonally fans claiming that he was CLEARLY biased towards one or the other. You had the people who just really, really liked one of the previous writers way more - usually Penders, as hard as that may be to believe today. That sort of thing. Pretty normal comic fandom type stuff. Again, it comes with the territory.

Unfortunately, many of those haters only got worse over time, morphing into reactionaries who constantly try to incite Comicsgate type culture war bullshit.

There are people still mad at Ian for making Sally bi and pairing her with Nicole instead of Sonic in the later Archie comics. There have been elaborate MS Paint red string conspiracy boards explaining how people like Ian and Jon Gray have apparently been destroying the franchise from the inside for years by Making Sonic Woke. (Jon gets dragged into this because people are still mad about him drawing The Slap 20 years later. Yes, really!!) There was an unhinged change.org petition trying to get Ian fired, specifically from people who were mad that the Freedom Fighters aren't in the IDW comics. There was even a very sad little fan campaign from these people trying to get Sega to move the Sonic comic license away from IDW and over to Udon, because they thought Udon would bring Sally and Bunnie back and also make them sexy again. There's a lot of this.

(Unfortunately, Penders has also exacerbated this by gossiping about Ian on Twitter and giving these fans ammo, but that's a whole 'nother discussion.)

The thing is, for years, people who only played the games or watched the cartoons had no reason to pay attention to any of this. Now, though, Ian isn't just writing for some weird spinoff comics that only the super nerds read. Now he's writing comics that are canon to the games, and ALSO some of the games themselves, and ALSO consulting on other tie-in media like Sonic Prime, and ALSO writing the official Sonic encyclopedia, and ALSO serving as part of the new Sonic Lore Team at Sega. And on top of all this, he's got an increasingly popular podcast where he fields questions about his work on all of these things, which serves as one of the fandom's main windows into creative decisions being made behind the scenes.

As a fan of Ian's work, it's been really cool to see him rise in prominence. But the dark side of this is that his obsessive haters from the Archie days now have WAY more of a potential audience of their own. Now, every Sonic fan has to have an opinion on Ian. What this frequently means is that you'll have the Comicsgate types taking things Ian writes or says out of context, attempting to get more of the general fandom to yell at the guy.

Unfortunately, there are a wide variety of Sonic fans who take the bait:

You've got hardcore fans who disliked basically any recent piece of Sonic media and are looking for someone to blame.

You've got the people who are concerned about the sanctity of Sonic's canon, who shoot the messenger any time Ian mentions a new retcon from Sonic Team on the podcast - or any time he even mentions the THOUGHT of changing anything about the canon, as we saw recently with the Sol Dimension nonsense.

You've got people who romanticize some sort of mythical artistic vision that Sega of Japan supposedly has (or had) for the franchise. To many of these fans, American contributors like Ian just don't "get" the heart of the series and are trying to turn Sonic into something different. (This "heart of the series" tends to be some mix of Japanese instruction manual lore, the cinematics from Sonic CD, the OVA, and/or the games written by Shiro Maekawa, depending on what Sonic media the fan in question grew up with.)

You've got fans of specific characters or ships who pin the blame for how their faves are depicted entirely on Ian - most vocally fans of Shadow, even though the root problem is that Sonic Team hasn't known what to do with Shadow since 2006. At best this stops at regular old criticism, but at its worst this devolves into claims that Ian has an agenda against certain characters.

You've got fans annoyed by a perceived over-emphasis on comic-original characters in the IDW comics, ignoring the obvious facts that these characters exist because the game cast is so tightly controlled by Sega, and also, you know, that people just like the IDW characters and want more stories about them.

You've got a LOT of discourse over IDW's Sonic being a hero who tries to give his enemies second chances, as if half of Sonic's closest friends aren't already former villains and rivals. Honestly this is very transparently just reheated Steven Universe discourse lmao

You'll also see people who just think they could do Ian's job better. They can't believe that THIS GUY is the American fan working on all these Sonic projects, when clearly THEY understand the characters and lore and themes SO much better than this charlatan.

All it takes is for someone in one of these categories to be unhappy about some recent piece of Sonic media, and for them to come across an out of context quote or comic panel that rubs them the wrong way, and suddenly the leftist Zoomer Sonic fans will join the latest dogpile on Ian alongside the reactionary Comicsgate types who are mad at him for Making Sonic Woke.

In general, when fandoms get upset, they tend to want a scapegoat. A person or two to point a finger at and go "THAT's who ruined the thing I love!" This tends to be based less on reality and more on which contributors are the most visible online. You'll sometimes see teenage and adult fans of children's cartoons single out a storyboarder who's particularly vocal on Twitter, blame them for every story decision they don't like, and harass them off the platform out of a sense of retribution for their favorite ship or whatever. Failing that, fans might choose to blame every nitpick, down to individual lines of dialogue and frames of animation, on a showrunner, just because that's the name they associate with the show. And unfortunately, when it comes to Sonic, Ian is now arguably the most prolific and outspoken contributor on the English speaking internet, and therefore a common scapegoat.

Some of the things I've seen Ian blamed for are truly wild. A lot of people have claimed for YEARS that he's just lying about the existence of creative guidelines and restrictions from Sega - or, as fans call them, The Mandates - even though they're just an inherent aspect of working on a licensed property. Others claim that The Mandates are real, but somehow Ian's fault. A vocal minority of fans have convinced themselves that Ian is the sole reason the Freedom Fighters don't exist in the IDW comics, even though Ian says he's been pushing to bring them back since day one.

Sometimes you'll see people say he ruined shit he didn't even work on. A few weeks ago on Twitter I saw someone claim that Ian had written a rejected script for Sonic Forces in which Tails died. I could not find a source for this for the life of me. As far as I can tell, the rumor seems to have been born from an alleged leaked script for Forces with margin notes from Aaron Webber that criticized the way Tails was written, and also an old tweet where Aaron joked that Tails would die in an upcoming episode of Sonic Mania Adventures. These merged into "Aaron Webber criticized a draft of the Forces script in which Tails died." How'd Ian get dragged into this? Who fucking knows!

It's all just a big game of telephone. All it takes is some asshole to make something up about Ian on Twitter or YouTube or a DeviantArt journal or some forum, and at least a couple people will believe it, and then it gets repeated as fact. Again, this used to be contained by the niche nature of the Archie Sonic fandom, but now there are WAY more people who are receptive to this shit.

It's just sad to me that Ian tries to be so open and honest about his work, to try to explain the rationale for certain things, to keep fans looped in on the direction the franchise is headed, and this just gives the Flynnspiracy types more quotes to take out of context and try to paint him as the devil. If it sounds like I'm being overly defensive and dismissing his critics, man... some of the things I've seen people say directly to him are just unbelievable. People will send paragraphs-long angry screeds in to his podcast that completely tear him apart, and he has to sit there and be like "Well, that's your opinion, and you're entitled to it." People literally pay for special guest interview episodes where they just rapid fire complaints about his writing at him directly to his face. I don't know how he does it. I would snap.

All of this over Sonic the fucking Hedgehog of all things.

I don't know how to wrap this up. Engaging with fandoms online is very tiring, which is why I tend not to do it. Things like this are too common. I guess, just... remember that making art collaboratively is a complicated thing. The people involved are generally trying their best given the circumstances, but they're only human. They make mistakes. But please treat them like humans. Criticism and dogpiling are not the same thing.