I find retroactive lore to be so funny. Like some dudes in the 90s decided to make a game about a blue hedgehog that goes fast and collects rings, and now 30+ years later we are trying to figure...
I find retroactive lore to be so funny. Like some dudes in the 90s decided to make a game about a blue hedgehog that goes fast and collects rings, and now 30+ years later we are trying to figure out a timeline for canonical accuracy.
He's a hedgehog. He goes fast. What more do we need to know?
There's a young guy in one of my city's messaging groups that won't stop talking about Sonic. I tell him "Sonic is just a thing that run fast" but he is deep into it. This is a smart dude with...
There's a young guy in one of my city's messaging groups that won't stop talking about Sonic. I tell him "Sonic is just a thing that run fast" but he is deep into it. This is a smart dude with great knowledge of pop culture, games, movies, etc. He loves the Alien movie franchise and played things like old-school Zelda and Final Fantasy. Things with depth that would better sustain an obsession. But he loves the Sonic movies, plays the games on his phone, knows everything about the character, and won't shut up about it. It is really interesting because I don't believe people were that passionate even in the 1990s. He is not at all bothersome, I like him and find his obsession amusing. We joke about it. But it is a little funny because, among the many awesome things that he loves, he chose to devote his life to the one that I find most unfulfilling to talk about :P
Whoa whoa whoa that’s a really offensive term, you can’t just say things like that… I’m kidding! Just referencing your other post about language and online discourse ;) Real talk though I can...
He is not at all bothersome
Whoa whoa whoa that’s a really offensive term, you can’t just say things like that…
I’m kidding! Just referencing your other post about language and online discourse ;)
Real talk though I can appreciate when someone has a very specific or niche hobby like that guy. Always interesting to hear someone talk about something they really love, even if I have no clue what they’re talking about, lol.
I can't help but respect and loathe it all at the same time. I spent so much time reading OG Phantasy Star fanfic in my you get years, that the sheer thought of an official canon, timeline or...
I can't help but respect and loathe it all at the same time.
I spent so much time reading OG Phantasy Star fanfic in my you get years, that the sheer thought of an official canon, timeline or addition to the lore is still super exciting.
I just find the obsession with Sonic's lore a little unfulfilling because it's a platformer first and foremost. I see that Phantasy Star is an RPG, so I assume it has a more substantial story....
I just find the obsession with Sonic's lore a little unfulfilling because it's a platformer first and foremost. I see that Phantasy Star is an RPG, so I assume it has a more substantial story. There is probably more to obsess about, and also in more depth.
Oh yeah, there's plenty. If hazard the guess, though, that Sonic's fans consume the ongoing comic series, tv cartoons, the seedier aspects of the fandom -- and there's so much of it. To many, it's...
Oh yeah, there's plenty. If hazard the guess, though, that Sonic's fans consume the ongoing comic series, tv cartoons, the seedier aspects of the fandom -- and there's so much of it.
To many, it's ridiculous that people would go to great lengths wrapping stories, lore worlds and all the rest around primary colour forest animals. To the fans, I don't think that they see the characters in the same way. It's like Star Wars movies. There's not much that's interesting or redeeming about it unless you're a longtime fan
For completion, my issue is not that Sonic is silly, but rather that it is a platformer that is very firmly in the realm of that genre. Even Mario has several popular RPG games. So its more about...
For completion, my issue is not that Sonic is silly, but rather that it is a platformer that is very firmly in the realm of that genre. Even Mario has several popular RPG games. So its more about the genre than the sillyness. Silly things can be deep and fulfilling.
I kind of love it. Nintendo did it with Zelda, and put out an entire book explaining it. Although in Zelda's case, I kind of prefer the fan theory that it's literally a Legend. There was only ever...
I kind of love it. Nintendo did it with Zelda, and put out an entire book explaining it. Although in Zelda's case, I kind of prefer the fan theory that it's literally a Legend. There was only ever one Link/Zelda/Ganon and all of the games are just variations of the same legend told throughout time. Which explains why most of the games are so conceptually similar.
Blizzard did the same with Warcraft's lore, and that took three books...and since have added enough additions to the lore to justify a 4th, but I doubt we'll get it. And I'm pretty sure they've introduced a few contradictions to the canon established in that trilogy of lore dumps.
Oh definitely. I don't mean to dismiss it or anything, I just find it funny how some silly brainstorm of an idea blossoms into a whole universe with hard rules and dates and chronology. If it...
Oh definitely. I don't mean to dismiss it or anything, I just find it funny how some silly brainstorm of an idea blossoms into a whole universe with hard rules and dates and chronology. If it brings people joy to create entire stories and worlds out of their favorite games and pieces of media, then good for them! I just don't think things need to make 100% sense when the original idea that sparked it all is just some goofy premise. Like imagine if someone took pong and made an entire world out of it and then people online one day started having heated debates about the exact origins of the ball and whether it existed before the paddles or not.
Incredible. I love that Sonic Shuffle and Sonic Battle are in here, lol. It makes sense, though, if you read the IDW comics. Sega apparently wanted everything to connect, so the head writer for...
Incredible. I love that Sonic Shuffle and Sonic Battle are in here, lol.
It makes sense, though, if you read the IDW comics. Sega apparently wanted everything to connect, so the head writer for the comics has technically been creating canon content that aligns with the video game content.
IIRC, a year-ish ago Sega was hiring a Sonic lore specialist. This likely is someone’s actual job - digging through games to make a cohesive timeline, then making sure new media aligns and integrates.
That might be damage control after the insanity that was the Archie comics. I never read them, but the things I've read and heard about them are... "Wild" is putting it lightly. Even with separate...
Quick edit: looks like the link to Part 2 is broken in that post, so here's a working link. It only seems to go to Part 3, but gives you a good glimpse. Ken Penders' Sonic run is a whole rabbit hole of his own.
Even weirder, I checked their user page and it doesn't show up in their posts. EDIT: Found it! https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/vle5ap/american_comics_an_abridged_history_of_archie/
Even weirder, I checked their user page and it doesn't show up in their posts.
It's possible that they, like many of us from old Reddit, did some fairly aggressive destruction of what we'd originally put into the site when it became clear that our data were going to be used...
It's possible that they, like many of us from old Reddit, did some fairly aggressive destruction of what we'd originally put into the site when it became clear that our data were going to be used as the fuel for further profit.
Possible, but their post list is still very lengthy and the linked post has a short comment history not fitting one that was up for a while and deleted in the transition. Also, I found it!...
Huh. While that link is broken, Part 2 is up in a different post by the same user. When I searched it to link I got to the third post and it had a working link to the second post, so I didn't know...
Huh. While that link is broken, Part 2 is up in a different post by the same user. When I searched it to link I got to the third post and it had a working link to the second post, so I didn't know the link was broken. Looks like they linked it while it was still in a queue and it had to be resubmitted, and then just... Never updated the link in Part 1?
Yeah, it was wild stuff. I grew up reading some of it, "grew out of comics," then got back in as soon as I could drive. Actually started back into comics with Sonic stuff again because I'd enjoyed...
Yeah, it was wild stuff. I grew up reading some of it, "grew out of comics," then got back in as soon as I could drive. Actually started back into comics with Sonic stuff again because I'd enjoyed it so much, but then moved over to DC. Right around then was when the Ken Penders stuff started to get wild, and I missed all the Genesis wave and other reset stuff. Came back when Hoopla started carrying the IDW trades, and I haven't missed an issue since (once it gets to Hoopla, at least).
I miss some of the old "lore" from the Archie comics every now and then (mostly the more fleshed out Knuckles back story stuff), but Ian Flynn and the rest of the team have done such a good job reworking it with only the video game characters and a handful of other new characters that could legally show up in games. Watching the odd hour long dive into the history of Sonic comics or the Ken Penders saga on YouTube every now and then is a good time, though!
oh sweet merciful Chaos, they made Sonic 06 canon. Jokes aside, I skimmed it with Google translate on and I'm actually pretty impressed. The timeline feels pretty concise and actually not too...
oh sweet merciful Chaos, they made Sonic 06 canon.
Jokes aside, I skimmed it with Google translate on and I'm actually pretty impressed. The timeline feels pretty concise and actually not too detailed. Sonic has never been super big at complex lore beyond what's needed for the current game, and that lore usually doesn't involve super big implications about the world itself. So it probably wasn't too hard to avoid inconsistencies or conflicts.
The Sonic universe is no where near as convoluted as the attempts at a Zelda timeline.
FYI: the Zelda Timeline has been solved. It was a task so daunting that only the greatest mind of our generation could solve it: the man of three first names himself, Brian David Gilbert.
The Sonic universe is no where near as convoluted as the attempts at a Zelda timeline.
Man, this really ruins the fun of Sonic for me. Sonic doesn't have to have a timeline. I like that the games are disconnected from eachother. When Sonic sees Tails, he doesn't say "Hey, Tails, do...
Man, this really ruins the fun of Sonic for me.
Sonic doesn't have to have a timeline. I like that the games are disconnected from eachother. When Sonic sees Tails, he doesn't say "Hey, Tails, do you remember the adventure we had when we first met up in the hit 90s video game Sonic the Hedgehog 2? I hope so because we're gonna make many more references you won't get otherwise!" He just says "Hey, my pal Tails, let's do adventure things!" Like, it might be slightly odd to see him greet a deep cut character from a game you haven't played, like Blaze the Cat, but it ultimately doesn't matter if you do because the buy-in isn't required. You could hand the latest game to a kid who has never heard of sonic before and they'd have a blast without getting lost in the plot. This is the reason (well, one of many) that Sonic Chronicles was so bad.
When it comes down to it, the thing I like most about Sonic games is that they're dumb, not too serious about everything, have an appealing amount of janky physics, and are more about the experience of playing them than needing to lay on things like meaning, continuity, or externalities. You can skip the story entirely and still have a blast with them, and in fact games where you're forced into story-related stuff tend to be the worst ones (think Sonic 06's non-action stages). You don't need to be in the Sonic fan club to enjoy a Sonic game. And I sincerely hope that establishing a timeline doesn't get rid of that important aspect.
I've only played a couple Sonic games, but they always felt like different adventures rather than totally different worlds to me, even without any direct connections between games. Like, at bare...
I've only played a couple Sonic games, but they always felt like different adventures rather than totally different worlds to me, even without any direct connections between games. Like, at bare minimum, I automatically expect any game with Shadow to take place after Sonic Adventure 2, or at least have his whole backstory with ARK as part of its history.
The games don't really have much overarching lore compared to other franchises though, and the lore that does come up usually only matters to the specific adventure. It reminds me of older cartoons where they have different adventures every week. They didn't need an overarching plot or care about timeline, but they still all took place in the same world. Hell, Sonic would probably suffer if they tried to connect them all in-game or build on the continuity.
But outside the games? It's neat to see a majority of them can reasonably take place in one, single universe, even if it never comes up in the games themselves. Makes Sonic's hero status feel even more established and deserved to know the same one had all those adventures.
Except Sonic 06. Seriously, why did they include that one??
06 erasing itself from the timeline and thus not appearing here would be funny, but putting it here makes sense since levels from it appear in (both) Generations later.
06 erasing itself from the timeline and thus not appearing here would be funny, but putting it here makes sense since levels from it appear in (both) Generations later.
The timeline seems to span a very long time, but doesn't explain how Sonic and co survive all those years. I've only played the old master system / genesis games, but it seems like this isn't...
The timeline seems to span a very long time, but doesn't explain how Sonic and co survive all those years. I've only played the old master system / genesis games, but it seems like this isn't explained in-game either.
Is Sonic like Link in that there are multiple Sonics throughout the ages?
No, Sonic is only involved in events that take place during his life span, barring some time travel. However Sonic has been 15 years old since 1991, so there's some sliding timeline stuff going on.
No, Sonic is only involved in events that take place during his life span, barring some time travel. However Sonic has been 15 years old since 1991, so there's some sliding timeline stuff going on.
I didn't translate it and just figured i'd scroll through and recognize the various title images and figure out the rough order from there. Is it a joke? Does it make more sense? Was this just...
I didn't translate it and just figured i'd scroll through and recognize the various title images and figure out the rough order from there.
Is it a joke? Does it make more sense? Was this just punishment for some poor intern?
I turned on Google translate, because I know Riders would've happened after Sonic Adventure. Looks like instead of making an order for the games, it's a timeline of the overall universe based on...
I turned on Google translate, because I know Riders would've happened after Sonic Adventure. Looks like instead of making an order for the games, it's a timeline of the overall universe based on events mentioned in the games starting thousands and thousands of years ago. The game covers are to show the source for that bit of history.
Ahhh ok that makes more sense. Still absurd and probably not needed at all, but at least I'm not looking at title covers wondering how the hell they landed on this.
Ahhh ok that makes more sense. Still absurd and probably not needed at all, but at least I'm not looking at title covers wondering how the hell they landed on this.
Also on Linux, using FF 136.0.1. It took about 30 seconds before the translate finished. Did it say it couldn't translate the page or did it just not give you the option at all?
Also on Linux, using FF 136.0.1. It took about 30 seconds before the translate finished. Did it say it couldn't translate the page or did it just not give you the option at all?
I find retroactive lore to be so funny. Like some dudes in the 90s decided to make a game about a blue hedgehog that goes fast and collects rings, and now 30+ years later we are trying to figure out a timeline for canonical accuracy.
He's a hedgehog. He goes fast. What more do we need to know?
There's a young guy in one of my city's messaging groups that won't stop talking about Sonic. I tell him "Sonic is just a thing that run fast" but he is deep into it. This is a smart dude with great knowledge of pop culture, games, movies, etc. He loves the Alien movie franchise and played things like old-school Zelda and Final Fantasy. Things with depth that would better sustain an obsession. But he loves the Sonic movies, plays the games on his phone, knows everything about the character, and won't shut up about it. It is really interesting because I don't believe people were that passionate even in the 1990s. He is not at all bothersome, I like him and find his obsession amusing. We joke about it. But it is a little funny because, among the many awesome things that he loves, he chose to devote his life to the one that I find most unfulfilling to talk about :P
Whoa whoa whoa that’s a really offensive term, you can’t just say things like that…
I’m kidding! Just referencing your other post about language and online discourse ;)
Real talk though I can appreciate when someone has a very specific or niche hobby like that guy. Always interesting to hear someone talk about something they really love, even if I have no clue what they’re talking about, lol.
I can't help but respect and loathe it all at the same time.
I spent so much time reading OG Phantasy Star fanfic in my you get years, that the sheer thought of an official canon, timeline or addition to the lore is still super exciting.
I just find the obsession with Sonic's lore a little unfulfilling because it's a platformer first and foremost. I see that Phantasy Star is an RPG, so I assume it has a more substantial story. There is probably more to obsess about, and also in more depth.
Oh yeah, there's plenty. If hazard the guess, though, that Sonic's fans consume the ongoing comic series, tv cartoons, the seedier aspects of the fandom -- and there's so much of it.
To many, it's ridiculous that people would go to great lengths wrapping stories, lore worlds and all the rest around primary colour forest animals. To the fans, I don't think that they see the characters in the same way. It's like Star Wars movies. There's not much that's interesting or redeeming about it unless you're a longtime fan
For completion, my issue is not that Sonic is silly, but rather that it is a platformer that is very firmly in the realm of that genre. Even Mario has several popular RPG games. So its more about the genre than the sillyness. Silly things can be deep and fulfilling.
Apparently so!
I kind of love it. Nintendo did it with Zelda, and put out an entire book explaining it. Although in Zelda's case, I kind of prefer the fan theory that it's literally a Legend. There was only ever one Link/Zelda/Ganon and all of the games are just variations of the same legend told throughout time. Which explains why most of the games are so conceptually similar.
Blizzard did the same with Warcraft's lore, and that took three books...and since have added enough additions to the lore to justify a 4th, but I doubt we'll get it. And I'm pretty sure they've introduced a few contradictions to the canon established in that trilogy of lore dumps.
Oh definitely. I don't mean to dismiss it or anything, I just find it funny how some silly brainstorm of an idea blossoms into a whole universe with hard rules and dates and chronology. If it brings people joy to create entire stories and worlds out of their favorite games and pieces of media, then good for them! I just don't think things need to make 100% sense when the original idea that sparked it all is just some goofy premise. Like imagine if someone took pong and made an entire world out of it and then people online one day started having heated debates about the exact origins of the ball and whether it existed before the paddles or not.
Scott... you just don't get it, do ya? You don't.
Do we include the chili dogs? Did he have a dad? Did Sonichu and he go on wild adventures together?
Now we know.
Incredible. I love that Sonic Shuffle and Sonic Battle are in here, lol.
It makes sense, though, if you read the IDW comics. Sega apparently wanted everything to connect, so the head writer for the comics has technically been creating canon content that aligns with the video game content.
IIRC, a year-ish ago Sega was hiring a Sonic lore specialist. This likely is someone’s actual job - digging through games to make a cohesive timeline, then making sure new media aligns and integrates.
That might be damage control after the insanity that was the Archie comics. I never read them, but the things I've read and heard about them are... "Wild" is putting it lightly. Even with separate canons in mind, the multi-part r/HobbyDrama writeup is highly entertaining and makes me fully understand why Sega decided to have more control over the comics.
That might be damage control after the insanity that was the Archie comics. I never read them, but the things I've read and heard about them are... "Wild" is putting it lightly. Even with separate canons in mind, the multi-part r/HobbyDrama writeup is highly entertaining and makes me fully understand why Sega decided to have more control over the comics.
Quick edit: looks like the link to Part 2 is broken in that post, so here's a working link. It only seems to go to Part 3, but gives you a good glimpse. Ken Penders' Sonic run is a whole rabbit hole of his own.
Part one: gripping summation of everything that came before the Archie Sonic comic. Part 2: [deleted by user].
Even weirder, I checked their user page and it doesn't show up in their posts.
EDIT: Found it!
https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/vle5ap/american_comics_an_abridged_history_of_archie/
It's possible that they, like many of us from old Reddit, did some fairly aggressive destruction of what we'd originally put into the site when it became clear that our data were going to be used as the fuel for further profit.
Possible, but their post list is still very lengthy and the linked post has a short comment history not fitting one that was up for a while and deleted in the transition. Also, I found it!
https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/vle5ap/american_comics_an_abridged_history_of_archie/
Huh. While that link is broken, Part 2 is up in a different post by the same user. When I searched it to link I got to the third post and it had a working link to the second post, so I didn't know the link was broken. Looks like they linked it while it was still in a queue and it had to be resubmitted, and then just... Never updated the link in Part 1?
Yeah, it was wild stuff. I grew up reading some of it, "grew out of comics," then got back in as soon as I could drive. Actually started back into comics with Sonic stuff again because I'd enjoyed it so much, but then moved over to DC. Right around then was when the Ken Penders stuff started to get wild, and I missed all the Genesis wave and other reset stuff. Came back when Hoopla started carrying the IDW trades, and I haven't missed an issue since (once it gets to Hoopla, at least).
I miss some of the old "lore" from the Archie comics every now and then (mostly the more fleshed out Knuckles back story stuff), but Ian Flynn and the rest of the team have done such a good job reworking it with only the video game characters and a handful of other new characters that could legally show up in games. Watching the odd hour long dive into the history of Sonic comics or the Ken Penders saga on YouTube every now and then is a good time, though!
oh sweet merciful Chaos, they made Sonic 06 canon.
Jokes aside, I skimmed it with Google translate on and I'm actually pretty impressed. The timeline feels pretty concise and actually not too detailed. Sonic has never been super big at complex lore beyond what's needed for the current game, and that lore usually doesn't involve super big implications about the world itself. So it probably wasn't too hard to avoid inconsistencies or conflicts.
The Sonic universe is no where near as convoluted as the attempts at a Zelda timeline.
FYI: the Zelda Timeline has been solved.
It was a task so daunting that only the greatest mind of our generation could solve it: the man of three first names himself, Brian David Gilbert.
Don't worry about it, 06 decanonised itself!
Not surprising though. Flynn sees the Time Eater as a fragment of Solaris, so 06 lore has to be real.
Guys you don't have to translate it. There's a language select in the corner.
Man, this really ruins the fun of Sonic for me.
Sonic doesn't have to have a timeline. I like that the games are disconnected from eachother. When Sonic sees Tails, he doesn't say "Hey, Tails, do you remember the adventure we had when we first met up in the hit 90s video game Sonic the Hedgehog 2? I hope so because we're gonna make many more references you won't get otherwise!" He just says "Hey, my pal Tails, let's do adventure things!" Like, it might be slightly odd to see him greet a deep cut character from a game you haven't played, like Blaze the Cat, but it ultimately doesn't matter if you do because the buy-in isn't required. You could hand the latest game to a kid who has never heard of sonic before and they'd have a blast without getting lost in the plot. This is the reason (well, one of many) that Sonic Chronicles was so bad.
When it comes down to it, the thing I like most about Sonic games is that they're dumb, not too serious about everything, have an appealing amount of janky physics, and are more about the experience of playing them than needing to lay on things like meaning, continuity, or externalities. You can skip the story entirely and still have a blast with them, and in fact games where you're forced into story-related stuff tend to be the worst ones (think Sonic 06's non-action stages). You don't need to be in the Sonic fan club to enjoy a Sonic game. And I sincerely hope that establishing a timeline doesn't get rid of that important aspect.
I've only played a couple Sonic games, but they always felt like different adventures rather than totally different worlds to me, even without any direct connections between games. Like, at bare minimum, I automatically expect any game with Shadow to take place after Sonic Adventure 2, or at least have his whole backstory with ARK as part of its history.
The games don't really have much overarching lore compared to other franchises though, and the lore that does come up usually only matters to the specific adventure. It reminds me of older cartoons where they have different adventures every week. They didn't need an overarching plot or care about timeline, but they still all took place in the same world. Hell, Sonic would probably suffer if they tried to connect them all in-game or build on the continuity.
But outside the games? It's neat to see a majority of them can reasonably take place in one, single universe, even if it never comes up in the games themselves. Makes Sonic's hero status feel even more established and deserved to know the same one had all those adventures.
Except Sonic 06. Seriously, why did they include that one??
06 erasing itself from the timeline and thus not appearing here would be funny, but putting it here makes sense since levels from it appear in (both) Generations later.
The timeline seems to span a very long time, but doesn't explain how Sonic and co survive all those years. I've only played the old master system / genesis games, but it seems like this isn't explained in-game either.
Is Sonic like Link in that there are multiple Sonics throughout the ages?
No, Sonic is only involved in events that take place during his life span, barring some time travel. However Sonic has been 15 years old since 1991, so there's some sliding timeline stuff going on.
I didn't translate it and just figured i'd scroll through and recognize the various title images and figure out the rough order from there.
Is it a joke? Does it make more sense? Was this just punishment for some poor intern?
I turned on Google translate, because I know Riders would've happened after Sonic Adventure. Looks like instead of making an order for the games, it's a timeline of the overall universe based on events mentioned in the games starting thousands and thousands of years ago. The game covers are to show the source for that bit of history.
Ahhh ok that makes more sense. Still absurd and probably not needed at all, but at least I'm not looking at title covers wondering how the hell they landed on this.
Firefox can't translate Japanese. Are you guys just using Chrome?
Strange, Firefox translated it for me without issue.
Maybe that is because I am on Linux right now.
Also on Linux, using FF 136.0.1. It took about 30 seconds before the translate finished. Did it say it couldn't translate the page or did it just not give you the option at all?