CONTENT WARNING!

This post contains sensitive material that may not be suitable for all readers. The material in question includes:

- Bad language
- Frightening imagery
- Mentions of rape
- Political topics
Weird
Yes, that’s an actual voice line. Remind me again of how the fuck this prime world-building opportunity was wasted.

So, why talk about this now? Well, as I also mentioned in that post, the Black Arms pretty much vanished after the destruction of the Black Comet, a detail that I’ve phased out of the Recollected Cut as it implies the genocide of an entire race—instead, Shadow simply uses the Eclipse Cannon to bounce the Comet light years away from Earth. Either way, you can read that post if you want more of the background info, because Sonic Generations will be rereleased for newer systems this fall, and presumably included with all new copies and made available for existing copies will be a Shadow-focused expansion. The premise? I kid you not—Black Doom’s coming back. That’s right! Those alien bastards are gonna do it again, and I literally just came to accept that they never would! Granted, this still doesn’t mean I see any reason to geek out over it, as the Modern Era isn’t known for featuring quality writing, and it’s quality writing that villains with complex motivations like the Black Arms need to work—or more mature writing, I should say, as Shadow the Hedgehog suffered from feeling like it was written by a teenager.

Unfortunately, since we’re long past the point of giving Shadow a heartwarming friendship that reminds him of Maria (something I know was in the Archie comics even though I rarely read them growing up), the chances are slim that they’re actually going to take the time to make it smart, funny, or emotional, which is a concern given it’s simply an expansion to a preexisting game. Unlike Black Comet, it feels like they’re doing it simply for the sake of nostalgia as opposed to doing something fresh with the source material, and as I said in my Sonic games post, there’s an obvious difference between sticking with a formula that worked with people and throwing in minute details from that formula. People actually want the formula, not just reminders that it used to exist.

Weird
“…and now that both pairs are clean, I’m… really not even all that excited.”

The best part of this whole ordeal? Well, aside from hopefully getting to hear the scariest voice in the history of fiction once more, I guess it’s time to get on with something I’ve been meaning to do for long enough now: dub Black Doom over with Neil Breen’s voice! Man, don’t I have enough to do in my free time?

Oh, my god, I think even Neil Breen’s writing surpasses this game’s…

Disappointing as it is, I’ve been in acceptance for a while now that the Adventure formula is never slated to return, no matter how successful that formula would be compared to the current one (for all the rumors of an upcoming Heroes remake, I fail to trust any of the sources I’ve heard them from.) This has pretty much led me to divorce myself from the brand, and to be fair, I’ll gladly just take the time to return to my Definitive Childhood Trilogy. That being said, it’s become a common talking point that fans are the only factor keeping the Sonic franchise running, a fact that’s only exacerbated by how fan outcry saved the first movie by getting the original design for Sonic changed. So, the question is, what would happen if these same crazy shithea– I mean, dedicated followers took matters into their own hands and sent the series down the path it deserves?

Well, most would rightfully say that sounds like an awful idea, but more often than not, some of the fan games they’ve produced are still far more enjoyable than any of the recent official releases. Granted, most of these tend to lack storylines of any kind, remain stuck in the prototype or demo phase, and/or utilize the modern boost formula if not the classic formula (which suggests that it’s more successful than it seems on the surface, now that I look back on it), but during the boarding school situation I’ve referred to ad nauseam here, another guy on the autism spectrum introduced me to a fan game that I could barely fathom at the time. In Sonic World (no, not the hub world feature from Sonic Jam), I could play as just about any character that has ever existed in just about any stage that has ever existed for free, and while its graphics left much to be desired due to having been developed on an ancient game engine called Blitz3D, its modding possibilities were borderline limitless, and I’d officially come face-to-face with the ultimate Sonic experience and the ultimate escape from that turbulent period in my life… I mean, aside from my comic series ElectroNuke, as the characters from that mean eighty times more to me.

Weird
P-06? Sorry. Never heard of it.

The popularity of this game raged on from Release 1 through 8, but come Release 9, it was criticized more than ever for being notably unfinished despite adding a plethora of well-crafted stages as well as new enemies and objects. Certainly seemed like someone just stopped caring… but then, lead developer Ozcrash started lying compulsively and threatening to rape his co-developers’ siblings.

Wow. Uh… way to go from one to one thousand.

While I have my doubts that he meant the latter, the development process came to a standstill, and after a rushed tenth release, the game’s cancellation was announced on the official site. I mean, sure, this doesn’t mean the previous versions couldn’t be enjoyed, but within a year of announcing that, the dev team began a new project dubbed Sonic World DX, a more advanced and graphically impressive remake that continues being updated to this day. What a heartwarming revival!

Yeah, well, many of the characters from the “legacy versions” like Chaos and Fang were unfortunately phased out entirely, and despite DX supposedly offering even greater modding capabilities, none of them have been added back. Aside from most of the legacy versions’ glitches, performance issues, level of detail, and potential for sporadic crashes (the most infamous being the dreaded “memory access violation”) remaining intact, it also features a separate hub world gamemode called “The Island”, and while it does feature characters like Cream and Vanilla that I never cared for in the slightest, it’s pretty much as wholesome and innocuous as it gets… until you come across four female animals based closely off the cast of the viral visual novel game that I have and will be calling “Doki-Doki Banana Chips” as a loving tribute to Sonic Adventure 2. Fuck my life.

Secret Rings Sonic putting every single drop of all he’s got into fighting Mecha Sonic in Night Palace.
’06 Knuckles in an arena version of Flame Core. You better believe I gave him Scott Drier’s voice beforehand!
Shadow Android and Eclipse the Darkling aboard the Black Comet. It takes a lot to look imposing inside a giant space-bladder.
The deleted Maria death clip from Shadow the Hedgehog, except prototype Shadow (Terios) looks on and does nothing.

Wait… what’s this paragraph for? I’ve already talked about all the crazy stuff happening with Sonic. I mean, you have unimportant little developments like that mobile… game… thing, Sonic Rumble, but it’s not like there’s anything of note there. Sonic is still stuck on a road I have no interest in following. Okay? We’re done. Bye-bye! See you when we talk about bad religious movies! Or my history with mods! Or the online true crime and mystery community! Or schlubby older men from the midwest! Or the descent of Super Smash Bros. into an ego-fueled shitfest! Or albums by singers with golden lungs that you’ll never listen to! Or past dreams of mine that could only come from the mind of a schizophrenic person on acid! Or whatever the next post will be about!

Oh, and Trump’s being sentenced on all 34 charges as we speak. Time to crack that bottle of merlot open!

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