Remember when Tails actually did stuff in the plot?

[NBOX21]

No, seriously, they ruined Tails in this game. He went from being able to keep up with Sonic in Sonic 2 and 3, to becoming confident in himself in Adventure 1 and 2, being a useful teammate in Heroes to even flying Sonic to different parts of the world and being the professor's assistant in Unleashed, and now he's a complete wimp in this game that can't even do anything.

Really? What happened to his character growth in these games? It almost seems like they completely undid everything he had accomplished in other games like they're starting from scratch. Even in Mania, Tails on his own was still the confident hero he was back in Sonic 2 and 3.

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by Duckilous:

You really think children even care about elaborated stories?

Actually, yes I do! I was quite young when I started playing video games and even when I was playing Spyro Year of the Dragon on my PlayStation, I cared about all the characters, the world I was experiencing and what was going on in the story. At a young age, I found all of that very interesting and only made me want to play through it even more. That was on top of the amount of fun I had exploring the levels and playing the actual game, and I still feel the same way to this day.

[靈 El Riesgo Siempre Vive]

You stated it like a gushing madman though.

[Duckilous]

Originally posted by NBOX21:

Originally posted by Duckilous:

You really think children even care about elaborated stories?

Actually, yes I do! I was quite young when I started playing video games and even when I was playing Spyro Year of the Dragon on my PlayStation, I cared about all the characters, the world I was experiencing and what was going on in the story. At a young age, I found all of that very interesting and only made me want to play through it even more. That was on top of the amount of fun I had exploring the levels and playing the actual game, and I still feel the same way to this day.

Maybe I was acting too cynical or something when I said that but anyway, the way you described how you're fascinated with Spyro's universe and it was what drove your younger self to play that game even further made me realise the irony of what some of these people were saying.

Not only do they think that the Sonic franchise is better off without stories, some of them implied that anyone who cares about a plot or lore in a Sonic game would be someone who is typically younger... because God forbid an adult enjoys it too.
But Sonic is a family-friendly franchise that appeals to children, right?
Wouldn't it make sense to have the games tell exciting stories that fuels children's imaginations?
Stories that would be so good that they leave an impact on the audience whether it's a moral message or memorable moments that made people learn something or feel generally positive?
Of course it does! We have a colourful and expressive cast of cartoon characters for crying out loud.

Sure, the Mega Drive era games and Sonic Mania demonstrated that the (Classic) Sonic series or platformers in general can do just fine without focusing on a story but if good stories are incorporated in a way that it doesn't hinder the gameplay, it can certainly improve the experience even better and perhaps more memorable.

[SpongebobTheHedgehog (Soul)]

Originally posted by Duckilous:

Originally posted by NBOX21:

Actually, yes I do! I was quite young when I started playing video games and even when I was playing Spyro Year of the Dragon on my PlayStation, I cared about all the characters, the world I was experiencing and what was going on in the story. At a young age, I found all of that very interesting and only made me want to play through it even more. That was on top of the amount of fun I had exploring the levels and playing the actual game, and I still feel the same way to this day.

Maybe I was acting too cynical or something when I said that but anyway, the way you described how you're fascinated with Spyro's universe and it was what drove your younger self to play that game even further made me realise the irony of what some of these people were saying.

Not only do they think that the Sonic franchise is better off without stories, some of them implied that anyone who cares about a plot or lore in a Sonic game would be someone who is typically younger... because God forbid an adult enjoys it too.
But Sonic is a family-friendly franchise that appeals to children, right?
Wouldn't it make sense to have the games tell exciting stories that fuels children's imaginations?
Stories that would be so good that they leave an impact on the audience whether it's a moral message or memorable moments that made people learn something or feel generally positive?
Of course it does! We have a colourful and expressive cast of cartoon characters for crying out loud.

Sure, the Mega Drive era games and Sonic Mania demonstrated that the (Classic) Sonic series or platformers in general can do just fine without focusing on a story but if good stories are incorporated in a way that it doesn't hinder the gameplay, it can certainly improve the experience even better and perhaps more memorable.

Agreed 100%. It's actually one of the reasons why I enjoyed the movie. Some people complained about it being too childish, but like you said it's a family-friendly franchise that has stuff for all age groups. The movie also contained lots of emotional impact at times and featured some adult humor so it's not as if it's all for kids. They did the movie as well as I think they could do for an origin story and I can't wait to see the sequel.

Another thing too, I think Sonic Adventure is a perfect example of having a moral message. In fact, just about all of the characters you play as have you learn a moral message in that game. Sonic subtely learns to never give up on anything or others (he might have already learned it, but that is a theme in his story at least), Tails learns to be more independent, Knuckles learns to accept his heritage and his fate of being the guardian of the Master Emerald, Amy also learns to be independent, Gamma learns the importance of friendship and freedom, and even Big learns to hold on to those closest to you as much as you can, as they may not be there for much longer. And then you got the overall message where closing your heart off to others for your own vanity or for your own personal gain can destroy a lot. And that with an open heart and an open mind, anything could be possible.

This is one of the reasons why Sonic Adventure IS my favorite Sonic Game of all time. You have awesome gameplay, awesome music, awesome characters and stages, and to go along with all of that, a compelling story that makes you feel for each character and can teach you a moral in each lesson if you dig deep into it. Here's to hoping a Sonic game returns with a story as great as that, one day.

[靈 El Riesgo Siempre Vive]

It was bold enough to have moments of darkness. It's purely cute now it's a shame.

SA total 90s classic

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by Duckilous:

Wouldn't it make sense to have the games tell exciting stories that fuels children's imaginations?
Stories that would be so good that they leave an impact on the audience whether it's a moral message or memorable moments that made people learn something or feel generally positive?
Of course it does! We have a colourful and expressive cast of cartoon characters for crying out loud.

Sure, the Mega Drive era games and Sonic Mania demonstrated that the (Classic) Sonic series or platformers in general can do just fine without focusing on a story but if good stories are incorporated in a way that it doesn't hinder the gameplay, it can certainly improve the experience even better and perhaps more memorable.

I also think that something being for kids or younger audiences in mind is a pretty weak excuse for either having little to no story, or stories that feel childish and immature just because they happen to star colourful cartoon characters, especially considering there are still plenty of adults that enjoy this series. So why don't they write a story that would appeal to all age groups? I don't even expect anything too complex either - Sonic Unleashed knew how to have a simple story done right while still managing to be an interesting story about friendship.

Also, I think the reason the Mega Drive games barely had any storytelling at all was due to memory limitations. Games had to be a lot smaller back then to fit on the cartridges, so they told a bit more of the story through the instruction manual. With the rise of CD technology, developers were able to have properly animated cutscenes with full voice acting by taking advantage of the increased storage capacity, which also meant deeper storylines that could communicate a moral message to players. After all, we can learn new things by playing video games without even realising it.

Originally posted by ПарадДикихМаппеt:

It was bold enough to have moments of darkness. It's purely cute now it's a shame.

People these days seem to think that anything that's cartoony is for kids and adults only enjoy gritty, realistic and mature games or movies nowadays and that there's no in-between. That's just how I feel and I could be wrong about that, but that's the general impression I get personally.

[靈 El Riesgo Siempre Vive]

It's definitely okay. There needs to be something wholesome around.

[Nori Doorman]

I take it pi am the only one that doesn't try to link up the games to one big story? I keep the oldes separate from the newer games. Keep the newer 2d games separate from the newer 3d games, ds separate to console and ect.

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by Scottish Echidna:

I take it pi am the only one that doesn't try to link up the games to one big story? I keep the oldes separate from the newer games. Keep the newer 2d games separate from the newer 3d games, ds separate to console and ect.

While I get where you're coming from, at the same time, there still needs to be some level of consistency with the series.

[Null_User]

Phew. I missed this thread back then but managed to read most of it now. As for Tails as a character. yes, I'm disappointed the writing team destroyed pretty much all of his progress since SA so far. BUT, one thing I never saw mentioned here, and I really wonder why it wasn't, was the shock and mental effect of seeing one's hero "die" right in front of you.... worse, while he's desperately needing your help.

Tails as a character, I feel that while he did progress, it was still on somewhat shaky ground (he's still a child and was bullied before, so that doesn't help at all), and any hard change to his current normalcy would revert him to an earlier mind state or worse. So seeing the character he's been looking up to, and who he most likely thought was pretty much invincible, "die" before his very eyes, and on top of that seeing a lot of supposedly beaten past villains come out of nowhere in a show of hopelessness (remember nobody bot Shadow at this point thought those were copies), and add THEN on top of that the pleas for help Sonic directed at him (Tails was trying to analyze a way for Sonic to be able to handle the current situation but he failed in Sonic's biggest moment of need). Yeah. The mind state regression was the lesser of the bad outcomes to see here. Simply studying that scene broke my heart and in some amount, I can relate to it.

That's why then that when the Chaos 0 scene happened, where Tails even tells the robot he can't fix him, relates to this mind break up. Basically, Tails was simply shell shocked to his very core. And it is an effect seen even in real life, experienced mostly by Military and First Responders when tragedy strikes in front of them and they can't do anything to help. In these cases, people close themselves, some quit their jobs and other go further down the tragedy line.

That's my opinion on tails. Was I disappointed they took that route with him? Yes, very, but still we have to understand the moment.

As for the other topic being run around this thread related to adults and platform video game stories, people can call me a kid, or retarded, or whatever they want. Those who would mock, laugh or see me as weird/loser/whatever for it don't pay my bills nor gave me life so unless they say something constructive that helps me or the society, I won't care. Still, I respect their opinion and preferences. So yeah, I DO go after video game stories. And if these stories are good and appealing to me, I relate to them. That I would have preferred a simple Sonic lore and would still like it? Yes, all of yes. But if we are gonna get a story like Forces and make it the new canon normal for the franchise, at least have writers and a dev team that tries to make a good thing instead of rushing and ending up with a bad tasting mess.

These are my opinions. They may be mutable with the correct evidence and a proper, peaceful discussion. But I feel nobody should get triggered for them as they are just the view of some random player.

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by Hanuke:

Phew. I missed this thread back then but managed to read most of it now. As for Tails as a character. yes, I'm disappointed the writing team destroyed pretty much all of his progress since SA so far. BUT, one thing I never saw mentioned here, and I really wonder why it wasn't, was the shock and mental effect of seeing one's hero "die" right in front of you.... worse, while he's desperately needing your help.

Tails as a character, I feel that while he did progress, it was still on somewhat shaky ground (he's still a child and was bullied before, so that doesn't help at all), and any hard change to his current normalcy would revert him to an earlier mind state or worse. So seeing the character he's been looking up to, and who he most likely thought was pretty much invincible, "die" before his very eyes, and on top of that seeing a lot of supposedly beaten past villains come out of nowhere in a show of hopelessness (remember nobody bot Shadow at this point thought those were copies), and add THEN on top of that the pleas for help Sonic directed at him (Tails was trying to analyze a way for Sonic to be able to handle the current situation but he failed in Sonic's biggest moment of need). Yeah. The mind state regression was the lesser of the bad outcomes to see here. Simply studying that scene broke my heart and in some amount, I can relate to it.

And then look back at Adventure 2 - when Tails saw Sonic being ejected out of the space colony via a capsule set to explode and kill Sonic, Tails still showed the courage to stop Eggman after the development he went through in Adventure 1. After all, it was more than just Sonic's life on the line, but the fate of the entire world as well.

Originally posted by Hanuke:

So yeah, I DO go after video game stories. And if these stories are good and appealing to me, I relate to them. That I would have preferred a simple Sonic lore and would still like it? Yes, all of yes. But if we are gonna get a story like Forces and make it the new canon normal for the franchise, at least have writers and a dev team that tries to make a good thing instead of rushing and ending up with a bad tasting mess.

The problem isn't that it's a platformer trying to tell a story - there are ways to tell good stories in platformers without getting in the way of the experience. Spyro Year of the Dragon is probably my go to example of the kind of story I expect out of a platformer, with a story that looked and felt cartoony yet still had serious moments when needed but it was never dark, while adding lore and world building to it making the whole experience much more interesting as a result.

[Null_User]

Originally posted by NBOX21:

And then look back at Adventure 2 - when Tails saw Sonic being ejected out of the space colony via a capsule set to explode and kill Sonic, Tails still showed the courage to stop Eggman after the development he went through in Adventure 1. After all, it was more than just Sonic's life on the line, but the fate of the entire world as well.

Yeah. There's that part indeed. It was impactful. But I feel what happened to Tails in Forces, the in-your-face beating of his hero instead of a distant explosion, seeing all those previously defeated enemies coming back and all that stuff, had a greater impact in my opinion. NOW, if I were the writer, I wouldn't have done such a hard regeression. Maybe a temporary bout of anger and self guilt that would get fixed mid story all by himself without having to resort to seeing classic Sonic for it. Or if I wanted Tails out of the main active story to introduce Buddy Avatar as Sonic's main combat partner, I would have just found a secondary job for him somewhere else. I mean, Forces was supposed to be a large scale war on multiple fronts. There's no lack of needed positions in such a war. BUT, we have what we have, and I wanted to try and make some sense of it, because we can't change what the dev team wrote now.

Originally posted by NBOX21:

The problem isn't that it's a platformer trying to tell a story - there are ways to tell good stories in platformers without getting in the way of the experience. Spyro Year of the Dragon is probably my go to example of the kind of story I expect out of a platformer, with a story that looked and felt cartoony yet still had serious moments when needed but it was never dark, while adding lore and world building to it making the whole experience much more interesting as a result.

My go-to story rich platformer (as far as that genre goes at least) is Klonoa 1. This game was very well designed and written. it gave you a reason and a meaning to go from point A to point B and jump over all those platforms and enemies along the way. If had funny parts of course, but along the game and through the end, you get to see a story with a surprising amount of feels that tells a story about loss, courage and unconditional friendship. And it's proof that a platformer can get a great story while having great gameplay.

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by Hanuke:

My go-to story rich platformer (as far as that genre goes at least) is Klonoa 1. This game was very well designed and written. it gave you a reason and a meaning to go from point A to point B and jump over all those platforms and enemies along the way. If had funny parts of course, but along the game and through the end, you get to see a story with a surprising amount of feels that tells a story about loss, courage and unconditional friendship. And it's proof that a platformer can get a great story while having great gameplay.

Oh yeah, how could I forget? The reason I brought up Spyro 3 instead was because it used fully animated cutscenes with full voice acting in a 3D platformer instead of text boxes in a 2.5D game. It wasn't as deep as Klonoa but almost as immersive thanks to how well it built up the main villain and its world, not to mention the villain's most trustworthy slave turning against her after revealing her ultimate plans as a rather clever plot twist near the end. Simple, yet effective.

Again, I don't expect RPG levels of stoeytelling in a platformer; we have games like Final Fantasy 7 and Paper Mario The Thousand Year Door for that - just one that contextualises and motivates gameplay while being complimentary to the overall experience, which is one of the main reasons why I loved Sonic Unleashed's story despite how simple it was.

[靈 El Riesgo Siempre Vive]

Sonic Unleashed is great imo due to the implications when you overthink it just a bit. Eggman killed billions of people fracturing the Earth like that. MURDERED BILLIONS OF PEOPLE. Hey look talking squirrel..love it

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by ДикийМаппетДжаз:

Sonic Unleashed is great imo due to the implications when you overthink it just a bit. Eggman killed billions of people fracturing the Earth like that. MURDERED BILLIONS OF PEOPLE. Hey look talking squirrel..love it

Yet they were still able to show us the threat at large without needing a single line of dialogue, which in turn helps motivates gameplay greatly.