It's not technically fan art, so it technically doesn't run afoul of the "no "awesome" fan art" rule. I can still understand why it bothers people, though I find the whole thing utterly hilarious myself. I find it more akin to mocking the worse-off moments of official Sonic media, like things on Awkward Sonic Photos or our collective obsession with "Nocturne" (no Beef that isn't license to post it again).
It's not technically fan art, so it technically doesn't run afoul of the "no "awesome" fan art" rule. I can still understand why it bothers people, though I find the whole thing utterly hilarious myself. I find it more akin to mocking the worse-off moments of official Sonic media, like things on Awkward Sonic Photos or our collective obsession with "Nocturne" (no Beef that isn't license to post it again).
You gotta live with it. Espically if that whole crew at bumbleking gotta live with it. And the writters and artists and shit moderate that site. Be like
" hey ian did you see the latest update from ken pender psychosis"
and then ian sees it and just sits with his head in his hands, thinking
" I used to look up to this guy, and then this"
Penders doesn't even actually release anything, his releases would just be updates about diving farther into the insanity realm.
Might anyone be able to recommend a good individual level speedrun of one of the Genesis (or CD) Sonic games? Something entertaining to watch, utilizing strange glitches (like the "Look Down" camera panning being abused)? I'm thinking something crazy from Sonic 3 would work best, since that game could really break.
TAS is okay; I might have time to play one TAS and one not, depending on length.
It really is. It's been a while since I've posted anything about the comic at length, but Universe #63 and the last couple issues of StH have been such a return to form that I'll probably bang on about them a bit later.
Yeah, a lot of the graphics are placeholders. Had we gone on with this design, it would have been cleaned up with new art and looked much better (for example, the Death Egg Robot would have been inside an aquarium). But obviously, before that sort of dev time is invested we have to be sure that the design is going to work - and after several discussions it was decided that the Sonic 2 bosses should not occur outside of their "canon" environments.
Looking back on it now, I think I actually prefer just being able to blast though the bosses with next to no filler.
Life income seems to be tuned around multiplayer, oddly enough. So much of the game isn't designed around having two players running around at all (much like DKCR), which results in the both of them dying left and right, at which point you start pumping banana coins into red balloons and nothing else.
Alright, comic books. I don't know where to begin and the last time I talked about anything at length was... #253, so let's start with Things That Suck:
The series was busy trying to unravel Flynn's Gordian plot and pretend it wasn't collapsing under legal pressure in the issues leading up to Worlds Collide and not doing a good job of either, so at the time I figured the four month break in having to care about continuity would be a great chance to clean up the loose ends and really hit the ground running after the fact.
Instead we got five straight issues of this shit, one scene for every major character (minus Sonic, plus Naugus) where they go through this dual memory mind blast and everything gets really angsty for a couple pages while we retread how miserable everything was pre-WC. Having them remember the past continuity was apparently editor Paul Kaminski's idea and I have no clue why he and Flynn went along with it. It's the sort of idea that sounds great when you come up with it at one in the morning, and then you look at it the next day and wonder what the hell you were thinking, only they ran with it for half a year. The in-universe justification for how it happens is paper thin and mostly serves to let them delay the Unleashed arc while burning issues on reintroducing the cast. And I'd understand doing a Meet the Team arc if they'd done a clean break and wanted to properly restart the series for new readers and Mega Man fans who had a lingering subscription from WC. But you don't then constantly remind the reader that there was a reboot. It's incredibly jarring and eats up valuable pages for the sole purpose of sending the series into mood whiplash every time. There's a lot to like when it isn't the focus, but even then Sonic and Tails won't shut up about it and how the new reality is actually pretty great because all the stuff they're moping over no longer applies.
It's a dreadful attempt to placate existing fans and convince them that the old continuity they were invested in still matters while simultaneously trying to talk them into accepting the new one. What should have been a triumphant relaunch of the series coming off of its most publicized event ever ended up being poisoned, not by legal demands, but by Archie themselves. Absolutely mind boggling.
Another weird editorial choice is that Universe #62 and StH #259 were themed as "After the Credits Month", which was pitched as being analogous to superhero movie stingers. In practice it was a way for them to push variant cover sales, since the normal and variant cover of each issue had a different ending page, for a total of four of these things. The two pages for the normal covers (the ones subscribers get) were dry as toast and wouldn't have been missed in the slightest. Over in the variant covers though, one offered a first look at a new character, and the other
reintroduced Snivley as a GUN scientist
. Subscribers are understandably not happy about this.
Things That Don't Suck But Which I'm Ambivalent About:
Meanwhile over in Universe we have Yardley writing an arc set in Blaze's universe to dodge the legal shenanigans. It's serviceable, but Yardley simply isn't a great writer. That's followed up with a Shadow arc that's effectively a micro-rehash of ShtH's plot, complete with the "whose side is he on?" stuff that was tired ten years ago. It reestablishes Team Dark, although not as well as prior issues have, and sets up a new villain who might pay off down the line but is thus far pretty bland. I can understand why the first arc was off-world, but setting the second one in space when there's a whole planet shattering down below makes it feel like filler.
Things That Are Legitimately Great and Make Me Mourn a Largely Squandered Half Year:
As it stands, if the "where do I start reading the series?" question comes up again, #258 will be the issue I respond with. There were glimpses of what the reboot could be in #252-257; the character dynamics were good when they were focused on the task at hand, and they pulled off a tour of Wood Zone, Metropolis Zone, Mystic Ruins, Station Square, and Metal Harbor in quick succession, which is leagues above the trouble the series had working game locales into continuity before. But being bogged down by the constant "oh noes my memories " nonsense killed the fun.
#258 is about a train robbery. (recommended listening: Falk's Radical Train ~ The Chase mix)
In one issue we've got a better sense of who everyone on the team is, what they can do, and how they work together than in the last six issues combined, and with loads of game references and zero mentions of the past along for the ride. Introducing characters by jumping straight into the action works out so much better. And it's extremely refreshing to have the series be straight optimism and good vibes again, which is a state it hasn't been in for a very long time. The only dramatic tension at the moment is coming from Eggman and the trappings of the Unleashed plot, and that's exactly as it should be.
So that's StH proper sorted out for the moment, and with the next arc's solicits sounding like pure fun I think it's finally, finally found its groove again. But Universe is a slightly different beast by design and its last arc certainly didn't inspire the same sort of confidence, so let's check in on the latest one.
Welp.
Chaos promptly bails to go hang out in StH, and whaddya know, spirit Tikal's still around giving unhelpful hints. Knuckles' entire supporting cast got Pendered the most out of anyone, so Ian's left to cobble together a new one based on what scraps the games provided and whatever he creates from whole cloth, and on that note:
They show up without fanfare in these two pages and aren't heard from again, and from the sounds of the solicits won't be returning for the rest of the arc either. But as I just said, introducing characters on the fly like this is the way to go; Fixit's blatantly gizoid tech while Relic (this is a pika) already has some small amount of history with Knuckles that we're not privy to. I already want to see more of them and find out what their deal is, and the last new character to share that trait was Shard, so they're in good company.
Then Knuckles proceeds to reenact the lyrics to Pumpkin Hill with the Chaotix in tow. Espio found a personality somewhere while Charmy and Vector play off each other better than ever. And if you want more game references:
It's a great issue even without being pure action like StH #258-9, and reminds me quite a lot of Sonic the Comic's Knuckles stories of all things.
I always want to be able to wholeheartedly recommend both series, and it's been a while since I've been able to do that. We'll see if the good times last or if this is a blip and things take a dive again, but for the moment we're at a rare peak in quality that's backed by being more strongly rooted in the games than ever before by a wide margin.
Nice write-up Sciz, good to hear things are finally settling again. I gotta get back into the comics myself sometime, but alas, life is cruel and unusual.
Side Note: It seems TheOGB's time in the spreadsheet is using the Skills one, but he posted a No Skills time later (with online time attack). Should use the latter.
Went through and updated the spreadsheets, and added the skills category. And I added pretty colours! (quote: )
I'm starting to think that because it took long for folks to join in and that some people are busy with finals / other stuff this week, I should extend it to May 17th. How does that feel? It gives me a parameter to aim for when discussing Sonic Unleashed's stuff when we do that one.
I'll start doing some speedruns tonight and start filling out that PS3 sheet.
Side Note: It seems TheOGB's time in the spreadsheet is using the Skills one, but he posted a No Skills time later (with online time attack). Should use the latter.
That used to work, but now it just hates me. I just tried to do it now and it spits back that the game got corrupted (there might have been another issue though this time as I had recently re-installed it).
Expect to see some 'LTTP: Time and Eternity' threads in the near future, unless the game's scarred so many GAFfers that they'll avoid to even talk about it as a mental defense =V
Oh and WHY THE HECK IS SONIC 2 IOS STILL NOT AVAILABLE IN MY REGION?!!? SEGA PLS.
LOL! It's so fun watching you two. Updated the spreadsheet. :O
I volunteered to do a quick emergency OT since the game is out on Tuesday but when I'm finished with that, I'll work on some runs while doing laundry.
PS: Kirby's fuckin' awesome. It's soooo goooooooooooood/cuuuuuuuuuuuute. I really wished that Kirby Fighters had online, though. The music's really good, too. I'm enjoying it a lot. I do wish some powerups haven't been rendered redundant, though. I think Return to Dream Land had better use of them. But man I love it. It's so delightfully Kirby.
Maybe I'll post some thoughts on Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze since I beat it earlier today. It was... a good game. With a good soundtrack. >.>
My copy of Yoshi 3DS was given to my friend who was in UK so he'd give it to me when he arrives.
Turns out he left the game with a friend of his to bring with him but that guy hasn't come back yet =V
Def. interested in trying the new Kirby game though.
Currently replaying Mario and Luigi 4 on 3DS, and god is the music in this game superb.
