Sonic

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Thad
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Re: Sonic

Postby Thad » Tue Jul 25, 2017 12:56 pm

Crackpot idea time:

I recently started blogging again. Then, a few days later, I stopped, because I've got some carpal tunnel or arthritis or something in my right thumb and I'm trying to take it easy. (I am typing this with my left index finger; it is slow going.)

Well, since the Archie Sonic comic is back in the news, and fanboys are getting upset at Ken Penders all over again (as Archie botching its WFH agreements was probably one of the considerations that led Sega to pull up stakes), it occurs to me that I probably still have all my contemporaneous Sonic comic reviews from the 1990s (Hell, I did that whole hard drive recovery thing a few years back). Maybe I should dig those up and start posting them on my blog.

(Special thanks for the idea go to the angry fanboy who just directed me to a YouTube video of some guy in a fedora talking about how Sonic Live sucks. Motherfucker, I don't need some guy in a fedora to tell me Sonic Live sucks.)

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Thad
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Re: Sonic

Postby Thad » Wed Jul 26, 2017 1:35 am

...great. Now I've gone through a stack of hard drives, haven't found it, and I'm all stressed out about it. Not so much over losing that stuff in particular as losing it again after all the trouble I went to to recover it the last time.

(There are some old unlabeled hard drives at the bottom of the pile; one of them might be the original damn Win98 drive, if I really want to try recovering it in a VM all over again. Better yet, one of them might be the drive that already has the VM and all the recovered files on it, though I'm not going to count on it.)

I do have e-mails from '94-'96 and '98 and on, but apparently I wrote all my Sonic comic reviews in '97.

...boy I talked like a pretentious jagoff in '98. Some of the best advice I've ever received was after the first paper I submitted to my senior honors English teacher (this would have been '99), who then took me aside and gave me the Hemingway lecture: if you want to impress me, quit being fancy and get to the fucking point. (I'm paraphrasing.)

Just how successful I've been at following that advice is subject to debate. But at least I no longer write sentences like these:

Teen Thad wrote:I've always respected you for your grace in the acceptance of criticism.
Quite a few of us (myself not least) have gone a little overboard in our
attacks on your work, but you've always taken it with a shaker's worth
of grains of salt.

Thad 98 wrote:Right, "going out of your way" is a tad melodramatic. My opinion is
that you toss the continuity to the wind when it's convenient to do so,
but marry the two series otherwise.


You know, reading terrible 20-year-old Sonic e-mails actually makes me want to find the correct terrible 20-year-old Sonic e-mails and post them in public more.

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Re: Sonic

Postby Friday » Wed Jul 26, 2017 7:43 am

You're stronger than me, Thad. If I read anything I wrote in the 90s, I would scream for a period of time at minimum long enough to cause my death.
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Re: Sonic

Postby Friday » Wed Jul 26, 2017 7:45 am

But yeah now I really want to read the correct terrible emails too you monster
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Re: Sonic

Postby IGNORE ME » Wed Jul 26, 2017 11:37 am

It's horrific but not surprising that I recognize the context of those snippets.

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Re: Sonic

Postby Thad » Tue Aug 01, 2017 10:48 am

Friday wrote:You're stronger than me, Thad. If I read anything I wrote in the 90s, I would scream for a period of time at minimum long enough to cause my death.


That's kind of the point. It's like a haunted house, and the monster is yourself.

When I recovered KateStory 9, there was definitely a feeling of "Oh dear God, this is what I've been trying to get for ten years?" I'm pretty okay with how it turned out, but that's after I cut out all the side conversations, which consisted primarily of me being an asshole for what appears, with the benefit of hindsight, to be absolutely no reason.

Brentai wrote:It's horrific but not surprising that I recognize the context of those snippets.


And you weren't even on that mailing list!

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Re: Sonic

Postby Niku » Tue Aug 15, 2017 9:10 pm

The Sonic Hater Has Logged On.

I don't know why I bought Sonic Mania? Like, I don't think I've really enjoyed a Sonic game without reservation since the first time I played through Sonic 3 and Knuckles back at it's release. Owning a Genesis during it's heyday was the last time I was into the series at all (though I don't hate the Adventure games, just kinda lukewarm on them), and going back to play the original games at one point just made me wonder why I liked them at all back then. I don't really care for Sonic level design, or the momentum of the movement, or their boss battles.

But Sonic Mania is .. okay? Like, they perfectly recreated all the shit I DON'T like about the Genesis games, so it's remarkable how damn well they managed to do that. And they actually added in some stuff I definitely DO like, like pretty goddamn good boss battles (including an incredibly cheeky one early on that is my favorite part of the game so far). It's got my favorite bonus stage (the 3D ones where you have to convert the blue orbs) and a weird fucking F-Zero esque chase bonus stage that I'm less jazzed about. It's got the elemental shields from 3 that I always liked. I don't know! As someone who has pretty much gone fully into the "Sonic the Hedgehog games were NEVER good" camp, I'm enjoying myself more than I'm not with Mania so far. I'm hoping that'll change to outright having fun unreservedly when I play as Knuckles; maybe should have just started with him in the first place, but the slower pace of his ability to climb around and explore made me enjoy the levels a lot more than playing as Sonic back in the day.

Also it's fucking gorgeous, doing for the Genesis kind of what Shovel Knight was doing for the NES. But I think we all figured out that bit early on.
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Re: Sonic

Postby Niku » Sat Aug 19, 2017 10:42 pm

After beating it I wanted to try to get the rest of the Chaos emeralds, but tracking down the level entrances only to lose quickly in the UFO minigame got old preeeetty quickly. So I loaded up the debug mode in the secrets menu of the no-save game slot, spawned the bonus ring over and over again to practice the levels, and got all the Chaos emeralds that way.

Figured I'd go ahead and debug-breeze my way through the rest of the game, spending some time as Super Sonic in the more fun levels, and see how the ending changed when you get all the Chaos Emeralds.

the game crashed to black as soon as i beat the final boss
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Re: Sonic

Postby Rico » Sun Aug 20, 2017 3:49 am

Niku
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Re: Sonic

Postby Wheels » Sun Aug 20, 2017 6:12 pm

Yeah, and it's the one full of LIES
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Re: Sonic

Postby Niku » Tue Aug 22, 2017 7:19 pm

Got the rest of the Emeralds all legit like on my save file; you get an extra boss fight at the end that's kinda neat when you go to that trouble! I doubt I'm going to go all the way and get the rest of the Gold medals since I got all the silver ones, and you only need silver to unlock the various unlockables as it is. In the end, the levels have some good gimmicks and pull the nice Mario trick of unique challenges and tricks in a level not outstaying their welcome, but it's still all just a Sonic game for better and for worse.
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Re: Sonic

Postby Wheels » Sat Sep 02, 2017 2:07 pm

[11:57 PM] Defenestration: I can't believe how much of a joy that Sonic Mania is.
[11:58 PM] Defenestration: I've never really had the moments that people talk about when they are transported back to being a kid. But the swerves in level design in the Act 1 stages where they pixel perfect for like the first 30 seconds and then... wait, what?
[11:58 PM] Defenestration: And then just raw excitement at the remix in Act 2.
[11:59 PM] Defenestration: this game is going to hurt so, so much when it betrays me.
[11:59 PM] Defenestration: But oh my god it's so good at the moment.
[11:59 PM] Defenestration: references to shit I NEVER THOUGHT would see the light of day
[11:59 PM] Defenestration: Combination Rings from Knuckles' Chaotix are a powerup!
[11:59 PM] Defenestration: just
[11:59 PM] Defenestration: SO GOOD
[12:02 AM] Defenestration: Games have made me happy. Most recently, Persona 5's build up and climax made me very happy. But this is a weird sort of... combination aura of joy, refuge, and positive nostalgia throughout like I have never experienced, start to finish.(edited)
[12:03 AM] Defenestration: I've actually forced myself to stop playing so it won't be wasted on one short work night.
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Re: Sonic

Postby Wheels » Sat Sep 02, 2017 2:10 pm

tl;dr I have no idea what Niku is talking about, this game is 100% upside. Turns out the betrayal (necessary in a Sonic game for the sake of karmic balance of the universe) was Denuvo copy protection, and not at all a fault in the experience itself. Absolute must play for any child of the 80s.
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Re: Sonic

Postby Wheels » Sat Sep 02, 2017 2:13 pm

Meanwhile,

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Re: Sonic

Postby Thad » Sat Apr 28, 2018 5:18 pm

Haven't played the original Sonic game in a couple of decades so I figured I'd fire it up.

I forgot the levels were designed by assholes.

I remembered Labyrinth Zone was bullshit, of course, because like everybody else, the drowning music haunts my dreams.

But I forgot just how much of it is "step in the wrong place and you instantly die. Well, not instantly. More like you very slowly try to get away and can't because you're underwater, so you've got several seconds of knowing you just stepped on a platform that's going to jam you into spikes and there's nothing you can do about it."

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Re: Sonic

Postby Kazz » Mon Apr 30, 2018 6:24 pm

Yeah, that part was like.. okay, the character is supposed to go real fast, right? Well, then you suddenly gotta just be really careful and steady and not miss any jumps, and due to the way Sonic moves slowly at first, he ends up being slower than Mario would be on the same stage.
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Re: Sonic

Postby Thad » Sun May 06, 2018 12:27 pm

So IDW's Sonic comic is out. It's been shipping weekly; it's four issues in and they've all sold out.

I finally saw a copy of #1 on the shelf (second printing), so I picked it up.

It's pretty good!

Not a whole lot happens, but it's a pretty fun issue. Artist Tracy Yardley does a fantastic job with the layouts and the action; he really gives a good impression of the speed and momentum of the games. Most of the issue is spent on Sonic pinballing around and wrecking robots.

My one gripe is, I don't much care for how he draws Sonic and Tails; they're too angular for my tastes. That might be Sega's call and not his, though.

Both Yardley and writer Ian Flynn were brought over from Archie's surprisingly long-running Sonic series (as was Jim Amash, who's been inking Sonic comics for, what, 25 years?), but it shouldn't surprise anyone that this is a clean break and they're not bringing any of the Archie series' backstory (or original characters) with them. #1 is back-to-basics; it's got Sonic and Tails in it, Amy appears on the last page, and Eggman and Knuckles are both mentioned but don't show up.

I haven't much followed Sonic for the past 20 years or so. I know Flynn is highly regarded and most of the fandom seems to agree he's the best writer the Sonic comic's ever had (and I've heard even higher praise for his work on the Mega Man comics). Here, he's...perfectly serviceable. He gets the job done. He introduces the main characters, the conflict, and a mystery to drive a six-issue story arc. That's what an issue #1 is in 2018; if there's not enough meat on that skeleton to satisfy my tastes, that's not Flynn's fault.

It's not enough to get me back into picking up Sonic comics on the regular. But it's fun. I wish Flynn, Yardley, and the rest of the team the best.

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Re: Sonic

Postby Thad » Sat Dec 22, 2018 1:11 pm

I went ahead and got that Sonic bundle.

This is also my first time trying out Steam Play, Valve's new feature that takes all the configuration hassle out of WINE/DXVK and turns playing Windows games on Linux into a transparent, one-click process. (Well, two-click, since the first time you start a game it warns you that it's running in a compatibility layer.)

None of the Sonic games are officially supported by Valve; I couldn't get Sonic Adventure 2 to launch at all (even after following the instructions on the ProtonDB page). But Sonic Mania works great out of the box.

Well, I say "works great" -- there are some frame drops that are pretty noticeable, and shouldn't be happening on a game with such modest graphical demands. That could be down to WINE, but I suspect it's Denuvo, as I've seen similar reports about how the game performs under Windows. Fucking Denuvo. Glad I got this game in a Humble Bundle and gave all the money to charity.

I played through Green Hill. It was good! I liked the twists on the original level layout, with elements from later games. And I liked the Sonic 3-style touch of changing the musical arrangement on Act II (Act I has the original stage music, II has a new version).

And I went 3 for 4 on Blue Sphere. Guess I've still got the muscle memory and the reflexes, but man, now it elevates my heart rate in a way that's not a whole lot of fun. I didn't like that part so much.

So I'm enjoying the game and looking forward to playing more, despite the annoying frame drops. And as much as I'm impressed by the game, I'm really impressed by how well Steam Play works. No, it's not quite perfect (again, I can't get Sonic Adventure 2 to launch at all), but it's still a huge advance in Linux gaming.

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Re: Sonic

Postby IGNORE ME » Sat Dec 22, 2018 3:01 pm

I'm in the same boat with Blue Sphere; I can still do it, but it's disorienting in a way I don't really remember it being. Not sure if it's simple age, being too used to modern 3D, NOT being used to the sort of pseudo-3D crap that everybody else was doing at the time anymore, or some combination of the above, idk.

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Re: Sonic

Postby Thad » Sat Dec 22, 2018 3:32 pm

I don't think it's any of that; I think it's just the amount of concentration and precision required. There's that tension, that adrenalin rush that used to be fun in my teens and twenties but now it's uncomfortable.

Had the same thing when I replayed Mario 3 a couple years back; it got a lot better once I went on blood pressure meds. Could be today's just an off day. (I'm almost certain I took my BP pill last night but I took it later than usual so I guess that could have thrown off the effects.) I don't remember it being nearly as unpleasant when I played through Angel Island on Sonic 3 a month or two ago, though I also didn't do as good a job that time as I did today (possibly related to both lowered BP and performance: I was drinking a beer that time -- come to think of it, I played Sonic Mania right after my morning coffee this morning; maybe that was a mistake).

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