#i still have to s rank eggmanland before i retire

[latin-dr-robotnik]

Closing thoughts on Sonic Unleashed’s character presentation and development

The year is coming to a close, and so it means my year-long adventure with Sonic World Adventure has come to an end aswell. Since April of this year I started taking notes on some of the underlying themes going on in the game, and it seems I struck a vein of interest in the fandom by doing so, so I kept digging and documenting each optional dialog from Amy till we reached this point, and now I would like to offer some closing words.

Edit: Buckle up, folks, turns out it’s a long post below.

Sonic Unleashed did a lot of things well with its characters, but I can’t shake off the feeling that it also was the first symptom of something that is a real issue nowadays: Tails gets the short end of the stick constantly in this game, not only because of Chip -the “sidekick of the week” if you like-, but also because of Professor Pickle. The way he flew away from Dark Gaia’s monsters at the start of the game gave me war flashbacks of Forces!Tails (not to the same extreme, of course), and after reaching Spagonia he just vanishes from the plot in favor of Pickle taking the helm as Sonic’s guide to each Gaia Temple. By the end of the game, Tails served only as a mean to Sonic and Chip’s end (fly them to each country), and he gets wiped from the climax of the game in an unceremoniously way, as he is shot down while flying over Eggmanland by what I believe was the Egg Dragoon. Only at the very end the game remembers “Oh, hey! Tails was always supposed to be Sonic’s best friend!” and gives him that closing moment when he finds Sonic in Apotos and they both blast away as credits roll.

Then there’s Chip. As a disclaimer, I want to say that I don’t think Chip is a bad character, but he didn’t grow on me like it happened for other fans. 

My biggest gripe with Chip is that, since he doesn’t remember anything about his real self until the Adabat temple is restored, he’s just a clean slate for 4/5 of the game, and the game itself does a weird thing with this: on one hand, it relegates all Sonic and Chip’s bonding moments to optional stuff (you have to feed Chip things he likes to raise the hidden friendship meter and get some of his more heartfelt lines and questions, or even those sweet CG clips), something that I did experience (since that’s how I like to play RPGs in general, get the sidequests first then the main one) but many others won’t bother; and on the other hand, the game puts all focus during the main campaign on what little we know of Chip and how he reacts to each location he visits with Sonic as they look for the Gaia Temples. 

This mess ended up leaving me with two feelings: a good one, since I can sit back and enjoy the world adventure at my own pace and without having to constantly follow a potentially convoluted plot (I can lose myself for 20 minutes in a night stage and have fun); and a bad one, since I was going through the game with this lingering feeling on the back of my head that Chip was just an egotistical prick that only cared about his journey through the world, and not at all about Sonic and that monster form he’s getting used to at least until the second half, or what the rest of his friends are doing (which is, by the way, the main reason why I play a Sonic game in the first place, my order of priorities goes as follows: Sonic -> Eggman -> Amy -> Tails & Knux -> Team Dark -> everyone else). 

By the end those thoughts kinda dissapeared so I can safely say I don’t hate Chip at all, it’s just that the game gave me a wrong message about him. Though the best thing I can extract from his relation with Sonic is the following quote, perfectly summarizing what Sonic is all about.

Finally, there’s Amy. I’ve talked a lot about her in my other two posts, but I still have some things to say. First of all, just like @skull001​ pointed out a while ago, she’s the only one that does not lose hope on Sonic when Perfect Dark Gaia is fully unleashed, as everyone else thought the world was doomed, even Professor Pickle himself. This is because of two reasons: 1) she’s Amy, so she’s always the optimistic one (duh); 2) Amy knows Sonic better than everyone else, and also she was there for him all along, checking on his progress and encouraging him to keep going (even lamenting she couldn’t go adventuring with him). Amy does understand how dire the situation actually is, but she knows Sonic always has a plan, y’all just need to have some goddamn faith (+1 for that RDR2 reference, amirite?). She even looks at the sky as the cutscene jumps back to Sonic’s perspective, like when two characters are telepathically communicating (something this series isn’t a stranger to, I remember reading a post here on Tumblr about Sonic X doing that stuff some time ago)

Sidenote: Also, another funny thing I just realized is that, if you as Sonic refuse to go on a date in the final optional dialog just before Eggmanland, Amy will exclaim: “Give a gal a little hope here, Sonic!” She’s willing to put all her hopes that Sonic will end up saving the world (insert the obvious “If I have to choose between the world and Sonic, I’d choose Sonic!” ‘06 line), how hard could it be for Sonic to give her just a little hope? It’s kinda interesting when making the comparison, Amy just asks for the smallest hint and she’ll keep going strong, pretty much like every shipper out there lol.

(Back on topic.) The beautiful part is that Amy actually gets her “I told you so!” moment with Professor Pickle in the very end of the game, and just as he’s being exposed, the old prick goes on a tangent about how darkness and light are part of the world’s balance, and that the cycle of Dark Gaia vs Light Gaia will keep repeating itself. What does Amy think about this?

Yeah, fuck off, Pickle. This is low-key one of my favorite Amy moments ever. She doesn’t care about the balance of the world or any of that philosophical bullshit Pickle was saying, she knew Sonic was there saving the world’s ass, she knew he was the one that made all the difference down there in the Earth’s core, and that is all it matters in the end. Now let’s go and wait till Sonic’s return so we can have a welcoming party and chill since this plot is over. Perfect ending.

So, that’s Sonic Unleashed for ya. Certainly one of the most interesting cases for me to talk about all year, and top 3 favorite 3D Sonic games for sure. There are lots of flaws and scary things that later would become actual issues with the Sonic franchise present in this game, but it also did so many things right I can’t help but applaud Sonic Team for the effort they put. For all intents and purposes, I’ll be thinking on this game a lot when it comes to character presentation and development in future Sonic games, now fully knowing what’s on display, and what lies beyond, deep in optional stuff. I hope you enjoyed reading or even taking part in the discussions I’ve had along this path, and I hope that, just like me, you might have learned something interesting.