04-24-2020, 08:27 PM
I am currently at work on something for the thirtieth anniversary of the Sonic the Hedgehog series for next year. It's supposed to be a retelling of much of the pre-Adventure games, but with some elements from latter entries as well as being a retooling of AOSTH into a less insane, but still comedic, incarnation (as the title suggests). My issue with it right now is the format; ideally, it would be a comic that's part hand-drawn and part sprite-based, yet I'm cautious about asking for volunteers with this. The cheapest option would be to just do a fanfic, the text of which I've included below. I'm kind of worried it's too clunky or poorly structured for this job, the latter being why I had toyed with it being a comic.
-----
Rainy Savanna—a lush region of Mazuri which got its name from the fact that it was cloaked in varying amounts of rain for much of the year. Lightning flashes, shining light briefly upon an outline. In the midst of the grassy expanse, a lone butte rises, a fifteen-foot electrified barbed-wire fence creating a perimeter around it. A chrome tower points skyward, like an accusing finger from out of the rock.
In a great command room within the small fortress is the infamous Dr. Eggman. A brilliant scientist, he is a firm believer in the philosophy that “knowledge is power”; in his case, however, he mainly uses knowledge to gain power over others—to control the world. Nevertheless, he could never attain this end, but this evening, he had a little bait on hand to draw out the main impediment to his goal: a little pink Hedgehog in a swivel chair, wearing a green collar shirt, yellow tutu, and periwinkle tennis shoes.
“Bogey approaching at 72.2 miles per hour,” announced the small red-and-black robot Orbot, from the radar station. “We have confirmation. It’s Sonic.”
The doctor cackled, satisfied by the news, as he tightened the bindings on his captive. “What do you say we roll out the unwelcome mat for him? Send a missile barrage, Cubot.”
Boxy, yellow Cubot, Eggman’s other robot lackey, saluted. “At vonce Herr Doktor!” The robot functioned well, but at one point or another, his voice processor became damaged and he randomly cycled through a databank of hundreds of voices.
Not two seconds later, half a dozen SSMs soared from the side of the butte below the command center, over the electric fence, and into the savanna. Fiery blossoms erupted beneath the darkening sky. Needless to say, they didn’t find their mark.
“Negative contact,” Orbot reported, “Sonic is still coming.”
A missed target was never an excuse for the Doctor to surrender. “No matter—OW! Your little spines hurt!”
“You’ll get hurt worse when Sonic gets here,” said the small hostage.
The incoming intruder came closer to the mesa and, in a single bound, leapt over the electric barbed wire surrounding the edifice, briefly illuminated by a searchlight on the way in. Klaxons wailed, accompanied by machine gun fire followed soon afterwards. Not a single bullet made contact.
The swift intruder circled the butte a couple of times as the auto-turrets vainly tried to reduce him to a bloody pulp, taking a few out in the process. Soon, a wayward spotlight revealed to him a cowl-like structure at the face of the butte. A way in, perhaps?
Safe from the fire for a moment, the interloper soon found himself pulled away by some powerful force, as if a large vacuum was sucking him up. Soon, what little light he had was gone, he was dragged by the violent suction into pitch black darkness. He wasn’t even sure if he was going up, down, left, right, backwards, forwards, or sideways. Eventually, though, he came to an abrupt stop and something snapped shut behind him.
A huge white monitor in the distance shed light on this gatecrasher: a blue Hedgehog with gloves and red, gold-buckled shoes. The light also uncovered his situation: he was stuck in some kind of clear ball, but couldn’t move it for some reason. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that this was a death trap.
The screen flashed for a second, and an image appeared on it. It was a face the Hedgehog knew very well, but it wasn’t a friendly one.
The sight of his old enemy in this situation had Eggman grinning ear to ear. “Well, well, well! It’s nice to see that could drop in on us, Sonic! Not that it was an entirely unexpected visit.”
The trapped Hedgehog folded his arms. “Well, I’m no fan of fat dudes who steal little girls in order to kill me. So how’s about you give her back and you won’t have to go to the ER?”
“Why don’t we play a little game first?”
Sonic rolled his eyes, this was one. “Lemme guess: a giant pinball machine.”
Eggman let out a sinister laugh. “I had a more original punishment in mind for you.” The screen went black.
A glowing red wall appeared in the distance, followed by an orange one in front of it, then a brown one in front of that, then yellow, then green, and finally blue. Finally, a single white rectangle appeared behind the Hedgehog’s confinement. It was definitely a clear ball.
The ball began to move toward the rectangle and bounced off, toward the blue wall. Contact with the wall gave Sonic a small shock and it revealed part of the green wall behind it. The fact that the ball kept picking up speed as the game progressed wasn’t helping matters. It seemed like it would go on forever until Sonic fell behind the glowing paddle. He was dizzy, but when he could see straight, half of the blue wall was gone and a little bit of yellow had been revealed.
Dizzy from all the back-and-forth, Sonic was flat on his chest, waiting for the world to stop spinning. Okay, I was wrong, he thought.
“Awww, feeling a little weak?” Eggman asked, mockingly. “I still have two lives left!”
Not good, Sonic thought. If this keeps up, I’m Hedgehog juice.
Eggman’s lethal game of Breakout resumed. As the ball careened toward the electrified barrier ahead once more, the trapped Hedgehog could see something tiny on the casing. A crack in the sphere, perhaps?
More of the blockade had vanished, revealing the brown wall at last and finishing off the blue wall, save of the left corner of the field. In the calm where Sonic’s ball was being moved into position for the third and final life, the Hedgehog within was busy with his scheme. It was too cramped for the employment of a Spin Dash, but if he could scratch up the glass enough with his quills…
Eggman’s final life was in play. More back-and-forth between the blockade and the paddle, but to Sonic’s relief the damage he had done to the shell was enough. Even though he’d get a jolt, the pressure on the ball he was in was causing the wear and tear from the scratches to combine with the crack he’d discovered. The ball became weaker and weaker, and finally shattered.
“Mein Doktor, Sonic has escaped der Breakout room!”
Eggman didn’t need Cubot to tell him this; after all, he was the one playing the game. “Thank you, Mr. Obvious! Level-5 alert, Orbot!”
“Alright!” the hostage cheered. “I knew he was going to get out! I knew it!”
Eggman grinned, ready to throw a damper on the Hedgehog’s sunny outlook. “Oh, there may be no more Breakout, Amy-Waymee,” he told her, “but Sonic’s not in this command room yet, and I still got a baseload of badniks between him and us.” He changed the channel on the monitor, to reveal Sonic’s current position in the complex: running down a hallway as a pair of wasp-like Buzzbombers pursued, abdomen-mounted beam guns firing as they gave chase. The screen cut to another camera: from behind a trio of Crabmeats, staring down the oncoming Hedgehog, claws ready to fire. He jumped through the midst of the salvos unscathed, the Buzzbombers still on his tail. Another camera: Sonic turned sharply to the left, the pursuing badniks were unable to successfully clear the corner and smashed into the wall. Two creatures emerged from the wreckage: a tiny white chicken and a penguin of the same size.
“I hate to be the barer of bad news, Doctor,” said Orbot, timidly, “but Sonic’s getting closer to the main elevator.”
“Close the blast doors immediately,” he ordered Cubot, “but have Boximushi on standby!”
“Jawohl, mein Doktor!”
More of these guys. No sooner had Sonic got rid of the pair of Buzzbombers on his six a moment ago did four more replace them. It was getting annoying. However, the stakes were getting higher: at the end of the corridor stood an elevator terminal, one that was slowly and steadily vanishing behind a shrinking rectangle bordered by steel! Gotta time this just right…
WHAM!! Suddenly, Sonic went flying backward. When he came to a moment later, not only did he discover that he’d made it, but Eggman had another robot waiting for him: one standing about three yards tall and structurally similar to a kangaroo but with the head of an ant and four arms with boxing gloves, shifting left and right on its legs.
“Nice one,” the Hedgehog remarked. “It just sucks that I’m ready for you now!” With that, Sonic leaned over and began what appeared to be a continuous somersault in one spot, spinning faster and faster with each passing second. In an instant, he rocketed clean through the robot’s torso, and landed gracefully in front of the elevator. He turned around to watch the wrecked machine collapse under its own weight before casually pressing the open button on the side of the door.
“I want every possible badnik at every terminal!” Eggman barked into the intercom’s microphone, now sounding a lot more flustered than he was a few minutes ago. “We have him cornered!” He turned to Orbot. “Make sure that elevator climbs slowly!”
“You lost,” Amy said, triumphantly. “My Sonic won’t die that easily!”
“Where’s he going to run in such a tiny, little elevator?” A nerve-wracked, but still hopeful Eggman gloated.
“You’re lying to yourself!”
“Am I, Amy?” the doctor asked “Or am I just being logical?”
Ping! The elevator doors opened and a swarm of tiny animals scurried out into the command room, leaving a mess of wrecked badnik parts and a triumphant blue Hedgehog standing in the midst of it. Sonic was there.
Eggman looked as let down as a five-year-old who only got nothing but rocks for Christmas.
Amy, though, was the complete opposite: “I told you!”
Before you could say “Spin Dash”, Sonic let one tear across the threshold and into the doctor’s belly, sending him bouncing away like a beach ball The Hedgehog landed right next to Amy, confidently staring down the stricken Eggman.
Eggman was alright, but scooted backward, butt still on the floor with an arm extended, begging for mercy. “P-Please Sonic! Not again! I’m sorry!”
Sonic slowly began to walk forward, with a playful smirk on his face. “After making off with Amy and trying to kill me several times tonight, the asking price for forgiveness is a little higher now.”
“D-D-Don’t hurt me anymore!” Eggman begged. “Please just let me PUSH THIS!!” As soon as he said “PUSH THIS!!”, Eggman’s terrified expression instantly gave way to cocky confidence as he pushed a button on the console he had retreated up against.
A hatch in the ceiling opened and an open net came down upon the surprised Sonic. Small, powerful magnets clacked when the trap reached the floor.
“Cubot, run self-destruct cycle NOW!” Eggman ordered, standing back up and opening an emergency escape chute by way of another button on the console. It didn’t take long for a door to slide open in the wall. Eggman jumped through it, with Orbot just barely grabbing onto his tiny yellow cape at the last second and Cubot latching onto Orbot’s lower body.
Sirens blared and a computerized voice announced: “Warning! This complex with self-destruct in five minutes!”
Spin Dashing through the net was no good. “Wait, don’t tell me…” Sonic, testing his suspicions, grabbed the metallic hem of the net. It took a little bit of muscle, but it was able to come loose from the floor. Just an annoyance to allow for an escape rather than a death trap, it seemed. It worked, too.
“Sonic…!” Amy was about ready to fangirl out over her beloved coming to save her, but Sonic wasn’t in the mood for any accolades at the moment.
Running back to the elevator, Sonic nabbed a wrecked Motobug wheel and threw it like a frisbee at the large window overlooking the savanna; it didn’t break it. “Shatterproof,” he groaned, “we’re going to have to take the long way down.” He scooped up the still-bound Amy and reentered the elevator, the throng of freed animals coming with them.
The descent to the basement hangar was swift, like a steep waterslide. Eggman’s two toadies didn’t seem to care for this method of escape. “Dr. Eggman,” asked a rattled Orbot, “did you have to make such a manner of an escape route?”
“If you don’t like it, Orbot, go back upstairs and file a complaint!” said Eggman, not caring at all.
------
-----
Rainy Savanna—a lush region of Mazuri which got its name from the fact that it was cloaked in varying amounts of rain for much of the year. Lightning flashes, shining light briefly upon an outline. In the midst of the grassy expanse, a lone butte rises, a fifteen-foot electrified barbed-wire fence creating a perimeter around it. A chrome tower points skyward, like an accusing finger from out of the rock.
In a great command room within the small fortress is the infamous Dr. Eggman. A brilliant scientist, he is a firm believer in the philosophy that “knowledge is power”; in his case, however, he mainly uses knowledge to gain power over others—to control the world. Nevertheless, he could never attain this end, but this evening, he had a little bait on hand to draw out the main impediment to his goal: a little pink Hedgehog in a swivel chair, wearing a green collar shirt, yellow tutu, and periwinkle tennis shoes.
“Bogey approaching at 72.2 miles per hour,” announced the small red-and-black robot Orbot, from the radar station. “We have confirmation. It’s Sonic.”
The doctor cackled, satisfied by the news, as he tightened the bindings on his captive. “What do you say we roll out the unwelcome mat for him? Send a missile barrage, Cubot.”
Boxy, yellow Cubot, Eggman’s other robot lackey, saluted. “At vonce Herr Doktor!” The robot functioned well, but at one point or another, his voice processor became damaged and he randomly cycled through a databank of hundreds of voices.
Not two seconds later, half a dozen SSMs soared from the side of the butte below the command center, over the electric fence, and into the savanna. Fiery blossoms erupted beneath the darkening sky. Needless to say, they didn’t find their mark.
“Negative contact,” Orbot reported, “Sonic is still coming.”
A missed target was never an excuse for the Doctor to surrender. “No matter—OW! Your little spines hurt!”
“You’ll get hurt worse when Sonic gets here,” said the small hostage.
The incoming intruder came closer to the mesa and, in a single bound, leapt over the electric barbed wire surrounding the edifice, briefly illuminated by a searchlight on the way in. Klaxons wailed, accompanied by machine gun fire followed soon afterwards. Not a single bullet made contact.
The swift intruder circled the butte a couple of times as the auto-turrets vainly tried to reduce him to a bloody pulp, taking a few out in the process. Soon, a wayward spotlight revealed to him a cowl-like structure at the face of the butte. A way in, perhaps?
Safe from the fire for a moment, the interloper soon found himself pulled away by some powerful force, as if a large vacuum was sucking him up. Soon, what little light he had was gone, he was dragged by the violent suction into pitch black darkness. He wasn’t even sure if he was going up, down, left, right, backwards, forwards, or sideways. Eventually, though, he came to an abrupt stop and something snapped shut behind him.
A huge white monitor in the distance shed light on this gatecrasher: a blue Hedgehog with gloves and red, gold-buckled shoes. The light also uncovered his situation: he was stuck in some kind of clear ball, but couldn’t move it for some reason. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that this was a death trap.
The screen flashed for a second, and an image appeared on it. It was a face the Hedgehog knew very well, but it wasn’t a friendly one.
The sight of his old enemy in this situation had Eggman grinning ear to ear. “Well, well, well! It’s nice to see that could drop in on us, Sonic! Not that it was an entirely unexpected visit.”
The trapped Hedgehog folded his arms. “Well, I’m no fan of fat dudes who steal little girls in order to kill me. So how’s about you give her back and you won’t have to go to the ER?”
“Why don’t we play a little game first?”
Sonic rolled his eyes, this was one. “Lemme guess: a giant pinball machine.”
Eggman let out a sinister laugh. “I had a more original punishment in mind for you.” The screen went black.
A glowing red wall appeared in the distance, followed by an orange one in front of it, then a brown one in front of that, then yellow, then green, and finally blue. Finally, a single white rectangle appeared behind the Hedgehog’s confinement. It was definitely a clear ball.
The ball began to move toward the rectangle and bounced off, toward the blue wall. Contact with the wall gave Sonic a small shock and it revealed part of the green wall behind it. The fact that the ball kept picking up speed as the game progressed wasn’t helping matters. It seemed like it would go on forever until Sonic fell behind the glowing paddle. He was dizzy, but when he could see straight, half of the blue wall was gone and a little bit of yellow had been revealed.
Dizzy from all the back-and-forth, Sonic was flat on his chest, waiting for the world to stop spinning. Okay, I was wrong, he thought.
“Awww, feeling a little weak?” Eggman asked, mockingly. “I still have two lives left!”
Not good, Sonic thought. If this keeps up, I’m Hedgehog juice.
Eggman’s lethal game of Breakout resumed. As the ball careened toward the electrified barrier ahead once more, the trapped Hedgehog could see something tiny on the casing. A crack in the sphere, perhaps?
More of the blockade had vanished, revealing the brown wall at last and finishing off the blue wall, save of the left corner of the field. In the calm where Sonic’s ball was being moved into position for the third and final life, the Hedgehog within was busy with his scheme. It was too cramped for the employment of a Spin Dash, but if he could scratch up the glass enough with his quills…
Eggman’s final life was in play. More back-and-forth between the blockade and the paddle, but to Sonic’s relief the damage he had done to the shell was enough. Even though he’d get a jolt, the pressure on the ball he was in was causing the wear and tear from the scratches to combine with the crack he’d discovered. The ball became weaker and weaker, and finally shattered.
“Mein Doktor, Sonic has escaped der Breakout room!”
Eggman didn’t need Cubot to tell him this; after all, he was the one playing the game. “Thank you, Mr. Obvious! Level-5 alert, Orbot!”
“Alright!” the hostage cheered. “I knew he was going to get out! I knew it!”
Eggman grinned, ready to throw a damper on the Hedgehog’s sunny outlook. “Oh, there may be no more Breakout, Amy-Waymee,” he told her, “but Sonic’s not in this command room yet, and I still got a baseload of badniks between him and us.” He changed the channel on the monitor, to reveal Sonic’s current position in the complex: running down a hallway as a pair of wasp-like Buzzbombers pursued, abdomen-mounted beam guns firing as they gave chase. The screen cut to another camera: from behind a trio of Crabmeats, staring down the oncoming Hedgehog, claws ready to fire. He jumped through the midst of the salvos unscathed, the Buzzbombers still on his tail. Another camera: Sonic turned sharply to the left, the pursuing badniks were unable to successfully clear the corner and smashed into the wall. Two creatures emerged from the wreckage: a tiny white chicken and a penguin of the same size.
“I hate to be the barer of bad news, Doctor,” said Orbot, timidly, “but Sonic’s getting closer to the main elevator.”
“Close the blast doors immediately,” he ordered Cubot, “but have Boximushi on standby!”
“Jawohl, mein Doktor!”
More of these guys. No sooner had Sonic got rid of the pair of Buzzbombers on his six a moment ago did four more replace them. It was getting annoying. However, the stakes were getting higher: at the end of the corridor stood an elevator terminal, one that was slowly and steadily vanishing behind a shrinking rectangle bordered by steel! Gotta time this just right…
WHAM!! Suddenly, Sonic went flying backward. When he came to a moment later, not only did he discover that he’d made it, but Eggman had another robot waiting for him: one standing about three yards tall and structurally similar to a kangaroo but with the head of an ant and four arms with boxing gloves, shifting left and right on its legs.
“Nice one,” the Hedgehog remarked. “It just sucks that I’m ready for you now!” With that, Sonic leaned over and began what appeared to be a continuous somersault in one spot, spinning faster and faster with each passing second. In an instant, he rocketed clean through the robot’s torso, and landed gracefully in front of the elevator. He turned around to watch the wrecked machine collapse under its own weight before casually pressing the open button on the side of the door.
“I want every possible badnik at every terminal!” Eggman barked into the intercom’s microphone, now sounding a lot more flustered than he was a few minutes ago. “We have him cornered!” He turned to Orbot. “Make sure that elevator climbs slowly!”
“You lost,” Amy said, triumphantly. “My Sonic won’t die that easily!”
“Where’s he going to run in such a tiny, little elevator?” A nerve-wracked, but still hopeful Eggman gloated.
“You’re lying to yourself!”
“Am I, Amy?” the doctor asked “Or am I just being logical?”
Ping! The elevator doors opened and a swarm of tiny animals scurried out into the command room, leaving a mess of wrecked badnik parts and a triumphant blue Hedgehog standing in the midst of it. Sonic was there.
Eggman looked as let down as a five-year-old who only got nothing but rocks for Christmas.
Amy, though, was the complete opposite: “I told you!”
Before you could say “Spin Dash”, Sonic let one tear across the threshold and into the doctor’s belly, sending him bouncing away like a beach ball The Hedgehog landed right next to Amy, confidently staring down the stricken Eggman.
Eggman was alright, but scooted backward, butt still on the floor with an arm extended, begging for mercy. “P-Please Sonic! Not again! I’m sorry!”
Sonic slowly began to walk forward, with a playful smirk on his face. “After making off with Amy and trying to kill me several times tonight, the asking price for forgiveness is a little higher now.”
“D-D-Don’t hurt me anymore!” Eggman begged. “Please just let me PUSH THIS!!” As soon as he said “PUSH THIS!!”, Eggman’s terrified expression instantly gave way to cocky confidence as he pushed a button on the console he had retreated up against.
A hatch in the ceiling opened and an open net came down upon the surprised Sonic. Small, powerful magnets clacked when the trap reached the floor.
“Cubot, run self-destruct cycle NOW!” Eggman ordered, standing back up and opening an emergency escape chute by way of another button on the console. It didn’t take long for a door to slide open in the wall. Eggman jumped through it, with Orbot just barely grabbing onto his tiny yellow cape at the last second and Cubot latching onto Orbot’s lower body.
Sirens blared and a computerized voice announced: “Warning! This complex with self-destruct in five minutes!”
Spin Dashing through the net was no good. “Wait, don’t tell me…” Sonic, testing his suspicions, grabbed the metallic hem of the net. It took a little bit of muscle, but it was able to come loose from the floor. Just an annoyance to allow for an escape rather than a death trap, it seemed. It worked, too.
“Sonic…!” Amy was about ready to fangirl out over her beloved coming to save her, but Sonic wasn’t in the mood for any accolades at the moment.
Running back to the elevator, Sonic nabbed a wrecked Motobug wheel and threw it like a frisbee at the large window overlooking the savanna; it didn’t break it. “Shatterproof,” he groaned, “we’re going to have to take the long way down.” He scooped up the still-bound Amy and reentered the elevator, the throng of freed animals coming with them.
The descent to the basement hangar was swift, like a steep waterslide. Eggman’s two toadies didn’t seem to care for this method of escape. “Dr. Eggman,” asked a rattled Orbot, “did you have to make such a manner of an escape route?”
“If you don’t like it, Orbot, go back upstairs and file a complaint!” said Eggman, not caring at all.
------