Sonic Prime thing
so basically after i watched Sonic Prime S3 (on the day it came out) i was left pretty unsatisfied with the weird storytelling, plot holes and loose ends and decided to start brainstorming a re-imagining for it and drew some designs...
so this is gonna be long but i wanna preface this by saying i'm not a writer or even that good at character design 😭!!!! and also the majority of this is like from almost 2 months ago and it's very incomplete so i haven't done much thought on it i just had some ideas and ran with it Tbh. so if stuff doesn't make much sense Lmk bc a multiverse story is a very big thing to tackle, you really have to pay attention to the little stuff for everything to be complete.
also i like stuff with darker themes so if a lot of this is like "a Sonic show wouldn't do that" well. Yeah. this isn't a pitch to SEGA it's just my own thing LOL
(also also we're just gonna throw out the whole "Prime is canon to the games" here, i use the games as a basis but i wouldn't say this is in the realms of canon for multiple reasons)
~ The Main Stuff ~
so pretty much i went into this mostly thinking about changing the shatterverses while still keeping the base ideas that Prime had, and also a bit about how the shatterverse works in the first place. so i have some bullet points that i wrote down. i haven't watched s1&2 in a long time so i don't remember too much of the lore they already established, so if some of this is just reiterating what they said in the show then that's my bad
i wasn't exactly sure how it made sense that a single rock in some random cave conveniently in green hills had control of the entire universe so i want the explanation for why breaking the prism had this kind of effect to be something else (or to just change the prism to be something different) but i'm not sure exactly what. definitely not like "it was an illusion like the phantom ruby" or some stupid shit but it felt off that something completely world (universe) ending was so easily accessible. anyway.
Sonic explicitly doesn't exist in each alternate universe because he was the one who broke the prism. Sonic being the final piece that brings the universe together should probably have bigger lore implications as well
i think this is already what's in canon but Shadow used chaos control as the prism got shattered, causing himself to get fragmented across time and space as well.
unlike in the show, Shadow still has alternate versions of himself in each of the universes, but he has to kinda do an EEAAO and swap into their consciousness for him to be able to enter their respective universes (which takes a lot of energy bc its literally dimension travel so he can't do it a lot). his actual body is stuck in the void which means its at risk of erosion and also any hazard in the void like asteroids n stuff. it also explains why he's greatly weakened in the show (because his ass should not have been handed to him that easily in s3) cuz bits of his . being. is split across each universe, and can only be completed by the prism.
the void decays life which adds a higher stake to Sonic needing to complete the prism asap and also why Shadow is so hellbent on getting him to do it quickly. his actual, original self is slowly dying. (adds a bit of a character flaw too like the zombot arc, because you'd think the ultimate lifeform would be resistant to erosion. maybe at first he thinks he'll be fine and does the dimension travelling for fun until he starts feeling Really drained)
before i get to the individual universes, i'll talk a bout Sonic's character real quick because hoo boy, was it BAD in Prime. no shade to anyone who enjoyed his character in Prime, but as a show that claims to be "canon to the games", he was embarrassingly out of character. if it were just another version of him like movie Sonic i wouldn't really be so weirded out by it. so i wanna just say right off the bat that i'm using my own favourite iteration of Sonic as a reference for his character, which is the characterization from Sonic X.
i think when the prism gets properly explained, Sonic would kind of put 2 and 2 together and realize completing the prism would erase the other universes. and rather than being all ambiguous about it like Prime was, here it very explicitly would be that restoring the prism will erase the shatterverse. so Sonic get's really stuck between a rock and a hard place, because restoring the prism brings his friends and world back, but then he's effectively killing thousands of people, many of them who look exactly like his friends, all for the sake of his own world.
i think this is the kind of dilemma that would be really good for a character like Sonic, who's carefree and always does what he believes to be the right thing regardless of what other people say. his conflict with Nine isn't even all that different from his conflict with Merlina. but would he be okay with being enemies with someone who's literally just his little brother? i don't think Sonic would have tried to reason with Nine as much as he did in Prime, attachment be damned, but i still think it would still be hard for him to come to terms with the fact that Nine is his enemy and that in the end he would have to erase him too.
this is all i wanna say about Sonic rn because truth be told i'm not exactly sure how different the decisions he made in Prime would be here since i haven't thought too much on it, i would have to rewatch the show (god forbid) to figure that out lol.
~New Yolk City~
so i actually have designs for this, some of them have went through changes but they're all pretty "initial concepts". i wanna say that first off, i wanted this to be explicitly an alternate timeline and not just an alternate universe. one where Sonic doesn't exist in the main timeline so nobody really does anything to stop Eggman and he takes over the world. the designs are deliberately edgy so i call it sonic underfell in my notes lol
also, because a dystopian Sonic premise already exists in the form of SatAM... we got Sally Acorn back :D i didn't include all the Freedom Fighters for fear of the cast getting too big, but Nicole is here too because i love Sonic comic's robo assistants like Nicole and Kintobor. Sonia and Manic were also considered as added characters since Sonic Underground also has a dystopian premise, but i think it would be weird to add Sonic's siblings in a world where he doesn't exist, so it's not like they'd have a little 'OMG he's my long lost brother' moment. like no they don't even know who he is LOL.
alright so for character info i'll start with Nine because he's like the 3rd most important character in the show. i have a few different sketches of him, most incomplete... and for the third one my friend wanted him to look more emo. i wanted to add a bit more to that design but i wasn't sure what to do. if anyone has suggestions lmk
just like in the show, bc Sonic never meets Tails, Tails doesn't get saved from bullying and becomes very jaded. as for the robot face and tails, i think in the show they really drive it home how Nine values robots over people very much, going as far as to make robot clones of his friends in order to replace them. so... robot body parts doesn't seem too out of the realm for what he'd do! it's a very good parallel to what i have planned for Eggman/the Chaos Council it's also very fucking gruesome and sad esp because hes like 8 years old..
also, i'd really love it if he wasn't just weirdly evil the way he was in Prime S3. because no the hell he is not evil, it felt like a cheap way to get you to stop sympathizing with him until the very last moment where he had a change of heart. he's just a small, traumatized kid who was shown friendship for the first time only to realize that Sonic only cared about him because he was a Tails and actually pretty much wanted him dead (even if this all wasn't exactly true, i can genuinely see why he felt this way).
next i'll talk about who the main extra characters in this universe will be, which is Sally and Nicole.
so obv the resistance is called the Freedom Fighters, and Sally is the commander (like she should've been in Sonic Forces/IDW, but alas, she is dead to SEGA). she'd have a much more serious personality compared to her Archie/SatAM counterpart. where she'd usually banter with Sonic in Archie, here she would straight up tell him to gtfo. the aim of the Freedom Fighters in current time isn't really to fight to get their world back, just to survive and preserve what they still have.
just like in other media, Nicole is Sally's AI assistant slash potential love interest who does all the tech-y stuff, like scanning the area for threats, hacking things, etc. which gives them a bit of more power against the enemy without needing Nine's help.
next we got Amy aka Rusty Rose, this time she's fully a robot instead of being only half of one, and i'll expand on why. (also to note i didn't look at other Metal Amy fan designs when making this just to try and keep this a bit more original lol)
so, obviously being inspired by SatAM and Archie, roboticization is a concept that would be reintroduced here through Rusty Rose. she was previously a freedom fighter who got a bit reckless and was captured, and was roboticized before her allies could save her. she's kind of used as a cautionary tale among the Freedom Fighters as a way to hammer in don't be reckless and don't get caught.
i remember in Sonic Prime they tried to use the flicky 'powering' her as a way to keep her connection with humanity, which was great except for the fact that she still had half a mobian face so she wasn't even fully robot. in this case, i decided to make her fully robot and keep the flicky, except this time it is genuinely powering her lifeforce unlike whatever they did in the show. obviously taking it out for a bit just to showcase the fact she does have a flicky won't insta-kill her, but she will slowly die without the flicky inside of her. not sure why the Chaos Council didnt just slap a chaos drive in there but whatever lol, it's nice symbolism anyway.
also just a note, she can shoot bullets out of her fingers if you were wondering why her hands looked like that. yes its an Aigis Persona 3 reference. but also she no longer uses her hammer because as a robot she's stripped of her personality and autonomy, and the Piko-Piko hammer was like an Amy signature weapon, who Rusty Rose no longer is at this point. but mostly it's an Aigis Persona 3 reference. We ball
next is Rouge, who's no longer a leader of the Freedom Fighters, but just a spy/intelligence agent who still has an eye for shiny things.
in the inital art i drew of her i named her Agent Rebel, but honestly Agent Rouge works just fine because yknow. Rouge is just the word for red in french. if they really have to all have different names then Agent Red also works too, but it might be a bit on the nose. anyway she's apart of the Freedom Fighters as their spy, something they desperately need because of the constant surveillance around new yolk. of course she's still the morally gray bastard she usually is, so she always desires compensation for her efforts, especially on the more dangerous missions.
the reason why i demoted her from leader is because Rouge is really not the leader type, maybe you could give her a leading role if it were a smaller group like Team Dark, but when its a whole resistance she's genuinely not cut out for it, especially because she's not particularly selfless and definitely doesn't give too much of a shit about the well being of others. here she understands very well that her life is also at risk, so aiding the Freedom Fighters is pretty much her only choice.
next we got Knuckles who is definitely not having a good time. he never met Sonic so he's very distrusting towards everyone, even allies. he lived on Angel Island until it was attacked by Eggman and he lost the Master Emerald. unfortunately i didn't draw anything full body or coloured so i only have this sketch
being from a clan of warriors, i'd say its a no-brainer that he'd be co-commander of the Freedom Fighters. as for all the injuries, they're from a time where he was captured. to compensate for his... lack of knuckles... he now wears brass knuckles. he's definitely the most angry and vengeful of all the different versions of Knuckles, because he feels as if he's been disgraced in multiple ways, and he sees the Freedom Fighters as a means to an end. his pure, unadultered rage definitely helps with taking out enemies tho.
okay, i mentioned that Shadow would have alternate versions of himself and lucky for yall i did draw a design for New Yolk Shadow, who's named Terios and is inspired by that beta design.
Terios isn't apart of the Freedom Fighters, but he's not on the side of the Chaos Council. hes kind of an anti-hero vigilante, he's cordial with Rouge but not really interested in the Freedom Fighters. he kinda does his own shit. realistically, since New Yolk is an alternate timeline where Sonic doesn't exist, and it's implied that Gerald based Shadow off of Super Sonic then technically Shadow shouldn't exist but hey, this is the one plot hole i'm not gonna try to mend. We Ball. Shadow exists because he's goated like that.
anyway his backstory is the same but because everything is so Fucked Up he never really gets the chance to explode the world like he wanted. since he's not on the evil side i'll say that Eggman wasn't the one who woke him up tho and he got talked out of his homicidal urges. who woke him up? idk i'll think about it
now for another added character... Silver!!! but he goes by the alias "Venice"... because his beta design is called Venice LOL
before i explain Silver's deal, i'll talk abt how i imagine time works in the Sonic universe. basically, the future isn't something predestined and is actively changed by events in the present. this is in fact something that 06 contradicts since the future was messed up before Sonic even met Elise, but that in and of itself contradicts Sonic CD which does the whole "actions in the present affect the future" thing with the good future/bad future. so i went with CD's time mechanics because it makes more sense for this story. also 06 isn't canon so #WeBall
so Silver, being from the future, wakes up one day to find everything all fucked up again. except now he's in the present too. he tries to ask ppl if they know where Sonic is, assuming that of course Sonic would know what happened, but nobody seems to know who he's talking about. Silver eventually crosses paths with Shadow/Terios and asks him where Sonic is, but even Terios doesn't know who Sonic is (at this point, our Shadow hasn't linked his consciousness w/ Terios) so Silver is just really fucking lost and doesn't know what the hell is happening, why it's happening and why nobody seems to know who Sonic is.
he ends up following Terios around as sort of an apprentice type thing because he's the only familiar face so far and he really needs to understand what's going on. Terios isn't very happy about it but can tell Silver's a pretty strong person he would want as an ally, so he keeps him around. Silver wears a cloak and goes by the alias Venice as a way to protect his identity.
so obv when Sonic shows up he KNOWS Sonic fucked up real bad somehow. cue the 'it's no use! take this!' loop
(Blaze isn't here because she's relaxing and enjoying a cup of tea in her palace. also trying to tackle how the prism affects the Sol Dimension will make things way more convoluted)
~ New Yolk City: The Chaos Council ~
okay... NOW we talk about Eggman. so maybe you've noticed i kept switching between saying Eggman and the Chaos Council, and i will explain.
the Chaos Council do still exist in this reimagining, but Eggman also exists. Kind of.
basically my idea for the Chaos Council was that it was originally just Eggman ruling the world (btw his name would be Robotnik because nobody was there to call him Eggman), but here comes the inspiration from Archie again, and now he's split himself into 5 robots to help rule over New Yolk City. and i say it's inspired from Archie because i very vividly remember that Robotnik fucking died in Archie and then uploaded his consciousness into a robot or some shit, and then when it came time for his modern design to be incorporated into the comic he literally switched robot bodies to become modern Eggman. So Yeah.
multiple facets of himself get uploaded into robot bodies, because what's the point of living a mortal fleshy life when you can be a sick ass immortal shiny robot (throwback to how i said it would be a parallel to Nine) and these different "facets" of Eggman would just be different parts of his personality, these are what i had in mind but it's still a WIP:
intelligence (cunning, manipulative, thinks logically and lacks empathy)
childishness (interest in juvenile things like themeparks, acts. well. childish)
vain (self-absorbed, uncooperative, gets upset by criticism, interest in flashy things/theatrics)
emotional (prone to outbursts--typically rage, empathetic)
dramatic (placeholder until i think of a better one because this is just grouped in with vanity tbh)
bad news is that i never drew designs for these. because if im not good at designing characters, im ESPECIALLY not good at designing robots. Rusty Rose was already a challenge. but ill figure it out lol.
ANYWAY now we're done with New Yolk. if this seemed long, don't worry because it was pretty much the only one i did brainstorming on. i have one more design and a few notes but nothing else for the rest of the shatterverses.
~ No Place ~
there's not much about No Place i would change other than the character roster and basic premise. it's still pirate-y, and Dread is DEFINITELY staying the same because i Love him.
pretty much my idea is that instead of there only being one crew which is Dread's, there are two. one with Dread, Amy and Tails, and another crew with Rouge, Shadow and whoever else i think to add. basically they're rival crews that compete to get treasure, and the prism shard is just another one they set their eyes on. Marine is also gonna be there probably on Dread's crew.
Sonic initially takes Dread's side because hes a Knuckles, Knuckles is his friend and Rouge usually means trouble, but when Dread starts being yknow. batshit crazy and manipulative. Sonic realizes that he picked wrong and hes kinda on his own to get that shard.
the only thing i drew for this is a design of Rouge
i imagine Shadow would just be the one pirate design from that Sonic mobile game that everyone likes to draw. his name would also be Blackheart because of the lyrics "black-hearted evil / brave-hearted hero" from I Am... All Of Me
that's all i have for No Place. in truth i didn't make much changes because i actually very much enjoyed No Place (mostly bc of Dread)
~ Boscage ~
so... this one i've done the least thinking about, and honestly it's because i don't really know what to do with this one. something about Boscage rubs me the wrong way, maybe just bc it's a jungle universe and the designs make me cringe a little bit. if anyone has any ideas on this then lmk. i don't think i want to get rid of it entirely but i just don't know how to go about this one.
all i have in terms of notes is that:
it should be a bit similar to Sonic Boom in setting, so an island with dense forests
Sticks should be a character, potentially taking Prim's role in the story
~ Extra Notes ~
more characters in the main cast like Cream and the Chaotix should appear
other characters robot copies should resemble canonical ones like Metal Sonic, Knuckles and Amy, however Nine's robot copies should look Fucked Up to emphasize the Wrongness in how he views his robot copies as true friends
^ this means Chaos Sonic should literally just be Metal Sonic. sorry Chaos Sonic fans i love him too but it made no sense to me that it wouldn't be Metal Sonic but lmk your thoughts on that
that's it for everything i think. i might have had more but i didn't write it down so it has just been forever lost in the dark depths of my brain. this is very unorganized and way too long but i hope it was interesting to read at least. ofc any feedback is welcome. i don't think i'll make any kind of story out of this but i'd like to complete it tbh
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♢ — @al-hazen asked: "Gods, you've fallen far, haven't you? I knew something was wrong, but this..." There were no words to describe what he'd done. (maybe akademiya-era after zan was ousted?)
UNPROMPTED ASK: ALWAYS ACCEPTING!
Gods. Gods. It was always gods, wasn’t it? Like everything revolved around THEM. Even the damn language and phrases used, and for what? He would sneer at them if he could. These false advocates, this land of knowledge, nothing but more disappointment. That wasn’t to say it wasn’t a tragic LOSS. Being ousted from the Akademiya meant he no longer had the FUNDS for anything he did. They’d worked fast, but Zandik had been FASTER in stealing away forbidden research and papers. He hadn’t been the fox surrounded by the hounds, too scared to move or fumbling over what to grab. He’d been the wolf that tore through the pack and left them maimed and made away with the bait. ( Little did he know that HE would be the reason for the fall of his Darshan. )
Some shatters, but whether it was some FRAGILE thread of questionable sanity or chains that set had still managed to shackle SOME part of the beast, it doesn’t matter. Either way Zandik can feel the LAUGHTER that starts in his chest and then bubbles to the surface until he’s laughing aloud, a sound that was DERANGED, intensified with the inferno of red eyes that watched the man in front of him.
“ Are the sages so terrified they sent you to see to me leaving? “ And as quick as the laughter had erupted, it died down as the bite of his words close around. One hand slides up into his hair, gripping candied locks and concealing one eye beneath the palm of his hand. He might have been forcefully kicked out of the refuge of knowledge and back to the coldness of the world, but at least he was free again. Without shackles or restraints, he could do as he pleased. He knew the desert well, and it’d be easy to get test subjects there. The Akademiya would practically send them to the doorsteps. And the Akademiuya teams out there were sitting ducks, dependent on the locals to survive.
He sneers, ugly colors finally on full DISPLAY rather than concealed under sneaky glances and sharpened words. “ FALLEN? On the contrary. I simply wasn’t a coward in the pursuit of knowledge. “ Zandik scowls, eyes narrowed with a wrath high enough to devour the stars. “ They promote the pursuit and transmission of knowledge at ALL COSTS, and the chaos is the natural order. Yet they cower at any risk. HYPOCRITES. Claiming to be representing the Darshan, yet when I propose bringing back the machinery for further investigation and knowledge gathering, I get PUNISHED and removed from the authors. It was MY research that several build their proposals on for that assignment. Or others! The technology, the illness, the samples. “ Three instances where he’d acted without authority, three on a long list of reasons that the sages had become wary of Zandik. He was an undeniable GENIUS, but one with a CHILLING indifference to others, and a TERRIFYING willingness to shatter rules, laws, and standards in the pursuit of his knowledge.
“ I lived up to what the Darshan FALSELY CLAIMED to be about. Any cost means any cost. Or do you mean SOHREH? I’m sure the sages have PLENTY of suspicions on the matter even though they couldn’t confirm it. “ He snorts and waves a hand slightly. “ I’ll confirm it just for you. “ Zandik remarks coldly, roaring rage replaced with dry ice like indifference. Cold enough to burn. “ She was in the way and would have hindered progress. She saw more than she was supposed to but she was such a STICKLER for the rules. Unfortunately, her death ended up cutting short the field research anyways, but no matter. Those extra days had been enough for ME. “ Enough to snatch up his research and cover all tracks of it so there’d be no further incidents.
His village in the desert, the Akademiya, viewing him with the world as a MONSTER just because he wouldn’t bend to another. He looked the part, especially now when his serrated smile and cruel hands had already had a taste of blood and cruelty in experiments and the BLASPHEMOUS desire for more the was UNEXTINGUISHABLE in carmine eyes. “ These SINS of the Akademiya are nothing but ABSURDITY. I’ve not fallen. I’ve CLIMBED. And I’ll climb higher even without the Akademiya. Just you WAIT. “
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