Sonic's world is low-key the weirdest part of the franchise. Let's start back at Sonic 1. You know how it goes, right? It all starts in the lively and stylishly geometrical vistas of Green Hill, moves onward through damp ruins, eventually ending in the heart of the technological hellscape empire that a single Dr Robotnik threatens to expand. A simple formula its immediate sequels followed that is resonant with the growing environmentalist concerns of the 90's, concerns that only continued to grow since then but I digress. All that said, it makes sense that this series be set in some kind of modified version of Earth right? And it is, and was at the time... in Japan. Sega of America decided that the world of Sonic seemed otherworldly enough that they could actually sell it as another world, which does seem fair I guess. And so, the Mobius of all of the Sonic spinoffs ever except for Sonic X and Boom was born, sometimes a place resembling the games, sometimes a totally conquered planet, sometimes written by Archie so uh... you know how that goes. Weird thing about Sonic X is that despite Sonic's world effectively being Earth since the beginning in Japan, the plot of that series still has Sonic being unwillingly transported from His World™ to Earth and so he teams up with Chris Thorn-slur-for-lesbians to do Sonic things like... re-enact all of the events of Sonic Adventure 2 wait how does that-

The concept of Mobius, while completely incompatible with the games past Adventure, is still kept alive in the side content, such as the current Paramount movie series, in which Sonic is unwillingly transported from Mobius to Earth and so he teams up with-

As mentioned this idea being applied to the games comes to an end in Sonic Adventure where the setting becomes very apparently Earth but funky, the biggest giveaway being the appearance of a city-ass city, with human-ass people that aren't Eggman. The continuity started here is carried on and built on top of all the way to Sonic 06, and then Sonic Unleashed happens and all of that just kind of becomes irrelevant, and then Unleashed becomes irrelevant, and basically the writing goes from Saturday morning cartoon(tho, not like THE Saturday morning cartoon) to Friday evening. While the first half of the 3D era can be considered weird because it jumps from Sonic being arrested by Not-The-US-Military, to an alien race that helped Gerald Robotnik of earlier games achieve his goals coming to reap the seeds they've sown, modern Sonic's world is weird because... what is modern Sonic's world? It's just kind of this non-descript amorphous blob that doesn't really take shape unless we're viewing it at some moment in time. And you know, that's not necessarily a bad thing, they took the adventure continuity pretty far and now we're in territory where anything is possible, and that's fine. The later writing style has bigger crimes than continuity, just look at Shadow. Honestly it feels weird to even be talking about this before whatever's about to happen in Frontiers happens, so all I can say is, yeah that looks pretty wacky innit.

No matter where Sonic actually is tho, his world is always one filled with sunny blue skies, treacherous obstacle course shaped ruins, and cool robots. Overall, that's pretty cool.

Having said all that, it sure would be weird if this was a Knuckles review instead.

Knuckles is a simple guy, he sit by his emerald, emerald gets fucked up, he puts it back together. Focused, in his lane, dedicated to his own cause. The echidna of all time.Just like the humble building owner of Station Square. We don't know what his building is for, but he owns that building, and for that he is satisfied. Perhaps we can learn a lot from the inhabitants of Sonic world... nah building owners are cringe actually.

Exploration as an explicit gameplay element, a common part of games that I oddly do not actually see interrogated deeply by any usual suspects... I mean I'm not going to today either. All I can say is that, yeah, it makes sense for Knuckles' moveset, and that without a real relevant fail state being threatened, the main thing to take away from this side mode of play is just being able to vibe in these spaces. That's really cool when you're dealing with the idyllic streets of Station Square and their burger signs, the theatrical antics of the Casino and their pirate ship. This kinda just becomes some busy fetching tho when you're just flying around red cliffs, or dealin with the cute but ultimately gimmicky last level (why is there one lever). If there's another simple takeaway from this, it's that Sonic Adventure 2 fucked it. Everyone knows about the weird radar change they made in 2 but also Knuckles' moveset is more suited to these levels that are big and open with only some amount of verticality as opposed to SA2's involved and sometimes vertical to all hell stages. It's weird, Knuckles as a part of SA2 is weird, how fortunate we are that there is nothing weird about our Echidna friend in Adventure 1...

So the year is 1996, Sonic team are now on a mission to make the next game(crazy right). For inspiration on where the blue blur should blaze through next, the team went on a journey, to Central/South America. More specifically, the ruins of several separate cultures whom dotted the landscape long ago, getting a close first hand experience of the remains of these cultures, via long tourist trip. Their efforts culminate as large chunk of that game which would become Sonic Adventure, would be set in not South America, South America is in Sonic Jump, but rather an allegorical amalgamation simply called Mystic Ruins. A place where its main modern inhabitants are white men looking for rocks to plunder. Ok, I'm obviously not the person to talk to about cultural appropriation, what that even is, what effect that even has, especially in the context of a Sonic game, but I think we can all take a step back and acknowledge how weird it is, even tho it was common at the time, that the team went through so much effort to "get real knowledge of the ancient cultures" that they want to depict, and then shat out this motherfucker. Pachacamac, leader of the Echidna ethnostate, spearhead of the Chao massacre who was smitted by the god of the land Chaos for his arrogance and violence, this guy's existence kinda fuckin sucks lol. It's current year, I'm not taking John Sega to task on this or anything, besides for all legal purposes the weird cultural mine field of the wider Echidna family is entirely Ken Penders' problem now, but damn, what a weird ass slice that existed in this franchise huh.

Sonic Adventure 1 was a weird ass way start to the expansion of Sonic's world, and Knuckles is equally a weird way to explore it, but for all that it's worth, that station do be square tho.

Also you know how it is, Unknown from M.E., iconic. They simply don't do it like that anymore.

See you later as we enter uh... you know, there's something I must confess. This is not a review of Sonic Adventure DX as packaged from the Steam store. Ever since the Tails review, this has been the Sonic Adventure DX steam port, modded to be more like the Dreamcast version in all ways except for the water. You have been deceived. I have made FOOLS OF YOU ALL. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-