Why can only Sonic and Metal turn super?

[time gear]

I just wanted to quote your perceived incentives since they align with that official reasoning because I think that that reasoning not only does not hold any water but is also irrelevant, which is why it might just be better if reasons are not provided full stop.

I do think that the reasoning does make sense, to a degree. The entire purpose of even having multiple characters is because your experience playing with each one is going to be different, so making it so everyone is more the same defeats the entire point. Where I disagree with it is where the reasoning concludes that characters shouldn't have Super Forms.

It feels like solving a problem by introducing another problem to me. You can plug a leak with your finger, but then you still need to figure out how to free up your finger without reintroducing the leak. Continuing with the metaphor, what I have been doing has been an attempt to patch up the leak without using anyone's fingers. A solution that gives most players what they need to do what they want without bias in favor of just one preferred playstyle. If you want to go fast, the expanded/buffed moveset allows for it. If you want to go slow, you can do that too.

 

[glaber]

Maybe perhaps the best way to continue this topic is to recommend people go try out that Super For all mod in the addons section and build from there?

It may disable the emblems, but you can still get the emeralds with the lua script active.

I already have a video where I'm even useing Super Tails and Super knuckles in SRB2
https://www.bitchute.com/video/KQduryGU1yHJ/

 

[time gear]

It may disable the emblems, but you can still get the emeralds with the lua script active.

I already have a video where I'm even useing Super Tails and Super knuckles in SRB2
https://www.bitchute.com/video/KQduryGU1yHJ/

The problem is that some people will have more difficulty finding emblems than others. They are quite well hidden, and if someone is attempting to go Super to make the process easier, introducing a countdown timer is going to introduce unnecessary stress. Scavenger hunting under a time limit can be fun when restricted to it's own game mode, but I doubt that's what most people are looking for while emblem hunting.

 

[Tatsuru]

The entire purpose of even having multiple characters is because your experience playing with each one is going to be different, so making it so everyone is more the same defeats the entire point.

I don't agree with that. I don't agree that super forms would make characters undiscernible and I have no reason to, and even if it by some miracle they did, it would barely be strong an argument for me because it's rectifiable. Super forms are only the same when it comes to their trade of rings for invincibility and speed buff. You'd be (provided you didn't engineer anything to counter them) impervious to enemies and damaging sectors for as long as you can maintain rings but the platforming is still there, and platforming is still what SRB2 excels at.

 

[CowboyJoseph64]

I would not bother with supers when emblem hunting, to be honest. When I turn super, I just wanna blast through everything. It's good, dumb fun.

 

[time gear]

I don't agree with that. I don't agree that super forms would make characters undiscernible and I have no reason to, and even if it by some miracle they did, it would barely be strong an argument for me because it's rectifiable.

It's less that it would make them undiscernable and more that it would pressure you to go fast even if you don't want to. Going fast is Sonic's thing. If I go Super, I am doing so because I want to have an easier time, not necessarily a faster one.

The reason why I have argued against total invincibility therefore is because you can't simply take away the countdown timer aspect to Supers and not balance that out with something. While the entire point to Supers is that they are an overpowered reward for collecting the emeralds, this logic doesn't stretch to the point of entirely destroying all semblance of balance, or else the ring drain wouldn't exist to begin with.

Let's use Amy as an example. What can Amy do? She is incapable of spindashing and doesn't curl into a ball when she jumps. However, she has a hammer she can use to attack enemies with proper timing either on the ground or in the air, and can launch herself higher with springs by hitting them with said hammer.

Now let's apply Super Sonic logic to this moveset, with the typical invincibility and ring drain. She is now just Super Sonic, but without the hover ability, thok, and spindash, and with the ability to launch higher off springs.

With this Super Amy moveset in mind, how is the player encouraged to play? They are encouraged to barrage through enemies without bothering with the hammer, collecting as many rings as possible in as little time as possible to avoid running out and losing the form, therefore making rapid progress through the level in the process. Neglecting this playstyle will result in the form being lost in roughly a minute or two, leaving you vulnerable to losing a life should you take a hit.

Now let's examine my suggestion's moveset: The ring drain doesn't exist, nor does invincibility, but Amy loses... Let's say 20 rings when she takes a hit. Her hammer has a larger attack range, does twice as much damage, and launches her farther when she hits a spring with it.

Under this moveset, the player is more than welcome to play the same way they do in the first example, albeit under the requirement they still need to defend themselves. However, they can also choose a slower playstyle without having the penalty of losing the form quickly strictly because they aren't addicted to shoving onion rings down their throat at incredible speeds. More importantly, the hammer is not trivialized under this moveset. In fact, it's emphasized.

This kills two birds with one stone. It allows the player to go Super, boosting their abilities beyond base form, and it does so in a way that boosts the character specific ability instead of turning them into bootleg Sonic with an insatiable appetite for fast food.

 

[Burning-Fox]

Not going fast in a Sonic game feels redundant, no matter what character you are. The argument about play-style changes means basically nothing because you will still have abilities to use at your disposal that other characters do not have. No matter how fast Amy becomes, she'll never reach a spot that Tails only could reach, or Knuckles could glide up to. It just makes it more fun when you have more speed and invincibility, and the novelty of just BEING Super at all is something a lot of people appreciate.

Case and point; the multiple Super mods that already exist to let people go Super in Co-Op. Surely those exist for a reason? I don't really like everyone being able to go Super because it ruins the uniqueness of Sonic, but the argument of abilities becoming redundant is pretty silly.

Not to mention, "pressure to go fast"? You mean, the pressure you choose to put on yourself the second you choose to go Super? You're never forced to do it, and a lot of the time from actual experience in netgames and F12ing, I don't see players rushing any more than they already were the second they turn whatever shiny colour their character becomes. They take it comfortably, because they can afford to do so with the extra safety net of invincibility.

Super Tails players still fly, Super Knuckles still glides, I see Super Amy still use hammers, Super Fangs still bounce and shoot. Literally nothing changes except they're a bit faster, invincible, can jump higher, and have a cool Super theme playing for the person that's playing them which is infinitely cooler than a glorified power-up that wrecks you the second you get hit.

 

[Lat']

The actual reason is that one of the big flaws of S3K's setup is that super forms removed character variety.

...And these flaws were ported to SRB2 by removing Super Tails' ability fly indefinitely and Super Knuckles' ability to multi glide from 2.1. So yes, now all that's left for them as perks for turning Super is... running fast.

Because SRB2's Super Transformation button is now Spin on mid-air with no shield, it's up to the players whether or not they want to transform, or if they want to keep playing normally, this was an issue before, when Super was mapped on the jump button still as you couldn't use your ability, or had to find a Shield, if you didn't want to turn Super, so turning Super was often unwanted.
I like Super forms as a way to expand upon a character's abilities while giving you a burst of invincibility when you need one; you make the deliberate choice to trade Rings for invincbility and improved abilities, in Sonic's case, you improve upon your Top Speed and gain the added perk of a float which covers Sonic's harder time on some platforming sections.
I do feel as though the speed increase should be removed from characters other than Sonic and Metal, so that they can focus more on their abilities coupled with invincibility, which in the case of Tails and Knuckles, even allows you to explore a stage more easily! You'll still benefit from finding extra lives and emblems. It's not all about running towards the goal, so that's where I think you're wrong.

But again, the topic is a very subjective one.
Even then I put together a really rough draft of what I think Supers should handle for Tails and Knuckles with Lua because I'm not just gonna spout garbage and do nothing else to defend my points. Fang and Amy are left untouched for now, but I think even their basic abilities need work, so nevermind a Super form improvement for them yet.

 

[TehRealSalt]

I normally don't really care about taking part in these kinds of debate topics, especially so when I don't really care either way about it changing. But, I saw this while skimming and it grabbed my attention:

I'm sorry but you're not making this easy for yourself. People are not going to understand when you testify that "super characters is the same" (in S3&K nonetheless) and they don't personally experience it. You are using your experience (and some unspecified others') as evidence, after all. There's no way to empirically pin this issue down. If you have to go to the lengths of saying that if people don't like the process of collecting emeralds for nothing then they shouldn't be doing it, and if they want to go super anyway, they should mod it in, you might as well answer that you (plural you) are making the game and thus you decide what's going to be in the game. It's less convoluted and gets the message through.

I'm cutting out a lot of this quote, but I could not agree more. This is not very relevant to the discussion at hand, but after reading this I feel like I need to get it off my chest.

I have been around for some of these arguments plenty of times and I've seen so many really arbitrary reasons thrown around over many different topics by the developers, that are somehow way more frustrating than receiving a "it's our game, we're doing what we want", since while they can make sense alone, it feels like they contradict themselves.

The absolute most frustrating examples I can remember for me were:
- "Circuit was removed because it was unbalanced." Hearing this was upsetting back in early 2.1 era. I've always suspected that this was just an excuse to shut people up, since Ringslinger has always had harsh character imbalances that are even more difficult to fix, and that the real reason was that no one on the team cared about the mode (which is a completely fair reason, I might add). I recently got that directly confirmed.
- "We don't want to change abilities/controls per mode because we want players to be able to not need to relearn things for what's practically a separate game", because it directly conflicts with what I was told on a different topic, like, last week: "We don't want to design Ringslinger around third person, it'll always be first person because we're fine with it being treated as a separate game." Both of these are fair on their own, but don't make even a lick of sense together.

While I don't think it really applies to the current argument, this is why I don't really take some of the developers seriously over certain aspects of their own game. I just want to hear it how it is, man.


----------------


As for something more on-topic, I feel like now that Super is near impossible to activate on accident (except for like, Amy, if you like using jump-spin for her air hammer, but I've always preferred jump-jump), that the argument of "it hurts the character variety" is flimsy than ever, because if you personally care about the variety then you can just... not activate it, if you just want to cheese stuff you can. However, I've also never cared since I just like to play NiGHTS, and I will get the emeralds just to play NiGHTS and I will ignore the Super form either way.

I will say I kinda preferred it when it was only Sonic and not Metal, if only because Metal feels very... "fanon"-y to me. If you wanna play along and argue over canon with me: it's now extremely awkward that Knuckles, the guardian of the Emeralds who's been able to transform in his starring game, isn't able to, but Metal Sonic, some robot who's never done it, IS able to. Mecha Sonic, the improved model, could only barely hold Super for a few seconds at a time using the full power of the Master Emerald. Just kind of a low blow to my main man Knux :V

 

[Goldenhog]

Actually, I wonder if this conversation would be taking place if Metal couldn't turn super and it was kept exclusive to Sonic.

Not like there was much point to giving super to Metal in the first place - as people have mentioned in this thread already, he gets very little out of it and he's already a sort of discount Super Sonic when being played normally anyway.

 

[JEV3]

I'm not entirely sure I fully understand this, so my apologies if I misconstrue this in some way, but what I take away from this is that just because some people will always be unhappy, that you must always take matters into your own hands? Something along those lines, at least.

If so, I can't say I agree with that sentiment, as yes, there will always be people who will complain. There is indeed nothing you can do about this, but if a majority of people clearly don't agree with your viewpoint, you shouldn't just... ignore them entirely.

If I'm missing something though, then again, I apologize.

"People will always be unhappy" means there should be a reason for a decision besides "making people happy." It can be a strong reason, a weak reason, or a reason you don't like but once you have a reason you can now stick to it.

I don't think it's a matter of ignoring them entirely but simply the fact that it was addressed, a decision was made, and that there is no requirement for it to be revisited. The dev team has commented a few times on the subject so it's not being ignored, it's just that the dev team is not changing their mind. That's not to say they never will change their mind, there's been some pretty drastic changes in SRB2 that I remember being a really dramatic back in the day... but our discussion only informs the team, it won't force them to make different decisions.

Fan feedback is helpful but is also dangerous if followed without restraint because it favors a vocal minority, wastes time backpedaling on design decisions that have already been made or at least are lower priority, and there are often strong feelings tied into the debate that can derail the conversation. As such caving to pressure from fans needs to be worth the time/risk and backed up by a strong understanding of how and why the solution would work better on the part of the devs. Otherwise it could well end up halfhearted or worse.

I'm afraid I've spent enough time on video game subreddits to feel a little exasperated by certain types of "fan feedback."

 

[Unknownlight]

As for something more on-topic, I feel like now that Super is near impossible to activate on accident (except for like, Amy, if you like using jump-spin for her air hammer, but I've always preferred jump-jump), that the argument of "it hurts the character variety" is flimsy than ever, because if you personally care about the variety then you can just... not activate it, if you just want to cheese stuff you can.

You're certainly not me then. :P This update has taught me that I enjoy landing into a spin (to attack enemies usually, and in 2.2 to take advantage of slopes) which means that I'm frequently accidentally activating Super Sonic. I really need to break this habit.

 

[Mystic]

I have been around for some of these arguments plenty of times and I've seen so many really arbitrary reasons thrown around over many different topics by the developers, that are somehow way more frustrating than receiving a "it's our game, we're doing what we want", since while they can make sense alone, it feels like they contradict themselves.

There's an important thing that you're missing here: the reasons can and do change over time. The dev team is not a monolithic hive mind that never changes its mind. We have many people with differing opinions and argue about things just the same as everyone else, and those people's opinions may change with new information and experiences. The reason a decision was made five years ago may not be the same reason that decision is being upheld today, and also indeed may no longer be valid and needs to be changed.

If you asked me ten years ago why Sonic is the only character that goes super, I would tell you because Sonic is the hardest character and we want him to feel special. While I do still think there's a bit of merit to that argument, I don't think it's anywhere near as important anymore and I don't base my decisions on that in 2019, but it was what I was basing my decisions on in 2009.

All of the reasoning you've posted that no longer really holds water did mean something when the decision was made. Just because we're no longer worrying about match's game balance at all doesn't mean we didn't when we were deciding what to do about circuit.

 

[U.Flame]

I feel like Super forms would be justified if the characters gained abilities that suit their specific playstyle.

For example, my favorite Sonic hack, Sonic Megamix, has 5 characters, some more complete than others. Each character gets an added ability when they go super. With the exception of Knuckles, only because he was unfinished.

Sonic has the homing attack in this game, and while super, he can thok in any direction you hold instead of always thokking forward. This enhances his speedy gameplay by allowing you to use the most efficient angles to continue uninterrupted.

Mighty has the ability to store and swap shields, and is the only character in the game who can use the shields' double jumps, playing like Sonic 3. While super, all shields stored become active, allowing him to simultaneously attract rings, breathe underwater, and use either the bubble bounce, lightning jump, or fire dash depending on the direction you hold when double jumping.

Shadow plays similarly to Sonic, and has an ability to be boosted at a cost of 5 rings. While super, the one time button press for a dash turns into a button hold. Instead of costing 5 rings, his ring count drains faster as he rapidly accelerates.

Tails has a tail swipe attack that is normally only effective at close range. While super, his tail swipe launches a quick slashing projectile.

Knuckles is the only character without a super exclusive ability. Don't know what it was planned to have been either, but I think Knuckles was planned to have some sort of drill dive, so I could see it being related to that. Both Tails and Knuckles were relatively unfinished.

Anyway that's how I like supers to be handled. They should complement what the character specializes in, rather than just being an invincible speed boost alone.

 

[TehRealSalt]

There's an important thing that you're missing here: the reasons can and do change over time. The dev team is not a monolithic hive mind that never changes its mind. We have many people with differing opinions and argue about things just the same as everyone else, and those people's opinions may change with new information and experiences. The reason a decision was made five years ago may not be the same reason that decision is being upheld today, and also indeed may no longer be valid and needs to be changed.

If you asked me ten years ago why Sonic is the only character that goes super, I would tell you because Sonic is the hardest character and we want him to feel special. While I do still think there's a bit of merit to that argument, I don't think it's anywhere near as important anymore and I don't base my decisions on that in 2019, but it was what I was basing my decisions on in 2009.

All of the reasoning you've posted that no longer really holds water did mean something when the decision was made. Just because we're no longer worrying about match's game balance at all doesn't mean we didn't when we were deciding what to do about circuit.

I apologize if I came off too rude, it was not my intention -- I did get a bit too heated there. I definitely understand minds being changed on a topic, or even just missing things (game dev certainly makes it easy to miss things, especially after going for this long!). I still stand by it being incredibly upsetting to see a decision made, then long after that decision's lost impact, it's still the same. It doesn't help the vanilla team isn't very transparent about what they're changing until it's all released and why -- it makes sense, but it still feels really bad. (and, well, I still have yet to hear how to reconcile the stark contrasting views of "Ringslinger's going to stay a different game so different viewpoint & controls are fine" and "Ringslinger's going to keep everything identical so it plays the same", but once again, this is getting far off-topic... I'll just go ahead and make some kind of multiplayer thread if I still care about the topic :V)

 

[Mystic]

Personally my opinion is "ringslinger isn't all that great in hindsight and we'd be better off scrapping it and spend time elsewhere entirely", actually. I don't think that's the opinion of the team as a whole, however.

Another thing it's important to consider is that when someone is asked to justify why they chose what they did, their response isn't usually going to be the only reason they chose what they did. The response will generally be what was the deciding factor in that decision. As an example, if I go out with the intent to buy a table, how do I choose the one to buy? Generally there isn't just one thing I want to use the table for, so I'm going to choose based on a lot of different goals, but one specific thing will be the reason I eventually settle on the option I decide, like say, fitting into my room. That doesn't mean there weren't other tables that could potentially fit into my room available. There were other table colors, designs, and other attributes that were already being considered, with many options being eliminated before I came to the two best options, and then selected one based on size as the deciding factor.

Hence, when I say that we're avoiding giving super to characters other than Sonic/Metal to preserve character diversity, that doesn't mean that's the only reason we're doing it. It just means that that was the deciding factor. It would be very hard to list every reason involved in the decision, because many of them are ultimately really minor or unimportant, like the aforementioned issue of Sonic being the most difficult. That doesn't mean that they're completely irrelevant. It just means that by comparison, one reason is way more important than the other.

 

[Cyron]

What begs the question is why Metal gets it when he barely has any sort of super prerpesentation which looks like this

Spoiler

and this

Spoiler

so the game isn't even an accurate representation of what a Super Metal would even look like.
I understand wanting to have a flow but the thing is....people don't care about flow when they go super they just want to go god mode. Flow doesn't make much sense anyway because Super lets Tails and Knuckles reach higher speeds with their ability with less effort, the only people without flow are Amy and Fang which you COULD just give them super abilities to give them flow.

Quite frankly I don't think any reasoning matters because people just aren't gonna take it lightly that someone gets a fanmade Super form yet the other person that actually does go Super, Knuckles, gets nothing.

 

[Jake]

I'm just confused over why Metal needs a super form when his base is already more broken than some other characters. He has infinite hover ability as long as he keeps moving, and unlike Super Sonic he doesn't immediately drop like a rock when losing speed. He also has multi-glide, which Knuckles no longer has. He has boost mode which makes him invincible. The character bio saying that Metal has just as difficult of a time getting around obstacles as Sonic feels like a lie when he's one of the easiest characters to use. Lack of thok doesn't mean anything when he can fly around forever and not lose height.

The reasoning I've seen in this topic is just really difficult to swallow, far more than "only Sonic can turn super because he's the main character" from past versions. That was acceptable reasoning to me, whereas "because balance issues" isn't. And honestly, I strongly doubt that any Sonic game that has featured super characters in levels has had developers think deeply about the feature other than "wouldn't it be fun for the characters to go super saiyan and go even faster?"

 

[time gear]

Quite frankly I don't think any reasoning matters because people just aren't gonna take it lightly that someone gets a fanmade Super form yet the other person that actually does go Super, Knuckles, gets nothing.

Tails also has a super form, either via Super Emeralds in S3K, or regular Chaos Emeralds in Mania.

 

[Tatsuru]

Hence, when I say that we're avoiding giving super to characters other than Sonic/Metal to preserve character diversity, that doesn't mean that's the only reason we're doing it. It just means that that was the deciding factor. It would be very hard to list every reason involved in the decision, because many of them are ultimately really minor or unimportant, like the aforementioned issue of Sonic being the most difficult. That doesn't mean that they're completely irrelevant. It just means that by comparison, one reason is way more important than the other.

If knowing more about said minor and unimportant reasons, as well as the entire process of decision making would make it easier for us to understand the final decision I'm all for hearing them. You've still got a lot of people confused or doubtful about them, and my point in this conversation (that was well complemented with Sal's examples) is whether it matters for you as a team that we understand those decisions.