The only way an opinion can be incorrect is if you state it as an absolute fact. If you're basing it purely on your own feelings, that aren't always logical or rational, then by definition it is not incorrect. You don't have to agree with it, but its not inherently wrong either. Don't get disagreements confused with actually being factually wrong.
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.
It’d need a lot more instances than that to be not Fan Myopia.
Granted, it very well could have been Fan Myopia on the developer’s part.
My musician pageIts 100% a Small Reference Pools problem.
And honestly, it's not a problem in of itself but the fact that they had to explain that way it part of the reason I feel its so damn undercooked.
Cuz The End being a personal personification of death sounds cool as fuck....and then they just recolored the fucking moon and made it a bullet hell.
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.Encylopedia.com has info on how ancient cultures had the moon as a symbol of death
, from Ancient Persia, to the Hindus and the ancient greeks as well.
Edited by Demongodofchaos2 on May 9th 2023 at 8:09:13 AM
Watch SymphogearThat The End could be defeated so quickly and easily is also a huge mark against all that foreshadowing they were doing. Like, the whole game is spent developing how unstoppable and inevitable this thing and its apocalyptic effects are. And then Sonic's just like, "Did you try violence?"
And I guess they didn't because violence works immediately. Sonic and one of the four mechs that the ancients built to protect them go up into space, punch The End really hard in its lack of face, and it drops dead right then and there.
Like. Okay. That was super easy, barely an inconvenience. Moral of the story: Try violence. Apparently violence was the missing solution this whole time.
Edited by TobiasDrake on May 9th 2023 at 7:24:22 AM
My Tumblr. Currently side-by-side liveblogging Digimon Adventure, sub vs dub.lalalei2001: If it's dead for now, then it's possible that the story DLC will either have you fight another incarnation of THE END or that future games will their monster villains be incarnations of THE END.
"Punishment is not the answer. Punishment is easy. It's lazy. Redemption is hard. Redemption makes you work."-Skulduggery PleasantRe: On opinions and critique of THE END.
It's pretty much accepted in Screenwriting that if you need to explain what happens in the film/story for the audience, then the work has failed, the quality is in question and it at least needs to be revised so it's much more clear. I'd argue the same can be said for game stories.
No one is walking around wondering what ancient civilizations perceived as death and demise. Sure it's a neat concept for a fictional plot or theme, but things like that only "work" if the context is clear, known and understood. I'm gonna assume everyone posting in this thread were neither born in year 500 BC or has Greek Goddess Selene on speed dial.
I haven't played this nor watched the scenes on YT, but from what it sounds like, the criticism is warranted.
Certified, self-appointed Sonic VisionaryIt makes sense knowing now, after all the research and speculation, just not when the audience experiences in that moment, either watching or playing the game. All Kuzu's been saying is that this could've been done better. Because in spite of the execution, making THE END appear as a simple moon for the audience as a reference to it's "Ancient" perception versus the cast's perception is either super cool or super corny depending on who you ask.
Certified, self-appointed Sonic VisionaryI feel like the 'perception of death' thing was thought of after the fact cause the OST for the cutscene says "Fake Moon" and the Japanese dub talks about it being "another moon."
The Protomen enhanced my life.I mean if people like The End the way it is, power to them. Ain't gonna take that away. I don't have to agree with it though and I have no problem articulating why.
I don't even dislike The End on principle and felt like it could have worked had they actually had the time and resources to finish the damn game. Its just that my next thought would be "y'all had five entire years and still couldn't finish the game?"
So I just found it interesting how much people talk it up, but there's not much to talk about outside of pure speculating and Epileptic Trees. It reminds me of how people talk about Infinite, where people are more invested in the idea and concept than the execution itself.
If you saw how people talked about Infinite, you'd swear he was one of the series' most well-developed characters as opposed to how underdeveloped he is in the game he originates from.
Edited by BlackYakuzu94 on May 9th 2023 at 4:15:23 AM
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.Ultimately I think the problem is that the story makes the same mistake a lot of plots that try to do mysteries make - they get a too much into the big shocking reveal and forget that the story needs to prop it up.
There's a lot of references to The End's existence. It's a lot of "oooh, they were fighting something" but no actual development for what that something is past the mere fact that it's there. All the story's development is instead centered on the Ancients themselves: their culture, their downfall, and the events that led to the creation of the horrible haywire monsters you're now fighting today. The story never gives us any indication that The End is there: no strange effects of The End's presence, and while Sonic hear's The End's voice once or twice, this has zero impact on the story and happens so rarely and so inconsequentially that the player can both be forgiven for forgetting it happened, or for not realizing after the fact that that strange voice even was supposed to be The End.
This was a heavyhanded attempt at preserving the shock value of The End showing up, but it actually works to the story's detriment: as Tobias explains, the end result is that the story is actually about the Ancients and The End just kind of pops up out of nowhere in the 11th Hour, and as written would've been better served as a sequel villain. They probably could have put more attention into the "Sonic is hearing a strange voice that turns out to be malevolent" plotline, which would've fixed this issue entirely note , but they didn't want to because they were presumably focusing more on the surprise than the story.
It's the same phenomenon you get where, like, a mystery story has the culprit be the character who has the least lines, and smallest presence and characterization. Or... say... something like Iron Man 3, where the plotline of the mystique and conspiracy surrounding the villain is very well written, but the true culprit is kept out of the spotlight so much that he doesn't really have a personality or decent motives, and can barely carry the plot once the twist brings him into the forefront.
Like I said, this is relatively common and this is like the first time Sonic's tried to do this kind of plot, so I don't fault them about it too much, but it's definitely still there.
Edited by KnownUnknown on May 9th 2023 at 1:25:45 AM
That's a great way of putting it actually. The game is so focused on being mysterious that it kind of forgot to develop the mystery itself.
And its funny too because this isn't the first time they've done this; Chaos, Shadow, Merlina and to an extent, Metal Sonic and Black Doom follow that same principle.
All villains who have hidden motivations that get revealed in the eleventh hour. But the quality tends to vary, but I'd say they're all still more developed than The End, or even Infinite.
Chaos and Shadow have their backstories slowly revealed over the game they're in, but they're also active participants in the plot too. Especially Shadow since the game is primarily centered on his motives as it is his rivalry with Sonic. That creates intrigue with the audience who want to know what Shadow's is and actually his ass as Sonic.
Metal Sonic and Doom are a bit worse since they both take a backseat until the eleventh hour, but their full motivations are at least revealed in the ending.
The player doesn't learn much about Infinite or The End's motives by the end of their respective games, and in the case of the former, I get the feeling someone realized that and just threw a motivation together for his appearance in Episode Shadow, but then that retroactively makes it worse since his apparent motivation isn't present in the main campaign, nor does he target Shadow at all despite being the catalyst for his turn. And its rightfully mocked for how abrupt and nonsensical it is.
I think they're gonna do the same thing in the Frontiers DLC and just try to retroactively try to develop The End since they at least seem to be aware of how undercooked it is.
A lazy millennial who's good at what he does.Huh. I never thought of comparing The End with the Biolizard in "undeveloped antagonists".
Seriously, that lizard was in Sonic X. Sonic X expanded plot points from Adventure 2 and yet that thing came even more undercooked.
And regarding Infinite - his Episode Shadow shit was to turn him into an Evil Counterpart of the Avatar. And as much I despise that marketing ploy, let's keep that in mind and stop talking of Infinite and his relationship with Shadow. It's *his* relationship with the Avatar, who is the true protagonist of the game.
Still sucks.
To win, you need to adapt, and to adapt, you need to be able to laugh away all the restraints. Everything holding you back.I think Biolizard is helped by the fact that he's basically just a phyiscal threat. Biolizard isn't really the villain of the story, Gerald is. Biolizard's just the last minute monster Gerald has in place to ensure his evil plan goes off, so finding out the Biolizard exists doesn't change anything (except giving Shadow an existential crisis, I guess). He's a replacement for Shadow, basically - a throwaway villain put in place to take Shadow's place as The Dragon once Shadow switches sides. This isn't great, but it could be worse.
Metal Sonic in Heroes, though, definitely has the same sort of problem as The End and I never really thought about it before. It doesn't help that literally the only protagonists who deal with anything surrounding Eggman in that game are the Chaotix.
Edited by KnownUnknown on May 9th 2023 at 2:54:52 AM

And the character interactions were definitively a highlight.
"Cynicism is not realistic and tough. It's unrealistic and kind of cowardly because it means you don't have to try."