EAC said:

Is it fair to say Sonic's console games have gone astray over the past 5 years or so before Black Knight? No, it's quite mostly consistent, with ups and downs. Way damn too consistent to a fault, it's the classic games that got over-rated. Is it fair to say Sonic's games storyline have gone a bit weird over the past decade or so? Yes, start with Adventure, get weirder in Adventure 2, got really weird in 2006. Look normal in Heroes though. Strangely Shadow's game actually it's brighter than SA 2, minus the weird looking aliens and the carnage. Black Knight is a fantasy story, that's why it's a medieval style environment with wagon tracks and western style town. It's a Sonic fantasy medieval RPG. You can imagine it as Sonic's weird dream on knights (after perhaps a snooze on the books), which he gets a knocker at the end. Fang was in only in a few games, and even then he isn't that well known enough to be in Sonic are. He seems to be well known enough in the Archie comics though. He got in Fighters because they needed the characters, AM2 even need to drag characters from other non-Sonic games (including Fighters version of their beloved Honey, which was unreleased) and create a new one like Bark (unused again even until now). It's odd on how some often said that Sonic got too much characters. Shadow got to be in 1 big game, people desired his return after that. He returned in Heroes, but officially returned in his own game. Tikal was only in 1 big game's storyline that is over a decade ago, but people still remember her and she is in the Sonic Channel's website. Fang's unknownness and lack of current appearance is either because he was in less known spin-off games or. He wasn't really that unique to begin with. But it couldn't be because he isn't appearing as much, just ask Tikal. Fang's closest current analog is Rouge, Shadow is Espio's, Cream is Bean's, and Big is Bark's. Fang is like Marine, since both came from games co-developed by non-Sega companies. Blaze is definitely cool, plus physically strong and fast. But it's doubtful that she's one of the most mysterious of Sonic's allies. Her origin is well defined, both in 2006 where she was developed for and in Rush where she was first released. In Rush, her personality was turned into Saber the Cat, unlike in 2006 where she was a calm surrogate big sister for Silver and Sonic's version of bad future's Gohan (if she was a hedgehog, people will start looking Sonic and Amy with weird eyes). Silver was pretty cool, I see a lot potential for him, both in gameplay (Pyscho Kinesis) and story (naive future successor of Sonic, Amy, and Shadow). Big deserved a Wii Sonic fishing game, where he and other Sonic characters gone fishing. Plus Big and Blaze's comedic fish cutscenes (like drooling for fish). Project Needlemouse/Sonic the Hedgehog 4 was co-developed by Dimps, and so far it's pretty unimaginative in comparison to advance and rush, down to the title. Anymore unimaginative then the title would be "Frontier" instead of "4', a fairer title would be "Online Adventure". Fortunately it's in episodes, so they can improve in further episodes. Animal/creature ally characters introduced after Sonic Heroes are: Jet, Wave, Storm, Blaze, Silver, Marine, Shade (her return is doubtful), and Chip. It's nice to see old characters (like the Chaotix), but it's nicer to see fresh new faces or old with new looks. Imagine if there's none, Sonic would plummet at the end of sonic the Hedgehog 2 (no Tails and Super Sonic). I want to see Fighters version of Honey, her role is still void, and she's both new and old since she was unreleased in an old game.