Megathread Archie Sonic Main Discussion

[Badnik Zero]

I don't understand people that call these characters recolors. If you read the old game adaptations (Sonic & Knuckles, Chaotix) you'll realize how out of touch the staff was with some of the source material. But they managed to create original stories with whatever understandings they had of the characters. Same-species characters are recolors because they were not game artists from freakin' Sega. There are only so many variations on a basic design you can do before it starts to look stupid. Also Archie is not the only guilty party:

[Marcello]

She looks manlier than Tails.

[Kuzu]

She looks manlier than Tails.

Not that its hard.

[OlenJimi]

Not that its hard.

Tails has chest hair. That's gotta count for something.

[leemour84]

i wonder if Ken's lawyer is Lionel huthz from the simpsons?

[AdventChild]

Wow, that design......It's like a Chia Pet has red plant growth on the top and leaves everything else bare......and hideously pink.

Edited December 3, 2011 by AdventChild

[Adamis]

On Ken's forum:

That design does not look like ANYTHING Naoto Oshima or Yuji Uekawa ever created. The body proportions, anatomical structure, line structure and fashion are NOTHING like anything Oshima-san or Uekawa-san ever drew. I have a Bachelor of Science in Game Art and Design and graduated top of my class. I know what I'm talking about.

Your rampant emotions are making you see what you want to see. That's all.

Ha ha ha ha ha ! Oh boy is this guy for real?

But then, there's a better post : http://www.kenpenders.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=2455&p=6087#p6087

[Soniman]

Thats a shit excuse, it still retains the basic body proportions and overall style that Sonic characters tend to have (noodle arms, muzzle), and the fact that she is just fucking Super Knuckles in drag doesnt help much either.

That dumbass probably his degree for five easy payments of $19.95

In fact, most of the comments are pretty face-palm worthy

Edited December 4, 2011 by Sonimas032

[Flyboy Fox]

No matter how much of this I read, I still cannot get over the fact that this guy is trying to legitimise his SEGA spin-off characters and ideas as independent works at the same time as trying to get SEGA to stop using 'his' characters.

[Your Vest Friend]

The body proportions

[Nix]

Ha ha ha ha ha ! Oh boy is this guy for real?

Edited December 4, 2011 by Nix

[Senator NinjaShark]

i wonder if Ken's lawyer is Lionel huthz from the simpsons?

KEN PENDERS

COMIC BOOK ARTIST AT LAW

AS SEEN ON HIS MESSAGEBOARD!

EChidna 5-ROOL

CLOGGING OUR COURTS SINCE 2010

*cough* but anyway, I actually Intend on downloading that Comic once it gets scanned, because I just wanna see what sort of Trainwreck that guy comes up with. The Cover alone it's gonna be not a A-Class Product.

Not to mention the reaction from both Sega AND Archie, wich no doubt should ensue into a Bitchslap of Major Proportions (and thus Hilarity for everyone else).

[Chaos Warp]

Wow, that looks like complete shit, and I still can't believe that he's trying to pass it off as original, while it's clearly based of the SEGASonic echidna design, which SEGA-sponsored Archie uses. WTF Ken Penders?!

[AuroraRedwinters]

It looks like Lara-Su got her wardrobe from the Salvation Army clearance bin.

(Disclaimer: No offense to those that shop there - tho I am more of a Goodwill Gal myself)

[Flyboy Fox]

He's clearly confusing a stylized take on the SEGA/Archie echidna design with a different style altogether, which it is not. Given that echidnas in fact look nothing LIKE that, there's no way he can claim it's his own design. The eyes, the 'dread' style quills, the fist spikes, the head-to-body ratio... there is nothing fucking original about any of it. What amazes me is his pure cockiness and confidence about the whole thing. I've never seen someone so narcissistic and delusional.

[Your Vest Friend]

My post made it onto the Penders forum! Hey, which one of you is Lammy?!

[Badnik Mechanic]

. I have a Bachelor of Science in Game Art and Design and graduated top of my class. I know what I'm talking about.

Where did these classes take place? Only I'd like to avoid going to that one if this is the quality of their top student.

Wig: Original owner donald trump, now in a much darker red. added a shortened ponytail bob thing from Tiara Boobowski from Sonic Xtreme.

Dreadlocks: Stolen from Knuckles, possibly went to the same barber as Shade the Echidna. Dyed a mild pinky purple since thats the fashion this year.

Dress: Stolen from Amy Rose, during the theft the dye tag exploded which removed the red colour and turned it purple.

Glasses: Stolen from Sonic the Comic's Megadroid MK2

Belt: Stolen from Batman, communicator, bought at the same place Sally got the original Nichole from.

Necklace: Pretty sure Nathan Drake gave it to Elena at one point.

Has anyone put this on the Sonic fandom wiki yet? It's cleary a fan character right? Don'tthink it is? I just randomly googled 'Echidna fancharacters' this is one of the first 'good' images I could find...

What is the difference in terms of creativity and originality between Ken Penders 'Lara -*don't*- su" and this?

lol it's even got similar pendent shiny things! Do we need the top graduate of an art school to point out that it's no more a fan character than that is? He can claim whatever he wants and his supporters can continue to fall for his crap but... just look, if some random Sonic fan drew Penders Pic's then everybody would instantly go 'cool fan character.' because it's so similar to the official Sonic echidnas, but we wouldn't be laughing as loudly at the quality because they would be the top graduate of their class in... something or other.

Originality the Penders... Do not steal.

Edited December 4, 2011 by Hogfather

[Your Vest Friend]

What is the difference in terms of creativity and originality between Ken Penders 'Lara -*don't*- su" and this?

Onyx doesn't look like a used dog chew?

[Soniman]

She instead looks like Julie-Su in amazon garb!

[turbojet]

This motherfuckah is trippin' yall!

[Mangoaxe5]

The key moment for me, as far as I'm concerned, is SONIC #125. I already have an alternate take on that particular story for various reasons and will reveal why that moment is pivotal to my plans at a later time. It recently occurred to me that it was possible to take my characters and concepts and tell the stories I wanted to without saying that anything I didn't do never happened. However, at some point, unless something is worked out between Archie and myself, whatever I created will no longer be a part of the Archie series and never referred to again within those pages. How they choose to navigate those waters is their business, not mine.

But you can't use Sonic!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So why bring up issue 125?

I like my chances just fine. It's because matters aren't fully resolved that I can't get into the details yet.

I think that it's quite clear that Penders is fucking insane.

Edited December 4, 2011 by Red Warrior

[SchemingMinor]

This is delicious. I come back to see Knuckles the Echidna in drag with a sea anemone on his head and Penders screaming to fans on his forum that he has the homeopathic medicine equivalent to an art degree which makes him immune to everyone's criticism.

This man has hit China.

[Mangoaxe5]

And BobR(Penders right hand man)answers back.

It has plenty to do with this discussion. Emotions, whether positive or negative, tend to cloud one's perspective to a degree if one is passionate about something. You are a fan of Sonic. You are obviously very passionate about it if you are studying graphic design and contributing to something like STC Online (Kudos, by the way. I like your art syle). I'm passionate about Sonic too. When I first saw this Lara-Su design, of course I got excited about it, as she is a character I enjoy very much. If I just left it at that and ran on just emotions alone, yeah, you would absolutely be correct in saying I'm blindly defending Ken. However, even if I am a fan of Ken's work, there comes a time when I have to take a step out of the fandom shoes and objectively look at the facts and do the necessary research, this Lara-Su design being just one instance of this. Judging solely on the wording of your previous posts in this thread, I can only conclude that they were emotionally driven because of either your passion for Sonic or your passionate distaste for Ken and the current situation, potentially obscuring your view of the facts. Posting remarks made by someone else on Sonic Stadium about my comments in an attempt to get a reaction out of me only further adds evidence to this and shows a lack of maturity on your part. While my line about my degree and my comment to Paul may have been influenced by my own emotions, at least I have the guts to admit to this one instance of hypocracy and take it into account before writing and submitting this post and not try to dodge the issue like you did. I'm only human, after all. If you are upset or fearful that Ken is trying to destroy or tarnish something you truly hold dear, or think he is crazy or whatever, that's fine. But let's try and be a little more civil and mature about things, please.

Lammy wrote:

With Knuckles : Same facial features, same dreads, same spiked knuckles, same tail.

With Rouge : Same kind of body, same curves.

Same style for the socks. Dress very similar to Sonia the Hedgehog. And there are other similarities, as seen in my picture ! Oh yes, the wig is new. Woah !

Yeah, totally not the same art style, of course

I believe there are some things you may have overlooked in this comparison. First let's take a look at Knuckles' facial features. His nose is cone based with a pointy tip while Lara-Su's nose has an elipse base. Knuckles has sharp corners for his eyes while Lara-Su's is round. Knuckles' dreads and tail have sharp tips while Lara-Su's are rounded. Knuckles' knuckles are cone-shaped while Lara-Su's are fang-tooth-shaped. Moving on to Rouge, that is a nice comparison and I understand where you are coming from, but there is no Uekawa echidna design with that body-type. For her body to be infringing on Sega trademarked echidna designs, she would have to have the same body-type as Tikal at least. However, even if you look at Tikal, her body-type is very similar to Knuckles, just with slightly wider hips. Lara-Su's arms, legs, hands and feet have more-human-like muscle structure and proportions compared to the Sega standard of round, tube-like arms/legs and large, round hands/feet. Next, Sega-standard Uekawa Sonic characters stand at maximum around 2.5 heads tall. Lara-Su can easily be seen as 3 heads tall, making her height proportions significantly different enough. Moving on to the Sonia fashion comparison, there are a couple of things I want to point out. First, Sonia's dress is clearly a two-part ensemble with two different colors compared to Lara-Su's one-piece, single-colored dress. Sonia's belt sepreating the two-piece outfit is designed signifcantly different than Lara-Su's belt too. Second, I ask you this: why do fashion designers not copyright or trademark their clothing or shoe designs? It is becuase all someone has to do is change one element, be it a button, a zipper, the stitching or anything, and the design is considered completely different in the eyes of the law. This situation is no different.

Keeping with this train of thought, I would like to share another comic book-related example of a similar situation. Back in the late 1970's-early 1980's, Disney threatend Marvel Comics with a lawsuit becuase they thought Howard the Duck was too similar to their own Donald. In attempt to make the litigation go away, Marvel decided to put pants on Howard. Howard wearing pants was a significant enough change visually to make Disney give up pursuing the suit any further, as none of their duck characters wore pants and would be extremely difficult to prosecute because of that. When you consider this anecdote, along with everything I've stated above, it should be clear that Lara-Su's design is significantly different enough from the Sega trademarked designs, let alone their female echidna design. Just because she is easily recognizable, doesn't automatically mean that she was drawn in the exact same style as Sega's characters. Using your logic, you could make the case that the original Oshima Sonic design is too much like Mickey Mouse because of his muzzle, gloves, pot-belly and eye design alone.

While I am fairly certain you will most likely dismiss everything I have just written as merely nothing more than, as VEDJ-F and the other commenters on SSMB put it, "bullshit" and probably berate me further, please do not think that my last post was a personal attack against you, becuase it was not and I apologize if you took offense to it. What I generally find disheartening is that a vast majority of the negative comments I have seen not only on this matter, but others as well, is that most of them are based purely on raw emotions, prejudice or assumptions and not on thoroughly researching the facts. Again, I admit my last post may have been done, in part, out of emotion, but the statement about the designs being different was based on what I have just written, which are researched facts, not emotion. I admitted my slight hypocracy, learned from it and moved on. While you probably won't do this, I ask that you think about what I posted here. Otherwise, go ahead and continue venting your frustrations if it will make you feel better. But as a Mod, I ask that you just don't break the rules of the board, please.

[Komodin]

At this point, I'm just waiting for the inevitable to happen, and when it does, I'm gonna laugh, laugh like Ed from The Lion King.

[Big Boss (legendsneverdie)]

I'm confused as to what this discussion is about.