Secret Rings and the Arabian Nights (read this!)

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kbaily

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#1 kbaily
Member since 2007 • 13042 Posts

Alot of the stupider Sonic fans like to come down on Secret Rings and its Arabian Nights theme and yet these same dumbasses will gush about how great the stories for Shadow the Hedgehog and Sonic Next Gen were because guns and beastiality are great and most of these fans I guess don't read books outside of Manga.

But many of us who though Secret Rings just copy/pasted elements of the books into the game and changed stuff around to be more "Sonic-like" such as having Tails and Knuckles as Ali Baba and Sinbad etc. But I talked with someone who played the game and read the massive book 1001 Arabian Nights and said that believe it or not, the game did a fairly good job in terms of level design. Yes Dinosaur Jungle, Skeleton Dome and the Night Palace are all places from various stories and depicted with a fair amount of accuracy give or take some artistic design choices.

As for Sharah coming from a ring. I bet you thought "Genies don't come from rings. They just did that because rings are a staple of the Sonic series." Right? WRONG! While skimming through the TV Tropes website I under "Disneyfication" defining how Disney likes to take some ahem "liberties" with stories to make them more kid friendly, I found this excerpt regarding Aladdin.

Aladdin, as well done as it is, is another example of alteration for alteration's sake. In the original story as presented in the Arabian Nights, Aladdin had two genies - a weaker one in a ring, and the stronger one in the lamp - and had no limit on the number of tasks he could set them to. Yes, he won the hand of a princess, but that was barely the midpoint of the story; the evil wizard who had first used Aladdin to try to retrieve the lamp (and who had no connection to the princess in any way) was not quickly disposed of but instead discovered Aladdin's success, and successfully stole the lamp (and the princess, and Aladdin's palace, and almost everything else) with a clever ruse. (Does anyone remember "New lamps for old"?) Aladdin had to win everything back from the wizard using his wits and the lesser genie he still had in his ring. And even then he still had problems...

So in actuality Sonic and the Secret Rings was more true to the story of Aladdin than Disney's Aladdin was. Sharah was the "weaker genie in a ring." which Sonic used to help him defeat the stronger genie in a lamp, Erazor Djinn and the fact he had four wishes at the end was also more true to the original story.

Interesting what you stumble upon by accident.

As for Black Knight's take on King Arthur ehh........

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deactivated-5b7a4a209ddaf

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#2 deactivated-5b7a4a209ddaf
Member since 2009 • 7764 Posts

you surprised me with this one :o

you are sure a good researcher

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chocolate1325

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#3 chocolate1325
Member since 2006 • 33007 Posts
Good info there and I agree.
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deactivated-5c35826ea3913

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#4 deactivated-5c35826ea3913
Member since 2004 • 5298 Posts
does it describe endlessly chasing after a glowing orb for seemingly no point just for filler in any point in the Arabian Nights? :P
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kbaily

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#5 kbaily
Member since 2007 • 13042 Posts

does it describe endlessly chasing after a glowing orb for seemingly no point just for filler in any point in the Arabian Nights? :Pwhoozwah

Nah that's all Sonic stuff there.

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koolkat14

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#6 koolkat14
Member since 2009 • 10428 Posts
kbaily, l agree with you. l'm a person that likes to read books and l remember reading a story about Aladdin in one of the books called '1001 Arabian Nights Stories'. And what you said about the story of Aladdin there is true
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Darkmoone1

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#7 Darkmoone1
Member since 2008 • 2845 Posts

Woah, didnt expect the ring and lamp thing.

Nice info.

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ULTRABAT

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#8 ULTRABAT
Member since 2009 • 1668 Posts

I had read the Arabian nights(okay my mom read it to me and my sister) and thought that Alladin was nothing like the original but that was 5 years before Secret of Rings so I had forgoten. Alladin wasn't an orphan either in the book(he lived with his mom) nor did the princess run away as they did in the movie EVERYONE knew she was walking around. So Sonic by no means ruined Alladin.

Secret of Rings is my second favorite Sonic game. I love the speed and quick boosts. And it was one of the only games I actually did not turn of the volume, and so I can say it had good music.

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kbaily

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#9 kbaily
Member since 2007 • 13042 Posts

On the TV Tropes site it basicallly lists all the Disneyfication examples and though recent movies have come under fire for taking a lot of liberties with the plot, it's amazing how much of the earlier ones people don't realize were off. Primariy because, over the years, we accepted the Disney version as the actual story when in fact the Brother's Grimm had a lot more darker aspects in their stories (and that was after a rewrite).

Snow White: Believe it or not, the Disney version stays true to this tale with two exceptions. One, the evil queen tried twice before to kill Snow White. The first by trying to asphyxiate her with a corset and then tried to give her a poison comb but the drawves cut the strings on the corset and removed the comb. As well as at the end the Queen was forced to dance in hot shoes until she died, which in that case throwing her off a cliff was much quicker.

Cinderella: Other versions I heard depicted Cinderella as having a living biological father but he was a drunk as well as some might be aware that the sisters did fit into the shoes but only after they cut off their toes.

Pincochio- Let's see originally Pinocchio originally killed the cricket (yeah!!), actually turns into a freaking donkey, is sold to the circus, breaks his leg while performing, and is thrown into the river and drowned. He only survives because his wooden body remained intact inside of the donkey body and thus climbs out of the water after fish eat the donkey skin away. Then Pinocchio dies as a puppet and then the original writer added additional chapters to where he is ressurected and turned into a boy. Orignally it ended with him dying.

Bambi's mom originally had a more graphic death.

The Little Mermaid- I once shared with someone the true story behind this beloved movie of how Ariel was going to die if she didn't get the prince to fall in love with her and her sisters try to help by selling their hair to the witch in exchange for a magic knife that Ariel has to use to kill the prince and save herself. After telling her this, I couldn't describe the look of horror and disgust.

Pocahontas- Anyone who paid attention in middle school American history know what's wrong with this.

And should I really get into the huge list of things that really happened in the story of Hercules? Let's just say Hercules was not a nice guy (Kratos has more in common with him than the Disney version). Most greek/roman mythology stories involve infedelity, incest, killing, etc.

Anyway I'll let you all read for yourselves:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Disneyfication

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macrules_640

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#10 macrules_640
Member since 2004 • 90033 Posts

Interesting read. Thanks for posting the article.

 

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deactivated-5b7a4a209ddaf

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#11 deactivated-5b7a4a209ddaf
Member since 2009 • 7764 Posts

say Hercules was not a nice guy (Kratos has more in common with him than the Disney version). Most greek/roman mythology stories involve infedelity, incest, killing, etc.

kbaily

+he is not son of a god, Zeus was a womaniser and have relations with an human. Theres were Herc comes out, a raped woman by Zeus