One question that's been haunting me since I binge-read most of the blog whilst doing testing is: in your opinion, what is the primary difference in the worlds of Archie Sonic and IDW Sonic? Obviously part of that is Penders' influence vs. Ian's influence, one's obviously based more on the games than the others, etc... but I feel like more than that, the two comics have a vastly different feel in terms of how their world generally just works in-universe. I'd like to know if this makes any sense, or if I'm just crazy.
I mean, the IDW world literally is the game world now, so yes, there are some pretty huge differences that are immediately apparent.
I'd say that where both incarnations of the Archie universe were much more of an "anything goes" sci-fi/fantasy world with all these different factions and kingdoms and whatnot, the IDW comics depict a more mundane modern/near-future setting that just so happens to have some highly stylized scenery and be inhabited by cartoon furries. (And off-screen humans, now that the two worlds have been reunited, I guess.)
I mean, it's right there in the names of the planet. Archie was set on the fantastical world of Mobius, but the IDW comics are just on a fictional version of Earth. Most of the sci-fi elements are Eggman's creations. There are still plenty of fantasy elements, but they tend to be hidden better. They're a thing for Sonic and his friends and enemies to discover on their adventures, not an everyday fact of life for the normies. In the Archie comics you had people living in medieval kingdoms and underwater societies and Mad Max wastelands and floating utopias and all this other stuff, but in the IDW comics they tend to live in pretty normal modern cities. I'd argue that this makes Sonic feel like more of a larger-than-life hero in the IDW comics, since he's always seeking out adventures in these corners of the world that the average person doesn't know about. Joe from Station Square's never been to somewhere like Sky Sanctuary or Little Planet
I know some Archie fans think this means the worldbuilding in IDW is "bad" or "boring" since there aren't a bunch of high-concept fantasy locations being introduced, but it's just different. The way they did things at Archie was fun, but this matches the vibe of the games much better
