5

Because she’s secretly a girl of action, Amy tells Cream of her plan to escape as Zonik reappears. Now we have the second biggest rewrite of the Saga: Zonik’s vulnerability. Before, stupidly, he was easily downed, defeated and shut down by the stupidest things so, to make up for that, Amy and Cream catch him off guard and smack him into the Roboticisor Machines, destroying them and catching him in a massive explosion! MUCH better than them just…jumping on him…They also now escape frame left, instead of above, and run past the cells, destroying the Guard and the locking mechanism, freeing the captured Mobians! This is because, before, Bean, bark and Antoine were just cameos here but they later appeared on South Island and even participated as characters, so how did they ever escape from the Plant? Here, I stick it into continuity that Amy and Cream rescued them thus tying up that minor irritating continuity mistake.

6

Here we have a brand new background for Robotropolis, Stardust mixed with Scrap Brain, also another rewrite here is Zonik’s expanded role. He now reappears and chases Amy and Cream instead of a group of EggRobos, thus showing he is not so easily beaten! He chases them to the edge of the Island, which I painstakingly reedited into the “ultimate bridged gap” (every time I redo this background I try to make it better). This time the background to Egg Island is from Sonic CD and its pollution seeps slightly into South Island in both the sea and the sky. It’s about as perfect as it’ll get (until the next time). Just when things look their worst, Tails and Ray catch Zonik off guard and save the girls!

7

Now, here, it is shown that Zonik can be beaten for a bit when caught off guard, thus keeping in continuity his statement in I, Metal that he was prone to frequent shut downs, but it’s nowhere near as easy or extreme as before. Zonik is pissed now and fires a slightly reduced blast at Ray, not so much killing him as before but still pretty powerful for a knock out blast. Like Sonic before him, Zonik’s voice fades out and trails off as he is sucked through the time stream and he vanishes in a ripple of energy.

8

Here’s another big rewrite for this comic, Cream can fly herself for brief periods! Like Cheese, I didn’t know Cream could do this until I finished the original Saga, but here it is put in to some effect (not hugely used because she’s still new to it) and, like her now omitted almost-flirtation with Ray, it is part of continuity. The introductions take place in another more conservative Emerald Hill background, which is also a lot better than before too.

9

Ray now has more coherent information about Little Planet and the Time Stone and the group figures things out together, rather than ray and Cream telling them. Cream contributes her information in a childlike way, which is much more in keeping with her true character. Determined to save Sonic, Tails has become a good substitute field commander though, like Amy, his skills and confidence are not at the level they will be later on. And, like before, we close on a black and white still frame shot.

OVERALL

I like this Part a lot more now due to the new backgrounds, improved ideas and the re-characterisation and an re-badassing of Cream and Zonik, keeping their characters like they should be, introducing elements that weren’t properly touched on before and making them a proper part of this world as well as re-enforcing ray’s personality as much as possible for a side character. Let’s see what I can do with Chaotix next…