Happy Friday the 13th everyone!
Crack open a cold one using a boy to celebrate
Damn shame the Friday the 13th game went through licensing hell, effectively kneecapping it’s chances at enjoying a regular shelf life. Great asymmetrical multiplayer game cut down before it’s prime. Bloody shame. *I would* suggest playing Dead by Daylight to get your fix in, as it has a similar approach to the Ft13th title in being within the conceptual camp of a survival horror based asymmetrical multiplayer game, but the same litigious disputes have prevented Vorhees from appearing in that game as well, which is nuts, as in Dead by Daylight, you can play as Freddie, Ghost Face, Michael Myers, Chucky, a Xenomorph, Pyramid Head…hell, they just recently added Dracula if I remember correctly.
At least Jason is available in Multiversus I guess?
Go crack some spines in celebration of the day: it’s how his mom would have wanted to remember him. Putting aside the spine tingling delight of a random day of note, I have only a brief moment to spare in discussing video games, but that is how it rolls sometimes. Usually in these moments, I have to utilize a radically reductionist tactic to see what is worth discussing: does it make me giggle or at least horrify me? The answer becomes clear quickly.
Probably why I’ve been writing about Elden Ring so much
recently
To that point, I definitely gave out a slight chuckle when I read that Sonic Team head Takashi Iizuka essentially said a stand alone Chao game spinoff, split apart from a possible Sonice Adventure 3, was not possible (paraphrase). The quote comes from an interview with VGC involving the Sonic boss’ thoughts involving rumors behind a potential spin off, a new Sonic Adventure game, and more. 
I very much made the same face as Sonic is making when
confronting the news involving more Chao in my gaming future
The Chao were fan favorites from the Sonic Adventure series, which saw you dive into a massive meta-game involving an almost Pokemon like system involving raising, training, fighting, and competing the Chao against each other, totally aside from the main Sonic experience. You could still gather resources for Chao in the main game, but they felt fundamentally separated in most ways from each other, which begs the questions as to…why one couldn’t just split the two into separate experiences? The Sonic Team boss says it’s just not possible:
“When we talk about Chao Garden specifically, I know everyone’s like ‘I want Chao Garden, I want Chao Garden’,” Iizuka replied (via an interpreter). “But Chao Garden is a piece… it’s part of the whole Sonic Adventure series of games. It’s not a standalone game, it’s integrated into the whole Adventure series gameplay, so we can’t just break it off and make it a thing. And so it’s like, alright, well, if you’re asking for Chao Garden and Adventure 3, then that’s pretty much asking for Adventure 3.“
So the logic he provides just isn’t really there, hence why I giggled when I read it. The whole thing comes off as kind of as nonsensical, as I could think of many ways you could split off the Chao Garden from the Sonic Adventure series itself, turn it into a mobile game, and likely make truckloads of money. But I guess for some reason, in Iizuka’s mind, the “integration” of the two makes it infeasible due to reasons of being packaged together?
It must be just like when you want just the cream in the Oreo,
but not the cookie itself, you know? You just can’t separate the two
entities, because they’re just a sandwiched deal.
It’s a laughable response, and basically just an obtuse way of saying “we don’t care about working on Sonic Adventure 3”, which is understandable on multiple levels. Not only has the studio moved onto bigger and better things, the Sonic Adventure series, outside of the Chao Gardens, has not aged well, and has held up quite poorly to the test of time, with most having mixed reactions to how uneven the games really were. Having said that, Iizuka does go on to say the equivalent of “never say never”:
“At some time, yes, because we hear the same thing. Everybody wants it! I think at some time I’d like to say ‘hey, yeah, we’re making Adventure 3’, but we don’t have plans for that yet. It’s just one of those things that if, if the stars align and it can all happen, then yeah, we’d love to make it.”
C’est la vie, as the Sonic community continues to await with baited breath for the day that never seems to come. Fingers crossed we will all be able to return to the Chao Gardens revitalized and anew one day, and spend time with our favorite little karate chopping, speed racing, demonic little bundles of joy once more.
~Pashford
Active Time Event 