So, the more clever among you figured out the solution to yesterday’s post: all five posts are, indeed, from Sonic 3. So what’s the point, you say?

There has been a lot of handwringing among the community over the past few months about “the state of the fanbase”; how we’re all horrible people who have turned against each other and now are super! mean! bad! people! In fact, this is all because of Sonic 4 or Sonic Free Riders or because there was an abandonment of ~black eyes~! However, my point is this: there always was and always will be people who are angry or upset or dislike things amongst any group of people. They were around in 1990, 2000 and 2010. There are people who are going to try to take advantage of those things in order to make people even more upset. Some people relish in making others feel that the thing they enjoy as a hobby is lame; therefore, they expend all their energies on making people think they’re wasting their time.

That, of course, is a load of crap. Things have always been the way they are, but the only thing that matters is whether you’re enjoying yourself or not. The reason we at Retro stay around is because so much of making fun of things is not being afraid to make fun of yourself. Because we’re in a fandom that could spawn Shadow the Hedgehog 2 with Big and Froggy.

So, I’m proposing a contest: learn more about the fandom you’re a part of by reading some of its oldest posts, get a laugh and learn that it isn’t as bad as people freak out over. Some of the USENET quotes I posted were pretty great in “the more things change, the more they stay the same” sense, but there’s a ton of ironic posts, things which make no sense in a modern context, things which are creepy predictions of the future that came true. Submit your best pre-1997 Internet commentary concerning Sonic; we’ll take a look and our favorites will receive ~fabulous prizes~. Then again, it’ll be hard to follow up this gem in a 1990 post on rec.games.video:

>Sonic, the Hedgehog, Action, SEGA
>[SEGA’s answer to Mario and Bonk]

Actually I think SEGA already has SEVERAL answers to Mario and Bonk…
and their names are Shinobi, Wonder Boy, Alex Kidd, and Space Harrier…

To find old posts, check out Google Groups or fire up your favorite newsgroup client. Other forms of early communication, such as the rat.org mailing list, are also fair game if you can track them down. The contest ends March 1, 2011, so be sure to have your entries submitted through the comments section by then.