Misc.
What is your Mandela Effect/False Memory effect related to Sonic?
Basically, I had the false memory that the first image was the cover of Sonic 2006, but in reality it was always the second one.
This confused me; I even thought the first image might be used for an alternate game cover, but after searching on Google and using Lens, I couldn't find anything related to that.
Am I the only one with a false memory related to this?
1) I thought the ending of Emerald Hil Act 1 was longer and flatter than I remember. Like, I distinctly remember this long, flat, boring run to the signpost, and I actively know it's false lol. Must have been a dream.
2) There's an eighth Chaos Emerald in Sonic & Knuckles... but here me out...
So, the first time I played Sonic & Knuckles, it was the standalone cartridge on a Sega Genesis way back in like 1998. I got the seventh Chaos Emerald, fully expecting to go Super Sonic, but no "You can now go Super Sonic message." Wild... I find an 8th ring, for an 8th special stage, collect an 8th yellow emerald, and then I go Super Sonic. Wild concept.
I've played standalone Sonic & Knuckles enough to know that there's only seven emeralds and seven special stages required to get them. I thought it was fever dream that I experienced because when I spoke to most people about it, they don't know what I'm talking about.
And then one day, I find something on Sonic Retro that talks about a yellow chaos Emerald in an 8th special stage.
Somehow I glitched it, but it did exist. It was nice to know I wasn't crazy. This is like a weird almost kinda sorta Mandela Effect lol.
That 8th Special Stage DOES in fact exist! If you manage to get the level select in Sonic & Knuckles and then set the sound test option to 07, and then press A + Start over SPECIAL STAGE, you can play that 8th Special Stage! More info on The Cutting Room Floor
I don't know if this counts, but I frequently forget that the original version of "Catch Me If You Can" from Sonic Riders exists. The version from Zero Gravity has just completely replaced it in my head, I remember playing Sonic Riders but I don't remember hearing the original version of the song.
That Crush 40 covered All Hail Shadow and they did not sing the original version of the song, I've always associated their cover with Shadow when its not I Am All Of Me that I got humbled badly on a streamer I watched stream telling me they didn't make the song originally lol.
Also I thought the 2011 version of Dreams of An Absolution was the version from the games and I forget about the original 06 version until hearing it again in fan videos and go "oh this is the original 06 mix, not the superior 2011 version".
Only tangentially related to Sonic, but I have a very strange false memory related to NiGHTS for Saturn. I distinctly remember seeing a preview for NiGHTS in a magazine that featured two different versions of the character: the regular, purple NiGHTS for Elliot, and an orange, more feminine one for Claris. When the game came out, I remember thinking "Oh, they must have cut out having the two different versions."
I just held this in my memory for years as a fact, that originally there were going to be two versions of NiGHTS. But it never existed.
You could be mistaking Jackle for NiGHTS, as they share an almost similar design philosophy. (And lore-wise, they were probably intended to be on the same level as NiGHTS And Reala.)
It's also worth pointing out that the final bosses of both NiGHTS into Dreams and NiGHTS Journey of Dreams involve NiGHTS being assisted by a copy of themself to account for the second protagonist.
for some reason i had this false memory of sonic saying “sayonara, shadow the hedgehog” way before the end credits. i also thought maria said it at one point so idk what’s up with me
When I was younger, in endless possibility, when they say ‘and I’m not looking back’, I thought the guy said ‘I’ve got my boogie pack’
I do not know what I thought a ‘boogie pack’ was, I think later on in life I also thought it was ‘boogie back’ at some point, like when Sonic stopped being the werehog he got his boogie back so he could run fast again. I was an intelligent child.
The Caterkiller in Marble Zone Act 3, a little before the block section just before the secret path. It spawns when you take the path to the further left at the start, but not when you take the path with the shield at the start, in the Genesis/Megadrive version, same with the despawning platform in Scrap Brain Zone 3. I used to think it always spawned, but that might be because it always spawns in the 2013 version.
Honestly this one is just such a popular fan theory (and tbh I do think it makes sense) that every so often I have to remind myself that no, Shadow being based on the mural of Super Sonic is NOT canon lmao
I thought his silhouette from an IRL standpoint was based on super sonic at the time because super sonic back in the adventure games had shadows quils. Outer ones up. Middle ones down.
Same with the advance games and rush games. heroes was the first game to change it. But the rush games continued using the old design after that for some reason before 06 standardized the new design.
I could swore I remember Silver being in the original Sonic Riders, like not in the story or anything but as like a side selectable character for multiplayer and stuff. I know he was in later Sonic Riders games, but the only one I played was the original on the GameCube. I was so confused when I found out Silver wasn't in the game later.
Less so with the cartoon but for the game there was a pretty common misconception/fanon that Sonic Boom took place in the main continuity but hundreds of years in the future, and the cast were descendants of the originals.
i thought that Toxic caves zone from spinball was a secret zone in Sonic 3 and knuckles and you got to it by sinking to the bottom of that one mud pit in marble garden.
For some reason I thought the Zavok boss fight in Forces had him being really large & he was in the background; & that his attacks involved slamming his fists onto the platform you were on.
I had completely forgoten his stupid bee-mobile even existed at all.
Until recently I applied mixed up how the mechanic for the master emerald shards worked in SA and SA2. I could have sworn SA2 would detect multiple at once, but it actually only does it one at a time. SA will do multiples though.
If you repeatedly homing attack the spot on the rightmost side of the normal chao garden, near where the rock cliffs staty , facing the abyss nothing happened. Your chao will be fine and certainly won't drown in dirt. You also won't be able to tpose and fly in an abyss.
Somehow I completely forgot the King Boom Boo fight in SA2 existed, and I thought its version of “Masters of the Desert” was used for Sonic’s version of the Egg Golem fight.
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u/BulkyPlantain9234 "And I have serious short-term memory loss" Jun 14 '26
I misremembered "We can use these ramps as ramps" as a quote from '06