The most interesting part in my opinion are the Sonic games prior to Sonic Unleashed, when Yuji Naka is not around anymore. I love how a lot of Sonic lore has been intertwined with each other. Like how the mural in Sonic 3 and Knuckles may have inspired Gerald Robotnik to create Shadow. And also got him to make Artificial Chaos. And then how Sonic Heroes had Metal Sonic get Chocola Chao and Froggy cause they have connections to Chaos. And then how the Gizoids were something Gerald analyzed. And so on and so on. It was so cool to see it all connect, and it made Sonic’s world fascinating.

And it’s something that post-Sonic Unleashed severely lacked. Like, where did the Time Eater actually come from? What is the Lost Hex? Whatever caused the Phantom Ruby to appear? Well fuck all cause we never got an answer to them. They just treat it as fodder to justify a game. Frontiers definitely got us going back to the connecting lore again, though it is rather sudden. Like they just brought everything from the past back to the present in an avalanche. While nice to see, I do wish they handled it better and not just dump it all as reference bonuses. I guess only time will tell.

In Archie: The Freedom Fighters and their splinter groups, and the Eggbosses. I love how with both of these they exemplify how each character in the setting is unique, my favourite example are the Desert Raider Freedom Fighters, who while they are Freedom Fighters, they're also in cahoots with Nephthys, the Eggboss of Midesta, as they both share the goal of keeping Midesta safe, so they're essentially triple agents.

In IDW: Metal Sonic and his identity crisis. It was very briefly explored during the Zombot saga, but it's known that he sees himself as the real Sonic, and thus is doing all he can to prove it. So when he sees Sonic is infected by the Metal Virus, he goes and dips his hand in the liquid that spreads it, only to have it slide off his hand and he stares at it silently. It's so subtle, but so striking in that it shows Metal Sonic having a sort of crisis about himself. I just wish it stuck around and wasn't dropped immediately after