Just when you thought Sonic Robo Blast 2 modding couldn't get more ambitious...
Sonic Robo Blast 2 is a Sonic the Hedgehog fan game built using the 3D Doom Legacy engine and is regarded as one of the finer Sonic fan games to have ever hit an official release...and then a game modder wondered "What would happen if we turned SRB2 into a Persona game?"
The result is the aptly named Sonic Robo Blast 2: Persona
, which, much like Sonic Robo Blast 2 Kart before it, is Exactly What It Says on the Tin: a Doom engine-powered Persona game with a plot similar to that of Persona 3, with Sonic and friends trying to reach the top of Tartarus to figure out what the deal with the Dark Hour is, and put a stop to it. Much like its source game and Kart, this also has modding compatibility, so with the power of mods, anybody can jump in to Tartarus to fight the Shadows. The game itself primarily takes mechanics from Persona 5 and a few from Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth and its sequel, namely the Sub-Persona system. Unlike other Persona games, though, this one allows Multiplayer, allowing up to 4 players to work together in a party...or for two parties of four to duke it out against each other.
As of right now, it is in the demo phase, with the most recent release being Version 1.3. Right now, there is no story mode, but the multiplayer is fully functional.
There are nine playable characters by default, with a tenth being unlockable.
Playable Characters (and their Personas) (Unmarked Spoiler)
- Sonic the Hedgehog (Orpheus)
- Miles "Tails" Prower (Nemesis)
- Knuckles the Echidna (Polydeuces)
- Amy Rose (Io)
- Metal Sonic (Palladion)
- Dr. Eggman (Samael)
- Shadow the Hedgehog (Hermes)
- Silver the Hedgehog (Omoikane)
- Blaze the Cat (Penthesilea)
- Kanade Tachibana (No Persona)
This game contains examples of the following tropes
- An Ice Person: Bufu (Ice) skills, which are the specialty of Penthesilea, Blaze's Persona.
- Atomic Superpower: The Frei (Nuke) skills, which are the specialty of Palladion, Metal Sonic's Persona.
- Blow You Away: Garu (Wind) spells, which are the specialty of Io, Amy's Persona.
- Casting a Shadow: Eiha (Curse) skills, plus Mudo (Dark/Instakill) skills, which are the speciality of Samael, Eggman's Persona.
- Expy: The Personas of all of the default cast, except Eggman and Silver and Kanade, who doesn't have a Persona, are those of a given SEES member from Persona 3 who matches them to some degree:
- Sonic's Persona, Orpheus, is based on the Persona 3 Main Character (Minato Arisato/Makoto Yuki).
- Tails' Persona, Nemesis, is based on Ken Amada.
- Knuckles' Persona, Polydeuces, is based on Akihiko Sanada.
- Amy's Persona, Io, is based on Yukari Takeba.
- Metal Sonic's Persona, Palladion, is based on Aigis.
- Shadow's Persona, Hermes, is based on Junpei Iori.
- Blaze's Persona, Penthesilea, is based on Mitsuru Kirijo.
- Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: Not in the conventional sense, but rather the characters themselves in PVP mode sort of form this:
- Sonic's Fire skills and high speed let him take Blaze down easily, but he's weak to Silver's Psychic Skills.
- Tails' Bless Skills hit Eggman's weakness, though because Eggman's Curse skills strike his weakness, it's an even match in spite of this. His auxiliary Psychic skills also give him an option to wipe Sonic out. Tails doesn't do so well against Kanade, though, as she resists his Bless skills, and can capitalize on Tails' low defense with her physical skills.
- Knuckles' Lightning skills let him make short work of Amy and do a number on Metal Sonic, but he gets wiped out by Blaze's Ice skills.
- Amy's Wind skills tear Shadow apart, but she hates dealing with Knuckles' Lightning skills.
- Metal Sonic's Nuke skills make him Silver's worst nightmare, but he has a bad time if Knuckles (Lightning) comes at him.
- Shadow's Fire skills let him blow Blaze to smithereens, but he gets blown away by Amy's Wind skills.
- Eggman's Curse skills let him smash Tails, but he has to watch out for Tails' Bless skills in return. He also trashes Kanade, too.
- Silver's Psychic skills utterly demolish Sonic, though Metal Sonic's Nuke skills obliterate him.
- Blaze's Ice skills stop Knuckles cold, but she gets wasted by Sonic's and Shadow's Fire skills.
- Kanade exclusively focuses on Physical skills and is thus exempt from this on the offensive front, but she gets trashed by Eggman's Curse skills, though due to her resistance to Bless skills, she leaves Tails on the back foot, especially as her physical skills take advantage of Tails' poor defense. Her resistance to Physical skills (and chance to reflect them outright) also gives her a leg up against Knuckles, Shadow and Metal Sonic.
- Fragile Speedster: Sonic and Shadow are this, possessing great speed and decent offenses, but their defenses are poor. Sonic possesses access to Link skills that let him follow up allies' attacks, as well as multi-target Fire spells and an accuracy/evasion buff, whereas Shadow has higher bulk, access to a defense buff and multiple physical attacks of varying elements (Pierce, Bash and Slash).
- Guest Fighter: One of the unlockable Vision Quest challenges has you square off against Kanade Tachibana, whom the mod's creator refers to as their 'anime waifu'. Clearing this unlocks her as a playable character.
- Irony: Due to her Persona being Penthesilea, Blaze not only does not possess any fire skills, but in fact her only weakness is Fire. This is in spite of Blaze, in the actual Sonic canon, having Pyrokinesis.
- Light 'em Up: Kouha (Bless) skills, plus Hama (Light/Instakill) skills, which are the specialty of Nemesis, Tails' Persona.
- Magically Inept Fighter: Kanade has a pitiful SP pool and the worst Magic in the game, but she possesses high physical attack, defense and hp, and uniquely resists physical attacks. She also has access to three Secret Arts: Howling, an all-target physical Almighty attack, Distortion, a spell that makes Kanade invulnerable for a turn before removing all of her debuffs and increasing her attack, and Delay, an enhanced version of the Counter (reflects incoming Physical attacks) passive with a much higher rate of activation. She typically specialises in Slashing attacks.
- Me's a Crowd: The boss of the first bonus Vision Quest, Kanade, has a skill called Harmonics, which duplicates the user (right down to their current state).
- Mighty Glacier: Knuckles and Metal Sonic are this, boasting extremely high defenses and HP, but their speed is low. Metal Sonic is slower than Knuckles, but he hits harder and has access to the Tarukaja series of skills, whereas Knuckles has access to the Tarunda level of skills and a unique, defense-debuffing series of skills.
- Nerf: In PVP mode, there are various nerfs to the characters for the sake of balance.
- Characters' SP pools are only 1/3 as large as in other modes.
- Similarly, percantage-based healing and damage, such as Mudo, Hama and Diarahan is halved, so Healing and Instant Death abilities don't blow the game right open.
- For a character-specific nerf, while Amy normally learns Recarm in other game modes, in PVP the skill is removed from her skillset to prevent stalling through revivals.
- One-Hit Kill: Hama (Expel) and Mudo (Death) skills, plus Ghastly Wail.
- Playing with Fire: Agi (Fire) skills, which are the specialty of Orpheus and Hermes, the Personas of Sonic and Shadow, respectively.
- Psychic Powers: Psi skills, which are the specialty of Omoikane, Silver's Persona (quite predictably). Tails' Persona, Nemesis, can also use these.
- Shock and Awe: Zio (Lightning) skills, which are the specialty of Polydeuces, Knuckles' Persona.
- Squishy Wizard: Silver, Blaze, Tails, Amy and Eggman all fall under various flavors this category, the primary difference being their elements of attack and auxillary abilities: Tails has instant death and slight healing abilities, Amy is the best healer in the game, being the only one to boast Mediarahan, Me Patra, and Recarm (Party-wide full heal, party-wide Status clearing and single-target revival, respectively), Silver boasts MP draining and magic reflection, Eggman gets a few status ailment spells (and instant death), and Blaze is just raw Ice damage.
- Status Buff: The buffs are divided amongst four seperate characters. Tarukaja-type skills (Physical Attack Buffs) are learned by Metal Sonic, Rakukaja-type skills (Defense Buffs) are learned by Shadow, Sukukaja-type skills (Accuracy/Evasion buffs) are learned by Sonic, and Makakaja-type skills (Magic Attack Buffs) are learned by Silver.
- Status Effects: It has quite a few, with bonus 'Technical' damage being dealt if you strike an enemy suffering a status with the correct element.
- Freeze: The victim will always move last in turn order. Typically inflicted by Bufu spells. Physical and Nuclear skills do Technical damage.
- Shock: The victim cannot move for one turn. Typically inflicted by Zio spells. Physical and Nuclear skills do Technical damage.
- Burn: The victim loses a percentage of their maximum HP per turn. Typically inflicted by Agi spells. Wind and Nuclear spells do Technical damage.
- Sleep: The victim cannot act for multiple turns, but heals a percentage of their maximum HP and SP per turn. All attacks do Technical damage, and the victim wakes up upon being hit.
- Dizzy: The victim's accuracy is lowered. All attacks deal Technical damage.
- Silence: The victim cannot use skills.
- Despair: The victim loses 5% of their SP per turn, and dies after 3 turns. Psychic attacks deal Technical damage.
- Rage: The victim automatically performs regular attacks on enemies with double attack power, though defense, evasion and accuracy are halved. Psychic attacks deal technical damage.
- Charm: The victim will either harm their teammates or help their enemies. Psychic attacks deal technical damage.
- Hex: Whenever the victim deals damage, they take half of the damage they dealt. Curse attacks deal technical damage.
- Additionally, there are stat debuffs. Knuckles learns Tarunda-type skills (Physical Attack debuffs), Tails learns Makakunda-type skills (Magic Attack debuffs) and Eggman learns Rakunda (Defense debuffs). Knuckles' 'drop'-type attack skills also debuff defense.
- Super Mode: The primary mechanic differing this from mainline Persona games is Emerald Power. As damage is dealt in combat, the Chaos Emeralds will become charged with energy, and once you have a full gauge, you can trigger Hyper Mode, which raises all stats slightly and, more importantly, prevents the user from being knocked down while it's active, preventing enemies from gaining more turns by striking weaknesses. During the final bonus Vision Quest, you also get to preview Super Forms (e.g Super Sonic), which grant greatly increased stats, zeroed out skill costs and the ability to nullify all attacks except Almighty. In the unlockable Monad Block, you actually get to use Super Forms for real. To transform, you need to have all seven Emeralds, already be in Hyper Mode and have three EP already stored. From there, just press the Hyper Mode button again to activate your character's Super Form.
