Knuckles the Echidna

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Template:Vg-in-universe [] Error: {{Lang}}: no text (help)This article is about the video game character as represented in video games and television series. For information regarding the character's representation in the Sonic the Hedgehog comics, see Knuckles the Echidna (comic character). For the comic series based on this character, see Knuckles the Echidna (comic series).

Knuckles the Echidna
'Sonic the Hedgehog' character
File:Knuckles2006.png
Knuckles is the Guardian of the Master Emerald.
First gameSonic the Hedgehog 3
Created byTakashi Thomas Yuda

Knuckles the Echidna (ナックルズ・ザ・エキドゥナ, Nakkurusu za Ekiduna) is a character within the Sonic the Hedgehog fictional universe of video games, television shows, and comics. His creator is Takashi Thomas Yuda.

Knuckles is a red, teenage, anthropomorphic echidna, and while Sonic has large, spiky hair locks, Knuckles has red dreadlocks. He also has a white crescent birthmark on his chest. His first game appearance was in Sonic the Hedgehog 3, released on February 2 1994 for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis.[1] He was described as being 15 years old when he made his debut, but since Sonic Adventure, he is now given the age of 16.

Knuckles' name is derived from the four knuckles, two on each hand, which are actually sharp spikes. His task since birth has been to guard the Master Emerald, which is located on Angel Island. According to official Sonic Team polls, Knuckles is the fourth most popular character in the series.[2]

Conception and creation

During conception of Sonic the Hedgehog 3, the development team wanted to create a new rival for Sonic. The final design of Knuckles was the result of dozens of possible designs inspired by numerous different animals.[3]

History

Games

Knuckles lives on Angel Island, which hovers in the sky thanks to the power of the Master Emerald. His duty in life is to guard the Master Emerald, and he is the last surviving member of the Echidna people who once inhabited the island.

In Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Knuckles thought that Sonic and Tails were attempting to steal the Master Emerald, and that the infamous mad scientist Dr. Robotnik, also known as Dr. Eggman, was trying to protect it. However, Robotnik had lied to Knuckles. He was planning to use the Emerald to repair his space station, the Death Egg. In Sonic & Knuckles, in the Hidden Palace Zone, Eggman's betrayal was revealed to Knuckles very bluntly, in the form of an electric shock. Since then, Knuckles has joined Sonic and Tails in their quest to stop the villain.

Aside from appearances in the main Sonic series, Knuckles featured prominently in Knuckles' Chaotix, a relatively unknown spin-off title developed for Sega 32X. The game also introduced Team Chaotix, a group of comical misfits.

In Sonic Adventure, the Master Emerald shatters when Eggman frees Chaos and Tikal's spirit from within it, causing Angel Island to fall out of the sky. Knuckles's goal is to reassemble the shards of the Master Emerald. These levels are large, explorable areas in which players must hunt about the various Action Stages for three shards per stage.

In Sonic Adventure 2, Knuckles the Echidna is guarding the Master Emerald when Rouge the Bat attempts to steal it. In the middle of their argument, Dr. Eggman snatches the emerald. Knuckles then shatters it in order to prevent Eggman from successfully obtaining it. Knuckles then sets off to find the pieces and restore the Master Emerald once more, before Rouge does. The gameplay is similar to the first Adventure title.

In, Shadow the Hedgehog, Knuckles helps out Shadow.

In other Sonic titles, he has been seen away from the Master Emerald at times, as in Sonic Heroes, where Knuckles joins forces with Sonic and Tails, becoming the power member of Team Sonic. Knuckles has appeared either as a playable character or in a supporting role in almost all later Sonic titles, althogh not always with particularly major role in the storyline. He appears however to have an important part to play in Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood; it has ben confirmed that in the game he gets kidnapped by a group of aliens. Knuckles has also been confirmed to be a playable character in the game.

Knuckles makes a cameo appearance in Sega Superstars Tennis in the Green Hill court. Knuckles also makes a cameo appearance in Super Smash Bros. Brawl in the unlockable Green Hill Zone stage where he, Tails, and Silver run through the loop in the background. He also appears in this game as a trophy and a sticker.

Sonic the Comic

In Sonic the Comic, Knuckles is depicted as (at first) being the last of his kind, and bears the burden of guarding the Chaos Emeralds alone. When the Death Egg crashed on the island, Knuckles was briefly tricked by Doctor Robotnik into believing Sonic was a dangerous villain who plotted to steal the Island's Chaos Emeralds. The echidna thus allowed Robotnik to place his Badnik armies on the island and also construct a Launch Base Zone to rebuild his Death Egg, and assisted him in fighting Sonic and stealing Sonic's own six Chaos Emeralds so they could be combined with Knuckles's into one set of Emeralds. Knuckles, however, didn't trust Robotnik enough to tell him that he had the "missing" Grey Emerald which could control the others, and when Robotnik tried to absorb the Emeralds' power into himself, Knuckles used the Grey Emerald to defeat him.

Knuckles spent the next few months destroying every trace of Robotnik's influence on the Floating Island, including the entire Carnival Night Zone, and assisted Sonic both when his secret base came under attack by a Badnik army and when Robotnik established a base in the Ice Cap Zone. Finally, the two heroes teamed up to destroy the Death Egg before it could launch, which they failed to do. In addition, Knuckles had also failed to stop Robotnik's Metallix from stealing the Master Emerald to power the Death Egg. While Sonic fought to retrieve the Emerald, Knuckles used ancient echidna technology to pilot the Floating Island and open fire on the Death Egg with Chaos Energy blasts, finally downing the craft. With the Master Emerald returned, Knuckles owed a debt to Sonic and, despite preferring privacy, agreed to hide the entire population of Emerald Hill Zone in the Mushroom Hill Zone to keep them safe from Robotnik's wrath.

In the story The Homecoming, Knuckles discovered that an elderly, white-furred echidna named Dr. Zachary had appeared on the Island. Initially he claimed to be the first echidna to return to Mobius and that he was being pursued by a dangerous robot. It turned out Zachary was evil and using the robot (in reality an ancient echidna Guardian Robot) as his minion. He had the robot destroy the Master Emerald and absorb its power, intending to attack Mobius with it, but Knuckles stopped him, using the robot's head as a brief substitute Emerald. Knuckles then created a new Master Emerald from the echidna's Sacred Emerald Mines, which existed in a graveyard haunted by the ghosts of the Kohenyu (a race of Styracosaurus' who were unwittingly hunted to extinction by the echidnas) and he had to take responsibility for their death.

He was roped into helping Captain Plunder and his Sky Pirates launch a heist on an alien galleon, in return for a chest of ancient echidna documents that could help him with the Island's ancient computer systems. Knuckles trekked across Mobius with the chest, fighting the occasional villain as he went, before finally returning to the Island to battle Robotnik as well as a cyborg Zachary's attempt to turn the Emerald Hill refugees into an organic computer. Robotnik was then overthrown, and the refugees returned home.

Knuckles spent his days with Porker Lewis trying to uncover the mysteries of his lost people, occasionally being drawn into battle. He left the island to save lives from the environmental collapse of Mobius, when Robotnik tried to drain the planet's life force. Soon after that, the Floating Island came under attack by the terrifying Chaos creature and Knuckles was forced to scatter the Emeralds across Mobius, dooming the island in the process. He was left distraught and had to be forcibly evacuated from the island, and joined up with the Freedom Fighters to stop Chaos and retrieve the Emeralds.

Knuckles is also one of the few to know of Tails' legendary status in the Nameless Zone, a fact he became aware of when he followed Tails through a portal mistakenly believing the young fox was being kidnapped. The Nameless Zone residents came to the conclusion that Knuckles was actually Sonic, whom Tails had claimed was his sidekick. Far from blowing Tails' cover, Knuckles was delighted to meet people who didn't worship his rival and played along, assisting him in defeating the terrifying Trogg once and for all.

The last storyline revealed Knuckles had lived in the ancient past, acting as a warrior and leader for the echidnas against the Drakon Empire. It is presumed by Sonic that Knuckles was placed in suspended animation for unknown reasons and lost his memory.

His design in the comic is different to that of the game universe: the green and yellow of his shoes are inverted and his White crescent birthmark is a white/silver medallion in the comic series.

Sonic the Hedgehog (comic book)

Main article: Knuckles the Echidna (comic character)

Sonic Underground

Knuckles appeared in four episodes of the cartoon Sonic Underground. Friend or Foe echoes the usual storyline of his initial meetings with Sonic, as he is tricked by Dr. Robotnik's cohorts and goes after Sonic and his siblings. In keeping with the constantly reenacted scenario, Knuckles came to realize that he had been tricked, and teamed up with Sonic and his siblings (Sonia and Manic the Hedgehog) to save the Floating Island. Afterwards, Knuckles revealed that he had met the siblings' mother, Queen Aleena, who left a message stating that Knuckles would be the first of many allies to join with them against Robotnik.

Later, Sonic and the others returned to the Floating Island in the Chaos Emerald Crisis trilogy of episodes, seeking Knuckles' help against another Robotnik plot, a giant flying fortress powered by a Chaos Emerald. Knuckles agreed to help, but received a dire warning from his great-grandfather Athair that his leaving the Floating Island could lead to disaster. Regardless, Knuckles helped the Hedgehogs onto the fortress, only to learn that Robotnik's lackeys had turned on him and stolen the Emerald. Going to Athair, the four learned that they had to align with Robotnik to keep the Chaos Emerald-which had split in half-from releasing so much energy that Mobius itself would be destroyed. The siblings refused, so Knuckles took the matter into his own hands. Making a deal with Robotnik, he unwillingly agreed to lead Sonic and the others into a trap in exchange for Robotnik's help, so long as Robotnik promised not to put any of the three through Roboticization. True to form, Robotnik betrayed Knuckles, but Knuckles was able to turn the tables and free his friends. Forging a new alliance with Robotnik, they recovered the Emerald, which Knuckles was then given charge over. He was offered the position of a Freedom Fighter, but was forced to decline because of his duties to take care of the Chaos Emeralds on the Floating Island.

Sonic Underground ended before the plots could be resolved, and so Knuckles appeared in four episodes. Knuckles was voiced by Ian James Corlett.

Sonic X

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Characteristics

Offical profiles have said that, as the last survivor of his clan,[4] Knuckles lived most of his life in seclusion on Angel Island,[5] an island floating in the air; and as such he is something of a loner.[4] His inexperience with off-islanders leaves him very honest, and also gullible.[6] Knuckles is shy around girls;[7] while some official sources claim that Rouge the Bat has a secret crush on Knuckles that she would never admit to.[8] Although he is cool and determined in battle;[9] his short temper gives rise to situations in which Knuckles, often instigated by the trickery of Dr. Eggman, begins fighting Sonic the Hedgehog.[4] Additionally, Knuckles has been tasked all his life as being the Guardian of the Master Emerald,[10] as only descendants of his tribe are capable of controlling it.[6] If Sonic exemplifies the wind, then Knuckles is the mountain: stern and anchored to his duty.[6][9] Although Knuckles sees Sonic as a friend,[11] he finds Sonic's adventurous lifestyle enviable[9] and considers him a rival.[12] He also is described as hating strong light.[7] Various literature from the early games list his favorite food as being fruit,[7] or to be more specific, grapes.[13] He also is described as hating strong light.[7]

Knuckles is physically one of the strongest characters of the Sonic series, if not, as some official sources claim, the strongest.[4] His brute strength is often depicted as equivalent to that of Sonic's speed.[4] His extraordinary physical strength enables him to perform feats such as shattering boulders with his fists.[6] Additionally, he is a master of martial arts[6] with a specialty in punching. He uses Spin Attacks like Sonic,[14] which are variations on the tendency for echidnas to roll into tight spiny balls for protection. Knuckles can also breast stroke to swim in water.[11] By trapping air under his dreadlocks, Knuckles can glide for short distances.[6] Knuckles is also a proficient burrower,[6] and can use the spikes on his eponymous knuckles to climb walls.[6]

Like several other characters in the Sonic games, Knuckles can make use of the Chaos Emeralds to transform into a Super Form, named Super Knuckles. In Sonic 3 & Knuckles, he could also use the Super Emeralds to transform into Hyper Knuckles. The exact powers granted by these transformations vary from game to game, but generally he has the ability of flight and near invulnerability and his normal abilities of speed and power are greatly enhanced.

Voice actors

Wikiquote has quotations related to Knuckles the Echidna.

TV Shows

Movie

Video Games (US)


Notes and references

  1. ^ Concept-Mobius.com, [1]
  2. ^ ソニックチャンネル/イベント/ソニック キャラクター 人気投票 結果発表！
  3. ^ "Secrets of Sonic Team: Interview with Roger Hector, former Director of Sega Technical Institute" (HTML). Retrieved 2008-02-28.
  4. ^ a b c d e "Sonic City" (HTML). Retrieved 2008-03-04.
  5. ^ Sega (2001). Sonic Adventure 2 instruction manual, pp. 10
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h "Sonic Channel" (HTML). Retrieved 2007-01-08.
  7. ^ a b c d Sega (1997). Sonic Jam, Sega Saturn. Sonic World's Character Profiles (in English)
  8. ^ "Sonic Central/about/characters/Rouge" (HTML). Retrieved 2007-07-07.
  9. ^ a b c Sega of America. "Sonic's official character profile from Sega of America". Sega of America. Retrieved 2008-03-10.
  10. ^ Sega (2001). Sonic Adventure instruction manual, pp. 22
  11. ^ a b Sega (2004). Sonic Advance 3 instruction manual, pp. 12-13
  12. ^ Sega (2003). Sonic Heroes instruction manual, pp. 7
  13. ^ Sega (1994). Sonic the Hedgehog 3 instruction manual, pp. 6
  14. ^ Sega (1994). Sonic & Knuckles instruction manual, pp. 7

External links

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