After seeing Friz’s article about leaving the community I decided I should once again put some effort into looking for Sonic Fan Character creators who may be interested in joining our community. I would usually go to communities on Facebook but I decided to at least window-shop at DeviantArt for once seeing how it’s the most popular location.

I assumed it was all because Facebook isn’t known for communities as much. I assumed Fanpop was simply too low-key and not well-known. Now that I’ve checked on DeviantArt, I’ve realized what’s actually happening… or maybe I’m finally opening my eyes to something that was in front of me to begin with.

Our community getting smaller and smaller… the rate of which this has happened is a miracle. It isn’t just our group that’s getting smaller. I tried Sonic Fan groups, normal Sonic groups, and went to areas I had previously visited. Many have been stalled, either dead or on hiatus. These groups do not have the “limitations” of ours. They are worldly groups that do whatever, but they are inactive or shrinking.

I can only assume this continuous decline is due to the failing quality of the Sonic Franchise. Sonic Boom was a gigantic flop, sending fans away more than gaining them. Sonic Lost World in the main series had many faults, also driving away fans. People all around the world continue to bash the franchise and the fanbase constantly. The Archie Comics just went through a retcon and while some fans stuck around, it clearly had an effect on our numbers.

I realize how rare our community was. I found our layout to be the most specified to work with fandom in general. Most other groups I found rarely roleplayed if at all, and almost entirely focused on pictures. We all know that stories are rarely given attention. With our group we had roleplays all the time, forums included. The stories were not given attention usually unfortunately, but it was active at the very least.

Unfortunately everything from our group to many others lacked the drive to stick to it; not in the sense of staying with the community, but seeing every even through. “Hey I made a contest. Who wants to join?” “Hey I’m making a comic” “Hey I’m making a game” “Hey, Art-trade” “Hey I’m writing a story” “Hey I posted this new roleplay/forum”. Rarely were these things finished. I know of VERY few people that actually finished any of my roleplays personally, and I’m sure others feel the same.

Yes I had an impact on this community, but what about people like NumnumnYellow? She had the same religious mindset and she left. Her reason? Well the same as many others. They grew out of it. They got bored. It wasn’t amounting to anything.

That seems to be what is happening nowadays to everything. I don’t want to believe the Sonic Fanchise is dying, or it’s fanbase, but I have found such a small amount of activity on the internet concerning fan-characters that it’s… depressing.

We can all start up as large groups, but those groups shrink, then break up, and become smaller groups, and those smaller groups DON’T mix. With each fall a percent (lets’ say 20%) of members go away. So let’s say 100 members start out. That turns into 80 which turns into 40 for two different groups. That’s already less than half. Then those groups lose 20% which is 8 members leaving two more lesser groups from that making 12 for each group.

So what do you want? To leave? If you start anew I wish you all the best of luck but this is not a good omen.

To those who’s minds are made up and want nothing more to do with this, I understand. I will not attack you for wanting to leave but I cannot help but feel upset that there are now less people to talk with.

To those who are willing to discuss what is right and wrong; what is required and what it is simply something being clung to regardless of it not being required, we can discuss.

To those who plan to stay here, the life of our community depends on you. I hate to say this but I am tired of pulling the weight from almost everything here.

This isn’t just our group, this is the Sonic Fandom.