World of GeneX - Paranormal Chaos Special!

Happy October! All month long, World of GeneX is covering the Halloween Specials!
Today, I'd like to do some behind-the-scenes talking about Paranormal Chaos, the other Halloween story with more than 1 chapter.

This was an idea that I just felt like doing. When I think about Halloween, I often think about ghosts and ghost-busting. At the time of the first Paranormal Chaos special, I'd hit a wall with the normal GeneX stories, and I felt a need to delay the Nightmare Zone saga until I made some progress on that front.

Anyway, for those that haven't read it, Paranormal Chaos is a story set in a reality based on SatAM. In this storyline, Robotnik has died, and it's up to the Freedom Fighters, now dubbed "Phantom Fighters", to rid Robotropolis of the angry ghosts left in the wake of Robotnik's regime. They do it using an invention of Rotor's called "Paranormal Chaos Devices", or PCDs, which utilize Chaos Emeralds to capture and contain ghosts.

Obviously, this story is heavily inspired by the Ghostbusters movies. I even used a Ghostbusters-esque logo for both specials! (on other sites, where images go with stories.) However, the PCD is partly based on the Poltergust from Luigi's Mansion, since it captures ghosts without the need for an extra trap device. In the previous year or two, I had finally gotten to see the entire series of SatAM, and the Ghostbusters video game had come out, so I wasn't short on inspiration.

I particularly seized upon Antoine to sorta play the role of Luigi. This is even more apparent in the sequal, where he is charged with exploring a haunted mansion while the core team is off on the primary mission. Being in a sense the ONLY TRULY COWARDLY SONIC CHARACTER, it was sorta obvious. (I'm sure I might be called out on that, but I honestly can't think of anyone. Marine, maybe? idk) So as not to go too far out of my comfort zone, I didn't use the SatAM characters TOO heavily in each special, and I stuck in some of my OCs to pad out the cast. Also because this is a GeneX special. Gotta... at LEAST stick Gator in there. (As a rule, I try to work Gator into every story.)

Ghosts were a bit rougher on me. I used up the Sonic-series ghosts that I could use in the first special, like the Sandopolis ghosts and Boom Boos (including King Boom Boo). In Paranormal Chaos 2, however, I found my ghost resources exhausted. I didn't want to be using Lost Ones all over the place, even though Lospecter was going to have a role in the story. (Lospecter actually IS a ghost, so he was a special case.) I had to come up with original ghosts, in that case. I am particularly displeased with the observatory ghosts... What was I smoking?? Well... I was out of ideas at that point. The freeze ghosts, however, I rather like. In my head they look like a ghost that might appear in a Sonic version of Luigi's Mansion.

There's a lot of fun ideas throughout these storylines... My personal favorite is the ghost train, which I believe appeared in the first special. I won't completely spoil it if you didn't read it, but it was based around this recurring Halloween Special gag of something (usually a swarm of creatures) running out and scaring the crud out of everyone. This took that idea and really took it to the next level.

I could probably find little bits to talk about all day, but it seems to me this is already running long. I hope this little behind the scenes look has gotten some people curious. I have no current plans to do a third entry in the series, but you never know. I could definitely think of an idea or two for a third one, though I may need to broaden the scope beyond simple ghosts, since I'm not great at making up spirits...

Well, Happy Halloween, and see you next time!