This page contains the featured article of September 2020 Tesla The Hedgehog. Alphonse Uprising was interviewed on September 5, 2020.
The Interview[]
|1=# Q1: How is siegeball played?
- A) Siegeball is a combination of football (soccer) and golf. It is played by two teams of up to six players. It was created only 50 years ago, but it became a very popular sport.
- The ball is slightly larger than a football, about 26 cm in diameter. What makes this ball very special is that it was created from rare, flexible alloy and carbon fiber, allowing it to achieve very fast speeds with a single kick. In one game, it was measured to have reached over 300 km/h.
- Siegeball arenas are usually rectangular, like an actual football field. Instead of goals that the ball must be kicked into, funnels are used instead. To score, the ball must roll into the center of the funnel for a "hole in".
- In Cybermania, siegeball mainly became so popular is because of its little amount of rules, allowing for creative and violent interpretations of the game.
- The rules state they prefer the ball to be kicked, but there are no penalties against using hands to move or pass the ball. It simply can't be carried. The ball cannot be destroyed or thrown out of the arena; these are fouls and the offending team will lose a point. Additionally, the ball can also be used as a weapon to attack opponents with.
- After the war, society in Cybermania was practically desensitised to death-- so much so that players have to sign a contract that makes the association and their team no longer responsible if they die on the field. The risk of death is prevalent on the field, which garners a lot of spectators to see the action.
- Three of the largest siegeball venues include one in Station Square, Tokyo, and Soleanna, with over 50,000 in-person spectators watching on average. Achieving victory in all three games is the pinnacle of any siegeball athlete's career. Tesla and Akio, both members of Team Radical, are close to fulfilling this goal.
# Q2: “When he was five years old, his mother died shortly after conceiving his sister, Theresa. Since the event, Tesla bullied Theresa, pinning the blame on her for their mother's death.” . How was Tesla’s sister even born if their mother died shortly after conceiving her? Wouldn’t that have caused his sister’s demise as well? I guess hedgehogs give birth much faster than humans do, right?
- A) I mean scientifically speaking, yes - real hedgehogs are smaller than humans and only have a gestation period of about a month. But, these are anthropormophic Mobians, so they have all qualities of a human being. Therefore, it is still possible for a Mobian hedgehog to risk death after childbirth (and the child to survive) if they have comorbidities.
# Q3: Who are the Neo-Knights and why did Tesla feel the need to join them?
- A) The Neo-Knights were formed some time after the war, when there was fear of another war just like it happening in the near future. The founder was Miles Prower, and he went all over the world searching for 1000 mercenaries that can do the ultimate task of serving a lifetime to prevent another global conflict.
- One of these mercenaries would eventually be his son, Cloud, who would go on to be the Neo-Knights captain after Tails retired.
- One particular event takes place in 2083, when Tesla was about 6 years old: the Tokyo Singularity. I mentioned it a few times but never directly detailed it. It was an AI uprising that took place in Tokyo, and the Neo-Knights were dispatched to end it. Though it was never clear, controversy surrounded the Neo-Knights and there was a conflict in leadership. Somewhere along the line, the world government decided to defund the Neo-Knights, and they would shut down in 2093; it was never public news. Theories say the Neo-Knights knew that something would happen in Tokyo, but deliberately delayed action for media headlines. Lots of speculation surrounding this.
- Tesla becomes attached to the Neo-Knights after the Singularity and, with his mother having died recently, he aspired to be the superhero that would've saved his mother by becoming a siegeball athlete - over the years, this grew into a toxic obsession that ends up distorting his sense of reality. The Neo-Knights' shutdown might've been his wakeup call.
# Q4: Given the fact that he was created 15 years ago, what were some of his characteristics such as design or backstory which were eventually removed?
- A) He used to be a Shadow recolour, literally. Over the years, he goes through loooots of redesigns, with each one making significant difference. Originally, Tesla was a 16-year-old scientist that absorbed energy from a blue Chaos Emerald, giving him electrical powers.
- ...This makes no sense.
- I did away with that in 2015, when I came up with Tesla's arguably most iconic design - the dark grey fur, the ring eyes, and the dual blue stripes that ran down his top quill. I think a lot of people really loved that design, so he remained pretty much unchanged for the next 4 years.
- 2019 came and I gave him the ultimate redesign. By then, my art style improved, and I was experimenting with more detailed character design inspired by ones from Overwatch and My Hero Academia. After a lot of people questioning if he was meant to be cyborg, I decided to make him one after all. Everything makes a lot more sense now, but I might've made his design a bit too detailed - now people have a hard time drawing him. Later this year, I'm working on an alternate design to make it easier for artists.
# Q5: Is there any special reason why he is named after the discoverer of electromagnetism rather than a different scientist?
- A) That's just because Tesla had electricity powers - a little less potent now, but he had abilities that reminded me of that inventor. I thought it was clever enough to name his father Nikola, but you can be the judge of that.
# Q6: How did his father’s cybermania affect Tesla? Does he have an aversion to technology?
- A) Cybermania is a mental illness that plagues many people who had even a single mod. It's comparable to alcoholism and drug addiction. You have the military turning them into weapons, the media making it a fashion statement, the criminal overlords transforming them into contrabands, and the corporations using them as paychecks. It's the overabundance of cybernetics that completely altered the world and its culture, and that's why there is stigma against it. Tesla's father falls ill to cybermania attempting to cope with his wife's death, and with Tesla witnessing his demise, he grows a strong hatred for cybernetics. So much so, that he would often steal cybernetics just to destroy them in his backyard with Theresa. If cybermania did one good thing, it would be bringing Tesla and Theresa closer. At some point, Tesla realises that Los Angeles became the hellhole for cybermania to run rampant, and dreamed of leaving the place ever since.
# Q7: What was the most difficult thing when creating this character?
- A) Definitely the designs. It wasn't easy for me to make Tesla as original as I possibly could without making him too unrecognisable from the previous design. I figured in order to help make him more original, I began omitting every reference to the Sonic canon as much as I could - this included the Chaos Emeralds, Mobian locations, and of course, canon characters; it was one of the reasons why he lived in the future, when all Sonic characters from the present day are already dying out. Now, it's so it fits the cyberpunk narrative of Cybermania.
# Q8: Briefly, what is his role in the series “Cybermania”?
- A) Tesla's role is supposed to be the audience viewpoint, introducing us to the decaying world of Cybermania; from the corrupt bloodsport of siegeball, to the mysterious end of the Neo-Knights, to the criminal underworld of cybernetic contrabands, the new threat that the world is facing, and the moment all of society collapses. Tesla is a 20-year-old with the mind of a child; up until this point he never got to see the world like it really is, and it's our chance to explore it with him.
# Q9: What is his favourite dish?
- A) Tesla became a pescetarian to help his athletic diet, so he prefers seafood as the only meat in his otherwise vegetarian diet. His favourite would be shrimp pancakes - a Korean dish that mixes shrimp with eggs
# Q10: How close has Tesla gotten in uncovering the truth about what happened to the Neo-Knights?
- A) Since Tesla kept tabs on several former Neo-Knights members, Tesla was always on top on doing his research while he played siegeball with Akio... much to his annoyance. However, at one point, these members suddenly disappear - as if they were no longer on the planet. This caused Tesla to stop his research and go directly to the Neo-Knights headquarters, located near the interstate between Los Angeles and Station Square.
- He's able to convince Akio to come along and cause a distraction while he breaks in (Tesla attempted breaking in several times before, but was always arrested and detained by police); there, he doesn't find what he was looking for, but he ends up finding the Arthur device - which creates a cybernetic suit out of nanomachines. A few Neo-Knights had this device if they had no powers but didn't want to be full cyborg, but this was an unfinished prototype. It suddenly activates, latching onto Tesla and digging into his skin. Considering his aversion to cybernetics, he freaks out, has a panic attack, and ends up in the hospital. Because we know how helpful emergency services are in 2097, they simply let him go, leaving Tesla to try and remove the device himself to no avail. With the Arthur prototype on him, he realises too late he just became a target of the Neo-Knights and Haven