The Honey the Cat Story ▸ A Character Saved By The Fans 

Hey folks, apologies but this video unfortunately contains a few bits of incorrect information! One of the key players in Honey's discovery helped me to correct those mistakes in my Team Hooligan BONUS Video right here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-NZTd_H_j2OE.html

I'm hoping she appears as like a background character in a future Christian Whitehead game

A bit of an update: If anyone has gotten the "Free Comic Book Day" IDW Sonic comic or has seen it in some way, Honey does make a return (granted only two panels, but still nice to see they brought her back)!

Honey had more success in sonic than vipers

I love that in the comics she’s the one who designed Amy’s dress. They really got on well together.

Honey's design manages to work wonderfully in both human and cat form. It is really cool that fan-interest has got her far more recognition than most scrapped characters can even dream of. The extra Pepsiman trivia was also neat.

I'm sure that it's already been commented but Honey finally showed up in the IDW comics! She was in the free comic book day issue yesterday, she doesn't speak sadly but it's great that she's finally been acknowledged since 2016 🙂

Thanks for watching. Here's a correction: - Pepsiman is ONLY in the Japanese SEGA Saturn version of Fighting Vipers. Not the arcade version or any US version. Not sure how I messed that one up.

A few things: Fighting Vipers was based on the Virtua Fighter 2 engine, not Virtua Fighter, which used Model1 hardware and not Model2. And... oh gosh you got to the part with Honey in StF... there's a bit of misinformation you're delivering here. Honey's eye transitions are fine actually, as evidenced when she is squished and hurt she closes her eyes, and when she is surprised by something like Amy's "Look Over Here! " attack or on the elevator to the final boss. Honey's body when squished does use Amy's assets, however Honey has assets of her own for squished body parts and Honey does have a VS screen portrait but goes unused in the Arcade version. Both of these were fixed in the 2012 re-release. In fact, in an interview with AM2 porting team when making the 2012 release, they found Honey's data on their own, most likely using debug mode. It was after this that they found fanart of Honey from the west when they searched for info about her. So I have no doubt Sega did acknowledge Honey on their own. Honey is not completely fixed in the 2012 version actually, her continue screen is missing her pigtails. As someone who was in that original thread from Sonic Cult, I would like to credit sonicblur, original discover of the character values, OmochaoAbuser who first used those values in an emulated environment, and myself who originally dug deeper and posted all the asset findings to Sonic Cult's site. Would have loved to have collabed on this one, but it is what it is.

I know others have said it here, but it seems like SEGA is keeping a close eye to some extent on Honey. she appears for two panels in the IDW Classic Sonic comics, and in a New Years art piece at the start of 2021. so it seems like Honey is indeed canon, but she's apart of the classic cast as opposed to the modern cast. hey, it works for me.

I feel like Honey could be a fun inclusion in future Sonic games if given the opportunity. Although it was made by fans. Honey was made playable in Sonic Robo Blast 2 and she was a fun character for me to play as.

Man you’re absolutely crushing it with these videos. I’ve always loved Honey’s design, one of my favorite female sonic characters. I was thinking maybe you could do Tiara from Sonic Xtreme since she has a cool and unique design as well but the research might be difficult because the game never was released. I’ve only ever seen her used in sprite animations

I love the Sonic Cult disclaimer. It's true, the internet isn't there to baby-sit children, and there are places where they definitely shouldn't be hanging around. I wish people understood that and let adults be adults in peace instead of trying to censor them because "think of the children".

Honey would be a great addition to the classic roster, specially since they're basically trying split modern and classic nowadays.

With Forces starting what may become a trend of customization I feel that Honey has a good chance of appearing in a future Sonic game. All that's left is to hope.

I hope that one day Honey the cat will be playable in another Sonic game! Her design is really cute!

"No long forgotten character can entirely be written off" - except if you're an Penders-exclusive character haha

7:25 i drew that! nostalgia! I did a lot of Honey art on Deviantart when I first found out about her back in the 00's. I even ran the club on DA and made contests for people to do fanart also ='D

I have a idea in lapse. A spin-off game focused on the cats of the Sonic Universe, like Blaze, Big, and Honey of course. Well, I would give it a try.

when i was a kid around 2005-6-7 i discover deviantart and i loved to see oc of sonic, then this honey the cat appeared a lot in drawings, i never knew who she was, i believed was only a famous oc, it took me years to know she was an unused character from a very obscure sonic game nobody played, im still impressed how this character became so famous

I love her design so much. I wish she appeared in modern games.

@0:36 Yeah, she's a cat girl wearing a kind of Gothic Lolita dress, idk how you get more iconic than that.

She Just recently appeared in IDW as a cameo in the Free Comic Book Day 30th Anniversary Comic!

Wonderful video! Didn't know Honey appeared in the comics, always something to learn!

She would make a great Shopkeeper NPC if we ever got another Sonic Themed RPG

Overall a good look at Honey the Cat, but there are a few inconsistencies here and there you might have overlooked or simplified to shorten the video. 1: Fighting Vipers is actually built over Virtua Fighter 2 and employs all of the new innovations (for the time) that were introduced by VF2, like texture mapping, and it was built on the Sega Model 2 arcade hardware. 2. Armstone City isn't actually explicitly in America, but its heavily based around western themes and the stage Old Armstone Town (a theme park) is even dressed up to look like an old wild west town (Similarly, Bahn is clearly supposed to be Japanese, and is the only character that doesn't speak English, but his character bio states he's from "an island nation") 3. Honey's armor is usually said to be some sort of plastic or rubber material, not leather (Fun Fact: her blue player 2 costume is made of a thicker and heavier material and its skirt reacts to wind effects different from the red outfit!) 4. Her undergarments are visible across all versions of the game. The western release only removed the cheat that allows you to remove Honey's skirt when her armor is broken, making it much easier to see her thong. The black bra(?) is always visible when her armor is broken in all versions and underskirt peeks at her skimpy underwear are not uncommon, especially with her high kicks. 5. Pepsiman is NOT in the Japanese Arcade version OR the Western Saturn version. He is only in the Japanese Saturn version, along with a few special costumes for Honey that were cut for western audiences too! 6. She's much harder to spot, but along with the Lunar fox, Rocket Metal Sonic, and Player 2 Honey the Cat, the default color red and yellow Honey the Cat is in the same scene in the Fighting Vipers Saturn intro! She's at the very top left just before the scene cuts, so she's a bit harder to spot! 7. Though Honey's character data is built around Amy, her moveset is almost an exact copy of Knuckles (minus his spindash) and a couple of Amy's moves that resemble her FV counterpart, like the bootie bop. 8. Honey doesn't use Amy's fighting stance, and instead has one that mirrors her FV counterpart. 9. Sonic the Fighters isn't necessarily non-canon, however Honey is restricted currently to being in the Classic Sonic universe ONLY since STF was set in the Classic World. Sega is fairly strict these days about what characters are allowed to show up when and where, after the Archie comics series was cancelled, IDW (the new publisher) has been very strictly monitored about which characters are allowed to be featured and WHERE. Mighty, Ray, Bean, Bark, and Fang/Nack are all allowed to be in the Classic Comics, but not the main series. This extends even further to HOW a character is portrayed and characterized, and Honey is in a bit of a pickle since she doesn't exactly have a canon SONIC personality. So outside of some cameo appearances in Classic Sonic content I doubt we will see much of her anytime soon. - - It wasn't really the focus of the video but even more coverage of Honey's human counterpart would have been really cool! A quick story breakdown of Fighting Vipers 1 and 2, her inclusion in Fighters Megamix alongside Bean and Bark, alternate costumes, and other cameo appearances of Human Honey would have been really interesting to see if you wanted to get really in depth, but then it would be more of a Fighting Vipers Honey video instead of a Honey the Cat video. These details were mostly nitpicks, this was still a really good look at Honey the Cat's history and origin and its always nice for people to be exposed to more Honey and Fighting Vipers!

If there's ever another Sonic fighting game I'm sure she'll be in it.

It took me a month to watch this video, but I finally got around to it! It's neat to see Honey getting some love in current year, I was always fascinated by the story of her existence (and probably had a crush back in the day) It was really cool to see her get referenced in the whole free comic sonic birthday thing too, as many have pointed out already. Good video as usual!! It's awesome to see one of the guys responsible for finding her in the first place in the comments, as well!!

Now here is a character I’ve never ever heard of. Great video.

I know you probably heard this hundreds of times by now, but Honey actually ended up appearing as a background character in one of the anniversary comics.

I loved this look at her history. I like Fighting Vipers a lot and I knew the basic jist of the story, but having it fleshed out with all the details and especially seeing Honey's original incarnation in action loaded into the arcade version was really cool. Great work.

Yeah, if Mighty; Ray; Fang; Bean; and Bark get to make appearances (albeit only cameos in the case of the latter three) in Sonic video games, Honey sure as hell deserves to reappear in at least that vein.

I actually would play her if she ever returns without any hesitation or embarrassment.

If Honey ever becomes playable in a mainline Sonic platformer, I'd love for the developers to mix the platforming controls with some of the fighting mechanics from Fighting Vipers. If they did that, Honey would be my preferred character to play as in that game because of how much I love Fighting Vipers.

Would love to see at least a billboard for her clothing in a new game. Also you should Sonics knights of the round table or emerl

I’m not the biggest Sonic fan (compared to the original) but damn this channel is amazing. You give so much content for characters I’d never heard of and it’s really well-done

You should do some of the other sonic mechs other than metals sonic. I think it’s an alright idea.

She looks like a great character on both games, maybe they could give her a struggling entrepreneur back story to make her more interesting,

I’ve been binging your videos for the past hour, I’m subscribing now!😌

Honey the Cat - Sega: That glitch character? Yeah we'll save that and use it again np Hyper Sonic - Sega: ......

I love this series, it would be interesting to see a Chaos 0 video ( I was going to ask one for Void, Lumina Flowlight and Illumina, but they only appear in one game and I feel like you might have more to work with Chaos) Keep up the good work. ^-^

Honestly we don't get enough cat Mobians in Sonic, the only other one I can think of is Blaze. Which sucks because Honey and Blaze (which sounds like a kind of sweet hotsauce when I say their names together) have some of the coolest designs. I know she's shown up in the 'free comic book day' IDW comics, and I really hope she shows up for real sometime in the future.

Great video, informative and well spoken! I love Honey! I have a Sonic project that's been in the works for some time now. If everything goes according to plan, it could be huge... And you better believe Honey's a part of it!! Keep your eyes open for it, it all starts... with a white cassette tape.

Petition for sega to bring back honey in future sonic games

I fell like many characters are saved by fans

I'd love to hear you talk about Dr. Fintevus from the Archie Comics!

Pengo is technically Canon. He was planned for Bark's stage and appeared in some other titles I think

I remember when I first bought an Archie Sonic Comic where Honey appeared in a fighting tournament and I knew right away she was a Vipers Easter egg.

she's also back in IDW with the free comic that was realised

I wish Sonic Team would make a Sonic game where every character (except comics) makes an appearance and many are playable like SA1. All the obscure ones showing up would be nice

Nice to know that fighting vipers was released nearly 1000 years in the future

I feel like Honey could be like a waluigi sort of character in the way that he is a staple spinoff character

Bark and Bean are technically canon, but only really appear in easter eggs, sort of. They both appear on a wanted poster in Generations and as illusions alongside Fang in the heavy magician fight in Mania, so if they're canon, it's likely Honey is too. As far as video suggestions go, how about Metal Knuckles or Tails Doll from Sonic R? Tails Doll isn't necessarily forgotten, so to speak, given his reputation online thanks to certain stories, but he does have a little bit of history outside of that!

Actually sonic the fighters characters are on wanted posters in sonic generations which means that sonic the fighters is canon

I first saw Honey in a Archie Sonic Comic

a sonic mania DLC that adds both honey and amy where both have unique play style would be amazing

Honey had a small Easter egg in the idw comics and she has appeared in official art recently

I was recommended this video after coming across Honey in SomecallmeJohnny's Sonic spin-off video.

LITERALLY MY CAT IS NAMED HONEY AND SHE LOOKS JUST LIKE HER ORANGE CAT WITH GOLDEN EYES IM LOSING MY MIND

I think Honey the Cat just became my favorite Sonic character other than Knuckles. She sounds pretty cool.

Ngl she looks INCREDIBLE

There were so many characters, I love them

This is the one character I never knew anything about she just randomly appeared in the Sonic forces mobile game and I've never heard about her since

The first I've seen honey was in the IDW comics, she also joined the fighting tournament to show off her fashion

i honestly hope she appears in more games

I remember playing as her a lot in the PS3 re-release, it was also the first sonic game I ever played.

I forgot this character existed thanks for reminding me man 👍

sonic the hedgehog said o0n twitter "Everything is canon"

She did appear in a panel in a free comic book day issue for IDW, but that was about it.

Be cool u made a history of Mighty & Ray I really enjoy you're content man fun to watch & fun to learn about someone even a big Sonic fan myself didn't know of Also note I didn't know Sonic gems Collection was on ps2

Next Sonic game should see Honey running the in game store like the merchant from RE4

Nice. Now do Mighty The Armadillo and Ray The Flying Squirrel next!

3:38 "In short, Honey was a little bit too sexualised for American audiences." Rouge: Allow me to introduce myself. (Yes I know she was designed in Japan but Sega America let it slide)

Let's see if she will come back in sonic mania 2, since she is a character from the classic era.

Johnny Vector: "It's high time Honey reappears in a new Sonic game" Me: "It's high time just about any character other than Sonic, Tails and Eggman reappear in a new Sonic game. The Sonic series has been neglecting other characters ever since Sonic Unleashed!"

She lives.

Super Job!!

Yes! My favorite Sonic character! Also, if you have the time, I think it would be neat of you to look at... Dark Tails

As was already commented, Honey did appear in the FCBD IDW comic. Since Mania, Sega has stated that they want to keep the two canons, "classic" (pre-Adventures) and "modern" (Adventures onwards), well differenciated adn moving from Archie to IDW was part of this idea. Honey is part of the classic canon and like Fang, Ray, Bark, Bean or the Sonic Band, will never* appear in the modern timeline in the IDW comics (*unless they change their minds, but that's the current plan), for keeping some exclusive characters for the classic stories. Charmy, Vector and Mighty might be supposed to appear in both, but I'm not sure about this.

I quite enjoyed her depiction in the Archie comics. Would love it if she had a similar role / depiction in the IDW series someday, but I hear SEGA wants character like Mighty, Ray, Fang and (probably) Honey to become "Classic Sonic" exclusives for some strange reason.

She's a Sonic character named after a character from Fighting Vipers and Fighters Mega Mix. I knew as soon as I saw the outfit.

I actually remember in one of my Sega Saturn Magazines back in the day, it had a picture of Honey from Fighting Vipers in a black revealing dress! My parents didn't approve, so they drew over it! I was livid! (I was 9 at the time)

And she did show up in the Mini Comic about Classic Amy!

I can confirm that since this video was released, Honey has made a cameo in the IDW Sonic Free Comic Book Day, so there’s that

I don't think we'll ever see Honey again mostly because I think Sonic has way too many characters as is in both games and comics. But I'll be pleasantly surprise if she did.

Good on the fans for working hard to bring Honey the Cat out of the obscurity and into the canon.

She looks like an OC I sent in asking to be canonized when I was 7-12. However I don't think the timeline lines up and don't think she's my oc Luna.

Funnily enough, in IDWs Free Comic Book Day 30th Anniversary comic, Honey cameos as one of Amy's friends in the Classic Universe.

Woukld be awsome to see Honey make a triumphate return to the Sonic Franchise. their are loads of charecters they could bring in you know.

14:20 Honey actually made a recent cameo in the 2021 Free Comic Book Day IDW issue in 2 panels

Manic the Hedgehog! I think Sonic Underground isn´t canon but I absolitly love the Character and am sad that he was only in that series

Imagine being a chao and some big ass cat pets you with their fist and forces you to eat.

This legit just appeared in my suggested feed after someone on a message board mentioned her and I was morbidly curious and did a Google search.

What about doing a video on the different characters In the sonic shows (aosth, satam, etc).

I swear honey is the most expressive sonic character second to tangle

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Breezy is from AOSTH right? Interesting that she made an Archie appearance too!

She actually is in the idw comic, sonics 30th anniversary comic Amy draws comic strips for all the mobians in town ; tails then hands them out around town and not of them is Honey and towards the end u can spot her worried with the crowd when sonic shows up.

Honey the cat Blaze the cat Big the cat??? HOW MANY CATS ARE THERE?????

I just put together Tails workshop from SA1 kind of looks like it was inspired from the one in Sonic Fighters. So many neat details.

Maybe a video about EMERL from Donic Battle? The sonic advance era isn't really mentioned as much on the internet