THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX, ARE WE? YOU DELIGHT ME, NEW FRIEND.

X, better known as Sonic.exe, is the titular main antagonist of JoeDoughBoi's 2023 remake of the original Sonic.exe game, now known as SONIC 2011. This game has the intent of being as accurate as possible to the original story, but this does not mean both incarnations of X are the same character. He is voiced by DylanZeMuffin who also voiced Armadonix. Being a reboot of the original canon, he replaced the original Sonic.exe and is now considered the original version of the character.

The God

Sonic.EXE is an entity from space made out of Dark Matter. He has a craving for blood and death, as well as an absurd obsession with Sonic the Hedgehog, molding his own body just to be like him.

Appearance

X's main vessel looks exactly like Sonic, but with black eyes, red pupils and grey shoes. He's also seemingly crying blood at all times.

The Tale

In mid-2011, the creature that would soon become Sonic.exe was born within the void between dimensions. It is unclear how he came to be, the creature was born within a cataclysm brought on by multiple forms of primordial energy accidentally ramming into each other all at once after said energy was trying to assemble itself in a creative manner. These "ingredients" created a sentient mass of Dark Matter, a creature purely made of primordial energy.

After X was born, he explored the recesses of subspace, floating in the darkness as a giant blob of pure dark energy with two red eyes. Suddenly, he discovered a dimensional window that revealed planet Earth and all that it contains. It is here that X learned about humans and Sonic the Hedgehog, and right then and there he was utterly fascinated by both, mostly by Sonic, who he was smitten with.

X then copied Sonic's very image and formed a suitable body that would house all his energy, a body that all in the universe would . After he created his body, his eyes experienced great pain and started to bleed, a distinguishable birth mark. X was seemingly unshaken by the pain his eyes made, and instead laughed, his very first laughter echoing through the void; a testimonial example that X was born as something that can be considred pure evil.

X decided that all the living creatures on Earth (namely the humans) were meant to be under his control, that he was born to have all of humanity to himself and himself only until the very end of time. He realized that in order to have his slaves he needed to have a place to keep them all in, a world where they (in his view) would live forever in harmony with him as their king, a world where he was a god.

This is how he discovered his true power: X can manipulate reality in any way he desires. With his reality-warping powers he was able to create his own dimension in a matter of hours. The way he layouted his world was by making "rooms" in his world, several them based off of the levels in the Sonic the Hedgehog video games (Example being Hill Act 1 being based off of Green Hill Zone from the first Sonic game), albeit in his own sinister style.

After creating the basis for his world, X grew more egomaniacal about his powers, viewing his creativity as superior beyond all else. He was really eager to have humanity under his command, hoping to show them all how "wonderful" his newly-built home looked. Unfortunately X learned that he did not truly exist in the other universe and thus was not able to access into the human world very easily. He was, however, able to channel some of his powers into it to find ultimate access into it.

X used his powers to find a way into the human world, and found a suitable alternative through an unknown computer programmer. This programmer was highly skilled at what he did, in fact, his skills were said to be near U.S. government levels, and X believed him to be his ticket to glory. With his powers, X "influenced" the programmer to create a computer game that would serve as a temporary doorway between the human world and his own.

The final tool required to make such an object is a sample of X’s own essence, so he could have full control over the system of the game within. X sent out a piece of his dark power to the human world, which arrived into the game in a manner similar to that of a meteorite. The newly made game disk survived the resulting explosion brought on by the shard of power, but the programmer was nowhere to be found, and thus presumed dead. The piece of X's power is said to have made a huge X-shaped crater when it landed.

X began his human collecting when the disk started getting handed down person to person, every time a human inserted the disk and ed the "game", X gained full access into that person's computer and in turn total control over it as well. As the person plays the game, X uses his reality-altering powers to show that person what's in his world due to the game being a gateway into it, serving as a window between the worlds. Once the game is finished X could channel more of his powers into the human world to spy on the human who played it (such as sending a Sonic plush as a spy or creating horrific illusions), until the time to steal their soul came.

The first time X captured a human was rather hasty; when he obtained their soul he did it very poorly, resulting in the mouth, throat and chest getting quite mutilated, yet the body was still alive due to the loss of the soul causing merely a Persistent Vegetative State. As time went on X’s captures became more and more careful and elaborate to the point that X simply used his powers to pull the soul out rather than just using his hands, leaving the body unharmed yet still in a Persistent Vegetative State. Each time X stole the soul, he always carved a number into the chest of the victim to keep track of each of his victims in order.

As the attacks continue over the few years, news starts to come in about them and the police begin to classify the case as "the Sonic.exe Murders" (it's not entirely accurate to call them murders due to the bodies of the victims still being technically alive), based on the evidence that the ed game called "Sonic.exe" remains inside each computer but is unplayable. X was amused at how the police coined the name "Sonic.exe" and thus decided to call himself that.

The Game

Some time after his arrival on Earth, an unknown individual would find X’s disk, playing it and meeting X himself. We don’t know the identity of this person or how he encountered the disk, all that we know is that he would dump the file within the disk online as a GameJolt game in an attempt to get rid of X’s influence. It’s likely he wasn’t successful, since X himself is implied to be the one in control of the after the victim made his last post.

After that, you, the player, would the game and play it, leading to the chain of events we’ve all experienced dozens of times by now.

In typical Sonic.exe fashion, the game starts with the Sonic 1 title screen, which would distort itself upon pressing start. You're then taken to the save select, with Tails, Knuckles, and Dr. Eggman. Of course, you cannot select Knuckles or Eggman.

Upon selecting Tails, he appears in "HILL". After walking for a bit, lots of dead animals appear, and after walking enough Tails will come across Sonic, but he seemingly has grey shoes. Upon realizing who is standing in front of him, Tails will walk to the left on his own, attempting to avoid Sonic. The screen border will stop him from escaping, though. After you force him to walk towards Sonic, "Sonic" will turn towards Tails and open his eyes, revealing his identity. A black screen would then appear, with the text "HELLO. DO YOU WANT TO PLAY WITH ME?" within it.

Alan then gets popped into HIDE AND SEEK, and after running a bit, the time counter would be given 10 seconds, which would eventually drop down until the count reaches 0. When it reaches 0, a sign pops up. "TIME OVER" followed by "READY OR NOT" and "HERE I COME".

The screen would then show X himself, who would rapidly twitch his head in front of the player. He would also pop up in the level itself, and after chasing Tails, he would knock him into the ground. Tails would fall, unable to stand up. X would immediately teleport and snap Tails' spine, killing him in an instant. X would then mock the player by telling them "AWW...TOO SLOW. WANT TO TRY AGAIN?"

Afterwards, Knuckles' level, "YOU CAN'T RUN", would start. The stage would be darker than usual, only lit up by thunder. At some point, Knuckles would come across X, who would tease him with a message that reads "FOUND YOU".

Knuckles would attempt to attack back, but X would dodge every single blow, mocking Knuckles every time. After a while, X would kick Knuckles' face so hard his teeth would come flying off his mouth. X would then stab him with a piece of metal in the chest, killing him. Afterwards, X's would express his enjoyment of the scene and gloat about his past victims by saying "SO MANY SOULS, SO LITTLE TIME. WOULDN'T YOU AGREE?"

The player would then start up Robotnik's level, "...". After walking downstairs for about two minutes, X would suddenly appear in front of Eggman, scaring him. He'd then suddenly open his jaw, which would extend itself in length in an antinatural, impossible way. The screen would be filled with static, and then we'd be shown a black screen with nothing but a text saying "GAME OVER". The letters of said text would be tinted with blood.

We'd be shown the torn apart corpses of the three victims, locked within the savefiles for each character. Then, the screen would be filled with static, and we'd be shown a close up of X's eyes. The screen would light itself up and show us X's face, rendered through a 16-bit filter. Said filter would eventually vanish, showing us a realistic close up of his facial features. He'd then write out "I AM GOD" in our screen with his fingers, which were tainted with the blood of his previous victims. He'd then lunge at the screen, breaking it, and finishing the game.

Secret Stages

There are two secret stages, one each for Tails and Knuckles' levels. They can be triggered by heading backwards on each stage.

Go Back

To enter this stage, you must break the wall behind the player to the left of the stage's starting point. Entering this will send you down the underground caves of Green Hill Zone, showing a misty background. The level has actual level design, which is surprising considering X's tendencies to make flat stages. If you get to the end of this stage, X will tell you "THE BRIMSTONE CALLS YOUR NAME".

if you lose at the platforming stage, he will tell you "NO CHEATING". In both occassions, X will send you to HIDE AND SEEK.

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To enter this stage, you must fall through the drop at the left of this stage. Knuckles will bug out and glitch the entire stage, He will enter a new stage, in which X will write out a few messages in the screen.

THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX, ARE WE?

YOU DELIGHT ME, NEW FRIEND.

BUT SOON THIS WORLD WILL BE YOUR HOME.

In the end, Knuckles will be forced to fight X, just like in the main route. The game will continue onwards completely normally after this point.

Trivia

•Midway though their segments, each character's name (Tails, Knuckles and Eggman) change to reflect who they were in real life, before falling onto X's hands.

•Tails' name changes to Alan. This is a reference to the name of Lord X's Tails victim.

•It is unknown if the name of the Knuckles victim, Dave, has any sort of significance or is a reference to something.

•The name of the person within Eggman's vessel, Paul, was actually taken from an extract of Round 2, the official sequel to the original Sonic.exe pasta.

•These names were confirmed to be canon to Lord X as well.

•In Tails’ segment, when he approaches X and notices it’s him, he will actually walk away to the left on his own, heading to the opposite side X is in, unlike most EXE games and the original story when Tails went towards Sonic on his own, in a cutscene-like manner. We are the ones forcing him to go forwards and interact with X in order to progress this time. This implies Tails has already gone through the events of the original creepypasta, and so, he already knows X is not truly Sonic. Or at least, that this isn't Alan's first time playing one of X's games.

•In the chase sequence in HIDE AND SEEK, Tails will start running through the trees present in the cutscene before the boss of the original Angel Island Act 2, in which Dr. Eggman was shown chasing Sonic in the foreground.

•The stage is also filled with small, brick made structures in its background. The reason for this is unknown.

•This version of the game has integrated the curtains in "...", which were described in the original creepypasta and were missing in the original game.

•If you stay still for too long, X will come out for you himself, saying “NOW...N...DO NOT BE SHY.” After this, you will appear on the next “stage”. So if you did this on Hill, for example, you will appear on HIDE AND SEEK. Or if you did this on YOU CAN’T RUN, X will force you to fight him right away.

•The original creepypasta specified that the purple bricked stage shown in "..." had original graphics, that didn't resemble those of any existing Sonic game. For what we can only assume to be simplicty's sake, MY5TCrimson decided to use Marble Zone for the stage's background, which started a big misconception where people thought "..." was always meant to be Marble Zone. Luckily, this game corrected said mistake, showing us a brand new look for the zone.

•As previously mentioned, Tails and Knuckles have secret stages that you can find when going backwards. However, this is not the case with Eggman. If you go backwards at the start of the stage, you won't get anywhere and will simply be stopped by the screen border. If you step on the stairs and try to go back, the stairs will turn into a flat, angled surface, making Eggman slide downwards and forcing you to progress through the level.

•Eggman's idle animation has him turn around as a sign of insecurity. He even turns to the camera shrugging at a later point in the stage. This is a direct reference to the original story, in which Eggman did the very same thing.

•The game features brand new tracks for most of its stages, which give the game a truly unique feel.

•X has been stated to not be very good at game design, and he doesn’t seem to enjoy attempting to work on it either.

•2011 X does not have a faker form.

•Furthermore into said topic, 2011's victims do not become "EXEs" or his slaves.

•The events of this remake take place in 2011.

•2011 being the year that the 20th Anniversary of [ci]•Sonic was being celebrated, Generations was released, JC released the eponymous Creepypasta, and of course, his namesake.

•When reaching the I AM GOD screen at the end of the game, X has a random chance to say one of two lines. “Ready for another round?” which is a reference to the original creepypasta’s “Ready for Round 2?” line and possibly a reference to Sonic.OMT, and “Keep this interesting for me.” which is a reference to the last line [ci]•X says in the original story, which is “Try to keep this interesting for me, Tom.”

•immediately after, he lunges towards the screen. This is something that was not present in the original game, but was detailed in the creepypasta and added back in for this remake.

•He is the fourth official X remake. (The first was 2017 X, the second was Lord X, and the third was Xenophanes.)

•He doesn't have the darker fur the original X has, having the exact same color scheme as the original Sonic. (Aside from his eyes and shoes).

•He also lacks the 7 guardians and possibly the Cult Of X. Or at least, we don't know about their existence yet.

•People usually confuse him with Lord X, however, he is supposed to be the original Sonic.exe in current canon. Lord X is the first, but not the original. This entity is the original, and Lord X is an alternate contuation of his plotline.

•As stated before, this X replaced the original entity and is now considered the canonical original entity, completely scrapping JC's original lore and replacing it with a similar, yet updated and improved storyline. Even [ci]•Joey calls this X "the original" as if JC's original entity had never existed in the first place.

•Unlike what's stated everywhere else, this X was originally created in July 28, 2022 with him appearing for the first time in this post.