Holoska


 * You may be looking for the Action Stage/Stage on this continent, Cool Edge.

"Covered in snow, this northern land is gripped by extreme cold and dotted with houses built out of ice."

- Description, Sonic Unleashed

Holoska (ホロスカ) is a Town Stage/Village that appears in Sonic Unleashed. It is a small and isolated snowhouse village located on the center of the earth's northern ice cap and is the coldest place on the planet. Sonic the Hedgehog and Chip visited Holoska during their quest as the fourth continent to restore a Chaos Emerald's energy and a broken continent of the planet back into its place after Dark Gaia's awakening.

Description
Holoska is a giant ice-covered continent which is inspired by the Inuit villages of the Arctic and the landscape and wildlife of the Antarctic. It also has similar features to Greenland, the Arctic and Antarctica. Its name is inspired by Alaska, one of the United States of America.

History
During the beginning of Sonic Unleashed, Holoska's continent was torn away from the Earth's mantle when Dr. Eggman awoke Dark Gaia, resulting in the planet shattering into pieces. After that, Dark Gaia's Minions slowly began to invade the area outside Holoska.

After they had restored Mazuri's continent, Sonic the Hedgehog and Chip traveled to Holoska when Professor Pickle revealed that he had pinpointed a Gaia Temple there. After getting to Holoska, Sonic and Chip managed to recover key fragments to the Gaia Temples in Cool Edge. However, because Holoska's Gaia Temple still remained hidden to them, Sonic and Chip left Holoska to investigate elsewhere.

Later, after restoring Spagonia's continent, Sonic and Chip returned to Holoska to search for more key fragments. In the dusk of night, the two of them entered Cool Edge again and successfully located the object of their search. Now having all the key fragments they needed, the duo was able to open the portal to Holoska's Gaia Temple, where they returned Holoska and its continent to their proper place with the Temple and the Chaos Emeralds.

A while later, as Dark Gaia began casting the world into darkness while maturing into Perfect Dark Gaia, the inhabitants of Holoska watched in horror as the sky above the village turned dark, but soon after celebrated as the world returned to normal after Super Sonic and the Gaia Colossus defeated Perfect Dark Gaia.

Notable Locations
In the point-and-click HUB world of the Wii/PlayStation 2 versions, many of the featured parts of Holoska are shown. These spots include:
 * Storage Area
 * Food Storage Area
 * Central Bonfire
 * Family Home
 * Sacred Shrine (Sonic the Werehog)

Trivia

 * Holoska could also be based on Finland (Holoska is in the north, they both have the same colors on their flag, and Jari-Pekka is a Finnish name).
 * One of the purchasable items in Holoska is the Canned Horror. When fed to Chip, it will cause him to utter random symbols, indicating that he is swearing.
 * A bonus cutscene from the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions show Sonic and Chip running through Holoska. In the cutscene, Chip gets tired and takes out a chocolate bar, but when he tries to eat it, he hurts his teeth since the candy was frozen solid (after Sonic knocks his finger on it out of curiosity).
 * Originally, the small shrines in Holoska contained what looked like Swastikas on them. In Sega's recent patch update, these were fixed to look like window panes instead.
 * The Holoska Gaia Gate is the only Gaia Gate with ice in it. The door on the left side (which requires 99 total Sun Medals and 69 total Moon Medals) in the Wii/PS2 version in the gate has icicles on either side of it.