The Return of Sonic the Hedgehog

There is much excitement over the recent announcement of a new Sonic the Hedgehog game that goes back to the old Mega Drive (Genesis if you are in the US!) format of fast, 2d platform games. The simple but very fun gameplay ended up the defining series of games of a whole generation of gamers and became legendary among people of all age groups.

Sonic began on the Sega Master System, the precursor to the Mega Drive, and very soon he was the main mascot for Sega, and featured prominently on their branding and there were many games on their subsequent consoles. The formula was created on the very graphically challenged Master System, however it all really came to life on the Mega Drive/Genesis. The first game Sonic 1 was a breath of fresh air, with much improved graphics and fantastic gameplay. This was improved upon in Sonic 2 a couple of years later, and this was the game seen as many people’s favourite Sonic game. Sonic 3 made things even better, with amazing graphics and some new features. Then they bought out Sonic and Knuckles, with its “lock on” technology so you could join two games together and play as different characters in the old games, getting new life out of them. These were the last great games on the Mega Drive, and after this things started going downhill for the Sonic titles as well.

After the Mega Drive met its demise, the Sonic games started to go 3D. These games were not met with the same enthusiasm (though there was a lot of anticipation, which then led to a lot of disappointment). The games got progressively worse over the years, leading to the very poor effort “Sonic the Hedgehog” on PS3 and XBOX 360 a few years ago. It looked great but bought in RPG elements that were a bit strange and completely took away from the old fast, fun Sonic games.

But now Sonic 4 is coming out and is going “back to basics” of the classic Sonic games, with a 2D interface, all of the old fast and fun gameplay and the traditional Sonic music. The twist is that the game will be in HD, which will look great.

The game will be episodic, so there is no real limit to the amount that can be released. Episode 1 is out in the summer, and is released as a downloadable game on the Playstation 3, XBox 360 and Wii. It will introduce a new generation of kids to Sonic, as some will have never played it before! As a precursor to the new game, the “Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection” was released on the 360 and PS3 last year, including most of the Sonic games, and on the Nintendo DS the “Classic Sonic Collection” is out, which has all of the major games from that era as well. A clever marketing move, generating interest in the games again before the new release.

It is an exciting prospect for those of us who used to play Sonic on the Mega Drive and is going to be just as good for those discovering him for the first time!

Ian Collins is an expert on gadgets and technical subjects, and runs Techie Reviews