Sonic The Hedgehog

In the late eighties/early nineties Nintendo were well and truly king of the Video Games Industry; Mario was selling by the bucket load and it seemed as though no-one could possibly topple their all-powerful dominance. Then faster than a speeding bullet came Sega’s very own Sonic the Hedgehog into the foray, offering an infinitely faster, sleeker type of gameplay than that of a certain Italian plumbers – Nintendo finally had a character to give their own mascot a (super-sonic) run for his money.

Sonic has become a staple of the Gaming Industry; up there with Mario and Lara Croft, there are few people who haven’t heard his name. Even after Sega’s withdrawal from hardware development he is still endowed with regular output on a variety of formats, currently including: PlayStation 2, Xbox / Xbox 360, GameCube and Nintendo DS.

Most of Sonic’s games (especially the earlier ones) all featured a simplistic plot along the lines of: Finding the Chaos Emeralds (precious powerful jewels that when collected can have immense consequences) as well as defeating Dr.Robotinik/Eggman. Hardly worthy of novelisation but since when has an in-depth plot (or lack of) ever affected a platformer, anyway?

The bulk of Sonic’s games are best known for their thrilling sense of speed and adventure, but also ring and emerald collecting as well as explosive boss battles. The basic premise of the character was to create something that could rival Super Mario, it needed to have something that old Mazza didn’t.

Designers got to work by analysing the ‘flaws’ of Nintendo’s mascot, who when stripped to his basic elements is essentially a plumber that jumps on his enemies and slowly progresses through the mushroom kingdom. What was so cool about that? Well by definition, not a whole lot, cue Sonic - the coolest gaming character for some time with immense speed to boot.

One of Sega’s earliest advertising campaigns really captured the idea that the company was trying to get across with the use of Sonic as their new-found hero:

• ‘Sega do what Nintendont’

The Fastest thing Alive has a rather vague and suggestive back-story with a plethora of variations available as to his exact origin and location. One example states him as an inhabitant of Earth living on South Island in the Pacific Ocean whilst many others deem him to exist on an entirely different planet: Mobious.

A commonly used explanation for his colour and speed is a laboratory experiment (attempting to contain all the evil in the world into 7 harmless Emeralds) which goes wrong. The resulting explosion also creates the evil Dr. Robotnik (original a kind-hearted professor named Dr. Kintobor) as well as the Chaos Emeralds.

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• Sonic has starred in three comic titles (Sonic the Hedgehog in the US and Japan, Sonic the Comic in the UK)
• Sonic now appears on a number of Nintendo consoles despite past rivalry.
• Sonic is not the only character to feature a ‘super’ counterpart, Tails and Knuckles can achieve the same result (as shown in Sonic 3)
• In the TV series Sonic Underground, Sonic has a brother and sister (Manic and Sonia) plus his mother is the queen of Mobious making him royalty.
• Before Sonic, Sega’s mascot was Alex Kidd.

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