Sonic the Hedgehog is celebrating its 30th birthday today, celebrating its original release with newfound success and releases in the gaming world.
Back on June 23, 1991, Sonic the Hedgehog first came out for the Sega Genesis console at the time. It worked as the direct rival for Nintendo’s Mario, working as Sega’s mascot.
While the franchise lagged for a few years, it’s now back and getting stronger than ever. The series has a few titles coming out, including a potential new mainline title in the series.
Sonic came out in 1991 for the Sega Genesis
The original Sonic game came out in 1991 for Sega in North America, with PAL regions following a month after. Sonic as a character originally showed up in arcade racing game Rad Mobile a few months earlier.
Tomorrow is Sonic’s 30th Anniversary!
Here’s to 30 years of amazing adventures, journeys across planets and zones, and all the wonderful friends made along the way.
Pict by: @SonicOfficialJP pic.twitter.com/vUYoZBwIQg
— Sonic the Hedgehog (@sonic_hedgehog) June 22, 2021
To those living under a rock, the game follows Sonic, the titular high-speed blue hedgehog. The character sets out on an adventure to battle the local tyrant, Dr. Robotnik. His quest was to release animals imprisoned in robots and retrieve the Chaos Emeralds.
The original Sonic game was among the greatest hits for Sega. Many considered the character to be the anti-thesis to Nintendo’s Mario series. To put into perspective, Nintendo was dominating the platformer landscape well before Sonic came out.
Many reviewers at the time loved the colorful maps and beautiful graphics. Many loved the fast gameplay for the title, something unheard of during the time.
Sonic rivaled Mario and went on to succeed
Sonic the Hedgehog is one of the most iconic games of all time. Once it came out, it quickly cemented itself to be a good rival to Mario. It also made Sega’s console more compelling, something that no other system at the time was able to do.
Sega Genesis, at the time, was also a more powerful console, which helped show more of Sonic’s gameplay. It allowed for faster gameplay without much of a slowdown. This was not possible for the SNES at the time, which carried a Ricoh 5A22 CPU with it.
Sonic continued its rivalry with Mario at the time. The sequel, Sonic The Hedgehog 2, added in Tails as a partner of sorts. Sonic 3 added an antagonist in the form of Knuckles.
By 1998, the Sega Dreamcast came out with Sonic Adventure, its first 3D platformer. This game became a genre-defining title for the series, creating a proper shift. Since then, the franchise experienced its own ups and downs.
Now, Sonic the Hedgehog will get a new remastered title under Sonic Colors: Ultimate. The franchise will also get a new 2022 mainline title that should be something worthwhile.
Featured image courtesy of Sonic The Hedgehog/Youtube Screenshot