The Sonic Hangout Archives
A dying man needs to die, as
a sleepy man needs to sleep, and there comes a time when it is wrong, as well
as useless, to resist.
-Stewart Alsop
There was once a great name in video gaming, a towering figure
who took the electronic world by storm in the 1990s. This particular figure
put Sega on the map and gained them fortune as well as a place in the infamous
console wars. This figure played a key role in revolutionizing the video game
industry back some 15 years ago by introducing bright graphics, split-screen
gameplay, co-op single player, and lock-on technology. This figure was seen
around the world, had many titles bearing his name, and had an attitude that
people loved. This figure was Sonic the Hedgehog. Over the years, he has seen
great success, but lately, he has proven to be a miserable failure thanks
to a company behind him who seems to ready to stab him in the back at every
chance they get.
The gameplay formula was simple. Sonic was the chili-dog loving energetic protagonist who battled against the game's antagonist, Dr. Robotnik, a menacing evil doctor with an IQ of 300. Sonic always managed to thwart Robotnik by some means, though, stopping his plans for world domination in the process. That gameplay formula was successful for years for Sega. And they've got the numbers to show for it. The franchise has sold 45 million games to this date, has spawned three unique cartoon series (two running in unison during their original runs), a comic book publication started in 1993 that continues today as well as other comic book series, and merchandise, all in addition to the record-selling games. Sonic was once a cool name, a franchise of a great caliber that no one could seem to pass up.
So what has happened lately? Well, I can tell you a few things for sure, and I'm not the only one who will tell you this. During the past say five or six years, Sega has failed to put out a Sonic game that has been truly satisfying and up-to-par with the standards that Sega themselves set back in the 1990s. But, every series has its ups and its downs, right?
I can tell you there is no up from here. Here is a bit of a story: Sega has been in trouble, and they are still in, if not more, trouble at this point. Poor management has plagued the video game giant since the late 90s. Before that, Sega enjoyed near-domination and many profits being raked in from successful franchises like Sonic. However, when the original Sony PlayStation hit the market in 1995, it became a worldwide success, selling over 102 consoles to date and leading to two successors and a handheld. The PlayStation was the first 32-bit system, but that didn't make it revolutionary - that isn't why people wanted it. The divorce of Nintendo and Sony effectively led Nintendo to create its own worst enemy as well as Sega's. Game developers were getting tired of Nintendo's restrictions, proprietary formats, and high development costs stemming from continued use of cartridges, which stored less data, over the CD format, with its popularity increasing each day. Where did they turn? None other than the CD-based PlayStation with its cheaper game development costs and increased flexibility. Thus, people wanted the PlayStation for the game selection available on it.
But wait! Didn't Sega lead the way to using CDs as a medium for game publishing? The Sega CD came out in 1993, two whole years before the PlayStation hit the market. Well, it failed, because it was an add-on to the Genesis. The market has not liked add-ons and history proves that. In addition, Sega launched the Saturn in 1995 6 months before the PlayStation was released. It supported CDs, but why did it ultimately fail? Initially, Sega released the console early, during E3 1995, to the dismay of developers and retailers alike, some feeling betrayed that Sega would release a console cutting time short for developers and leaving out some retailers, thus holding back their potential to gain a then-uncontested market early. Afer game cancellations and poor sales, the Saturn ceased production in 1998, and Sega was left with a market that was skeptical of it and aguably overzealous towards the growth of the PlayStation console. Sega had to correct this.
In 1997, Sega's talk of a future console upset developers further because they didn't want Sega to rush and put out another console, ultimately the Dreamcast. The Dreamcast came out in 1999 and was the first 128-bit console with online capabilities out-of-the-box and enjoyed a successful launch, selling 500,000 consoles in two weeks. The Dreamcast also was the first console to introduce anti-aliasing, an important part of video game graphics today. The console was a revolution at the time and it had a lot of promise. It was technologically superior to the PlayStation, but the Dreamcast lost against it. So, why did it fail? Skepticism from poor decisions and Sony's overtake of the market. The end quickly drew near for the ill-fated console. The PlayStation 2 was announced shortly after the Dreamcast's release, and Sony had the backing of major games due to the success of its original PlayStation mentioned earlier. The announcements of the Xbox and GameCube further led the Dreamcast to it's ultimate demise in January 2001, when Sega stopped production of the Dreamcast console. This was Sega's end in the hardware market. They produce only software at present.
So the ultimate demise of Sega as a hardware giant was based on poor decisions and skepticism following two major failures. Now why did I just tell that story if this is about Sonic? Well, the poor management of the company continues to today, and it spreads it has been spreading its poison into the Sonic series. The Sonic series at the time of the failure of the Dreamcast was in great shape. Sonic Adventure is the best-selling Dreamcast game, with 1 million copies sold. Sonic Adventure 2 did not receive the praise the original Adventure did, but was still accepted by fans. Both games had some glitches that would ultimately not be resolved in later games and contribute to the series' downfall. Re-releases plagued Sonic for the next couple years, along with Game Boy Advance titles, which were successful for the most part. However, some viewed the advent of the 3D games as a low-point for Sonic. That low point wouldn't be recognized until 2004, when the release of Sonic Heroes enraged most of the veteran fanbase. The game received reviews in the 60 and 70% range, less than what one would expect from a Sonic game.
Bad decisions showed themselves in that game, and they were more apparent in subsequent games. Shadow the Hedgehog, released in 2005, was an abomination, and was officially a betrayal to long-time fans of Sonic who have sat by and watched helplessly as the games hindered seriously in their quality. After the passing of Deem Bristow, the respected voice of Eggman in the Adventure/Heroes series, Sega pulled a move that would displace much of the fanbase. Sega replaced the entire cast of the Adventure series with the 4Kids voice actors then casting the voices for the characters in Sonic X (and 4Kids is a company notoriously known for ruining great animes by introducing horrible voice actors, bland, generic soundtracks, and censoring scenes). The actors are awful and do not show enthusiasm while acting out their character, thus adding to the problems ingame. The addition of characters into each and every game was beginning to be overkill, and Sega still insists on adding new characters each game.
Sega then hyped the market with the 2006 title Sonic Riders, a game that pits Sonic and company on air boards racing across different terrain. The game fared well in terms of sales; however, the idea of the game goes right against the idea at the core of Sonic - running fast. If you put the board into the equation, you destroy the most essential aspect of the franchise. Later in the year, Sega then decided to hype the fans up once again with a title that they had stated will be a "rebirth" of the Sonic series. This got the hopes of many up once more, praying and wishing that the game would not be an abomination. Turns out it has been the worst release for Sega thus far. The game sold a scant 38,000 in the weeks following release, an extremely low number for the Sonic franchise. The game is plagued with problems such as long loading times, less-than-impressive graphic work that was promised, as well as many other issues that turned gamers off from the product. Sega made sure they ended 2006 with a bang, alright. And, personally, I think I have $60 worth of kindling now.
All of these were just poor decisions on Sega's part. Someone needs to be fired because someone is intentionally making these decisions to bring down a once great company respected for its quality products. Sega continues to say "we don't need you" to its fanbase by further ignoring pleas from fans to improve the games, by adding senseless amounts of characters, by creating inconsistent storylines, and by making gameplay a joke. The Sonic series isn't ANYWHERE near what it used to be, and now it looks like a vomit-pit. I've never seen a series so abused, so poorly let go, and so run into the ground (and still running into it) ever. I'm not the only one disgusted, and frankly, I'm tired of getting my hopes up when I hear Sega's announcement of new games because history repeats itself: we are only in for more disappointment.
And that is why this site is now an archive site. I am sick of the disgusting antics that Sega has been playing over the last few years and I am sick of the way they are milking a franchise that should have been considered dead for a solid four years now. I am sick of the abuse of power chiefly because Sega is still under the impression that they can sucker in millions to buy their shitty products. Companies should not be able to toy with the minds of their consumers, and they seem to not be anymore.
So so-long, Sonic. We had fun with you for
a while. But now your creators are killing you, and you will now die a slow,
painful, and unforgiving death.
Signed,
Artis Oracle
