SEGA Says Glory Days For Sonic a Hope to Return

Sonic the Hedgehog has been a franchise in the past I've never really been interested in. I fell into the camp of the Super Nintendo during the glory days of the Sega vs Nintendo feud. Since then, I have played a lot of Sonic games, but never enjoyed them as much as real fans of the series. The newest games Sonic and the Secret Rings, Sonic Unleashed, and Sonic and the Black Knight were by far my least favorite of the series.

If you're going to do a Sonic game right, I agree with most people in that you have to get back to the 2-D sidescrolling games of the past and capture that magic again. Sonic is definitely at his best when he's moving fast and never stops. The newer games that have been released really do appeal to audiences who have not played the old school side scrolling Sonic games. They also know Sonic from his recent alliance with Mario to visit the Olympics. Those games haven't captured the old school fan like Sega wants, and I think the best way to do that would be to do a downloadable Sonic game.

“If you read everything, we need to be all things to all gamers with Sonic, and that’s a difficult thing to do. Trying to put everything into one game and making everybody happy is impossible. And I think that’s something clear going forward. I think we’ve had challenges with [the 2006] Sonic the Hedgehog and Unleashed. [The 2006 game] Sonic the Hedgehog sells extremely well at a budget price. So clearly it’s very popular with a young audience. But first and foremost is: We’ve got to make a quality game for that audience. Does quality mean it’s got to be a Metacritic 90 percent? Well not necessarily. It’s just got to be quality that’s appropriate for them. Then we’ve got our core fans, and what we need to do is now and then produce a Sonic that will appeal to those fans specifically. Often it can be looking at another take on the nostalgic take on Sonic. Or re-issues. They’re very popular. Fans do like that.” - Mike Hayes, the head of Sega Europe/Sega America

This quote really does capture what Sega should and hopefully will do. I might even get on board and play a new game that uses the same mechanics as the Genesis versions of the game. Sonic is a mascot that shouldn't die, but I think he's been on a bit of life support lately and it's time to re-invigorate him.
You can't capture the magic of Sonic in the 3-D games we've seen of late and a retro revival may be just what the doctor (Mario) ordered.