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Sonic The Hedgehog Game History
What other superlatives can be made about the little blue hedgehog that bought the world of video gaming onto it's knees, and ended Nintendo's dominance of the market. The Sonic boom was definitely heard around the world. The game had everything, looks, presentation, characters and playability in abundance. It's now hard to image the gaming world without Sonic. By November 2007 the game had amassed a total number of 4 million sales for the Sega Mega Drive alone, and is still considered by many as the greatest video game of all time.

Sonic Boom: A History of Sonic The Hedgehog

Before the release of Sonic, Sega were dramatically trailing in the wake of Nintendo's gaming prowess. Sure, Sega had a home console of immense power for the time,(16 bit) but severely lacked a cutting edge game to convert the gaming public over to their side. It looked like they needed a miracle.

Sega wanted a character to replace their previous mascot Alex Kidd. Put in charge of this task were three game developers; Artist Naoto Oshima, designer Hirokazu Yasuhara and programmer Yuji Naka. There were numerous character designs, such as an armadillo, rabbit and a dog. But it was Naoto Oshima's spiky haired blue hedgehog that was finally chosen.

After the initial design of the character, Sega placed a group of five people to work on the game. These five were renamed “Sonic Team,” and the rest is history.

The game was first released on June 23rd 1991. Developed by Team Sonic and published by Sega, it was a single player game of the platform genre. Sonic The Hedgehog added unique elements to the genre. Not only was it the games speed of play, but elements that became synonymous to the series, including; spring boards, loops and the now famous rings.

The object of the game is to guide Sonic through six levels, each being divided into three acts. At the end of each level, Sonic had to defeat the evil Dr. Robotnik. An important aspect of the game play was to collect as many rings as possible. Collecting rings has it's purpose.

Firstly, while Sonic is in possession of a ring, he cannot be harmed. If he collides with an enemy or “Badniks” he just loses the rings, but if he doesn't have any rings, then the player loses a life instantly. Secondly, if a hundred rings are collected, the player gets a free life. Thirdly, if the player approaches the finish with more than fifty rings, they are given the chance to jump through a giant ring. Jumping through this ring, Sonic is immediately transported to a “special stage,” and given the chance to collect a precious Chaos Emerald.

There are other collectables throughout the levels, these come in the shape of monitors. Contained within are a variety of things, including; Rings, power ups such as speed boots and invincibility.

Conversions

After the global success of the game on the Sega Mega Drive, the inevitable release on various other home based systems, including; Nintendo Game Boy Advance and Game Cube, Sony PlayStation2 and PlayStation Portable and Xbox.