SEGA very quietly slipped in a port of the original Mega Drive Sonic the Hedgehog onto the Apple iTunes store yesterday, with the iPhone platform now being the latest in a long line of formats that can play the classic game.
An official blog today confirms the existence of the title, which you can now pick up for your iPhone for $4.99 $5.99, or £3.49 to the British fans out there. Control is made using touch screen ‘buttons’ that appear on the bottom of the playing screen – the D-Pad is located at the bottom left and the only button (A) on the bottom right. Two screen modes allow you to play the action full-screen with semi-transparent buttons, or in a smaller window with a visible START button.
The graphics appear to be intact, and the blog mentions how faithful and fun to play it is (but of course, they would say that really). Have you bought it already and played it? What do you think of it? Does another Sonic 1 port tickle your fancy or is it starting to wind you up? Let us know in the comments box!
UPDATE: According to our American friends, the price on the iTunes store looks to be $5.99 instead of the $4.99 SEGA’s blog announced. That would bring the £-$ difference a little closer (£3.49 equates to about $5.55 as of this moment), but it’s curious why the wrong price was mentioned. Most likely just a mistake on the community blog’s part.
I purchased this and it is a dream to play. There is no slow down, or lagging like in other ports.
The Control scheme works well. It takes a while to get used to this as you can’t hold that much pressure on it to get sonic running, but they are responsive when they are needed to be.
I’m glad I got it. Extremely fun and it sure as shit got my freak flag in the air. If you have an iPod touch or iPhone, get it!
$4.99?
My iPhone still says it’s $5.99, and that’s what I’ve reported elsewhere.
Seems Sega’s PR folks goofed…unless I’m being penalized for having a first-gen iPhone >_<
-T
looks good, i have the game on the ipod and its a good port go I guess this will be even better 🙂
It’s pretty awesome in the lower resolution mode. 4/5 stars, because the “A” button is unresponsive at times, and the frame-rate drops when in full-screen mode. Otherwise a good port of v3 of Sonic 1. (spike bug fix and moving clouds included!) 🙂
I guess my dilemma is the usual “do I want to fork out £3.50 on a game I already own on several formats?”
The answer is most likely to be “probably”. Such a sucker.
M’kay. It cost me $5.99 to buy it. ¬.¬;
This was the very first computer game I ever owned and as a result I love it. Good job sega. Hopefully they will port more megadrive games and hopefully more Sonics
That’s cool. Still waiting for a PocketPC Version
I’m just waiting for a port of Sonic Adventure. After all, the iPhone is as powerful as the Dreamcast, and the touch-screen interface could be a good control method for the 3-D wonder…
@extaticus
I really think that Sega should release sonic Adventure 2 on the PSP. Its got the power.
Well as for me I absolutely hate apple so Im not going to get this. Im content with having on the PSP along with the better sonic 2
@Edge
Sa2 on the psp would be epic