Categories News

Happy 32nd Birthday, Sonic The Hedgehog!

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Author Dreadknux

It’s hard to believe that THIRTY-TWO YEARS AGO today, the original Sonic the Hedgehog video game arrived on store shelves. And since then, the heroic blue blur has catapulted himself to super-stardom, appearing on everything from comics to TV shows and movies, to coffee cups and t-shirts and a whole lot more!

SEGA’s mascot has had the kind of celebrity life that many can only dream of: the dizzying highs of ‘Sonic Mania’ in the early 1990s; the crushing lows of ‘Sonic 2006’ in… well, 2006; a series of make-overs and interesting fashion choices; the always-classic “five year lull”; and a comeback story that celebrates both his retro early successes (Sonic Origins, Sonic Superstars) alongside his more Adventure-ous contemporary works (Sonic Colours Ultimate, Sonic Frontiers).

If any character proved that they can truly stand the test of time, Sonic the Hedgehog is that guy. Several times.

To celebrate, SEGA shared an incredible fan art piece today by Serxx – you can see it below and catch the original SEGA post here.

We’ll be updating Sonic News throughout the day with cool things that the official Sonic channels have done to pay homage to the blue blur on this day. How will you be celebrating? A little bit of Sonic Adventure 2? Reading the latest IDW Sonic issues? Watching the Sonic 2 movie? Let us know in the comments below!

Oh, and don’t forget – today is also the day SEGA hosts its annual ‘Sonic Central’ showcase, which is bound to include a number of interesting surprises.

Happy birthday, Sonic!

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Categories Features, Site Updates

Happy 18th Birthday, The Sonic Stadium!

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Author Dreadknux
6 Comments

That’s right! On this very day, at the turn of the new millennium, The Sonic Stadium formally opened its virtual doors to the world. It was a very different world back then – people used Yahoo to search for things online instead of Google, Napster was the fresh new way to download music (not altogether legally), the hottest ‘meme’ was the Hampster Dance and the Sonic online community was just getting started. Continue reading Happy 18th Birthday, The Sonic Stadium!

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Categories #Games

Happy 26th Birthday, Sonic the Hedgehog!

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Author Dreadknux
11 Comments

Can you believe it’s been 26 years to the day that the original Sonic the Hedgehog video game was released on Sega Mega Drive? The blue blur is now way too far gone for any ‘old enough to drink/drive (though not at the same time)’ jokes. In fact, he’s well on his way to being old enough to starting a mortgage and a family. Continue reading Happy 26th Birthday, Sonic the Hedgehog!

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Categories #SEGA

19 65 09 17: Yuji Naka Celebrates 50th Birthday

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Author Dreadknux
15 Comments

Yuji Naka at Tokyo Game Show 2015
Yuji Naka at Tokyo Game Show 2015

Yuji Naka, the master coder that was responsible for programming the original Sonic the Hedgehog, turned 50 years old yesterday. Doesn’t time fly!?

The former SEGA developer – left the company in 2006 to start his own independent studio, Prope – received a wave of well wishes on his social media channels. Naka-san spent the week enjoying Tokyo Games Show, where he has taken pictures of Sonic and SEGA merchandise available for sale at the event.

Although he has not been associated with the Sonic franchise for quite some time, he is regarded as one of the main ‘fathers’ of the blue blur, deftly creating a game engine in the early 1990s that allowed a character to use curved environments to reward players with bursts of speed. He became a spokesperson for the franchise during his time at SEGA, eventually leading the Sonic Team division during the Dreamcast era. For Sonic’s 20th Anniversary in 2011, he attended SEGA’s Sonic Boom event as well as the fan-organised Summer of Sonic convention.

His latest game, Rodea the Sky Soldier, is seeing a release on the Wii U later this year.

“Thank you very much for all the birthday messages,” he wrote in a message to fans. “I can feel all the love and support from my fans! I decided to be even a cool man in my 50s. I’ll do my best.”

With a seemingly undying love for Ferraris, we’re pretty sure Naka-san will continue to be cool for many years to come!

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Categories #Community

Sonic & Tails wish Sonic a happy birthday, guest starring Ryan Drummond!

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Author Hero of Legend
19 Comments

[youtube]https://youtu.be/EgH-npy0mnc[/youtube]

A person with the name of FlutterTreeMuffin on YouTube teamed up with Ryan himself to bring you the above video featuring Sonic and Tails. It’s a really sweet gesture and a wonderful treat to hear Ryan behind the mic as Sonic even if it’s unofficially again after so long (he did play as Sonic on camera in an interview not that long ago).

For reference, Ryan voiced Sonic starting from Sonic Adventure on DC in 1999, and ending with Sonic Advance 3 on GBA in 2004.

Thanks Flutter and Ryan for the video! 🙂

What did you think of it? Let us know in the comments!

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Categories xxOLDCommunity News, xxOLDVideo

Mash-Up Monday: They Don’t Care About Sky Fortress

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Author VizardJeffhog
5 Comments

Hail to the King (of Pop), baby!

As if the world hasn’t seen enough Michael Jackson/Sonic mash-ups, Hyper-Shan of the SSMB decided to combine one of the King’s tracks with something a little more recent than most combinations.

Thus, fusing Sky Fortress Acts 2 and 3 of Sonic 4: Episode II with They Don’t Care About Us, this mash-up was born!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mkrpe7jYiq8

On that note, happy birthday to Shan as well! Have a good one!

Found an interesting mash-up for a future Mash-Up Monday? Have one of your own you’d want to see featured? Then don’t hesitate to send it over to vizardjeffhog@sonicstadium.org!

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Categories xxOLDCommunity News, xxOLDVideo

Sound Test Saturday: 21st Anniversary Edition!

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Author VizardJeffhog
22 Comments

My readers, this day is what all true Sonic fans strive for!

Yes, today is June 23rd, and you all know what that means! The Blue Blur himself, Sonic the Hedgehog, is celebrating his 21st birthday today!

So, let’s have a bit of an extravaganza ourselves! 21 is the magic number, so why not go for that many tracks, just for today? A great number of these tracks have been tipped by you guys, and I thank you all for your contributions!

Due to the sheer amount of music to be featured beyond the jump, I’ll refrain myself from commenting on each track. Instead, I will leave you all with this. If everything goes according to plan here, Sound Test Saturday will be moved to SEGASonic: Radio next week. Yes folks, SS:R will return sooner than you think! And with the big move, we will introduce a new feature on our weekly music column: interviews! First ones up are Freen in Green, followed by xTrickyWolfy and Ring Energy should all go well!

If there is any particular artist you would want featured on a future Sound Test Saturday, if there are any remixes, covers, or originals you want to share, if you have work of your own you would like to see up on the site, then do not hesitate to notify me at vizardjeffhog@sonicstadium.org!

That being said, Happy 21st Anniversary, Sonic the Hedgehog! Still unstoppable after 21 years!

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlfoErrGMSo

Title: Green Hill Zone
Author: TheSymphonicGames
Tip: Faseehudeen

Continue reading Sound Test Saturday: 21st Anniversary Edition!

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Categories xxOLDSite Updates

Happy Birthday TSS! PLUS BONUS ANNOUNCEMENT!

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Author Dreadknux

The Sonic Stadium is eight years old today (and it was Cephrien’s birthday a few days ago too, so happy birthday to you too). It’s hard to imagine that this little site of mine would be so involved in an international community like this, but we’re here today amongst other awesome websites like Sonic Retro and Sonic Fan Games HQ, and man is it all good.

As you may be aware, I’ve been chronicling the years of TSS, from beginning to end (we’re at 2001 at this moment in time, but over the course of the next week you’ll learn more about the last few years too) in celebration of what this website has achieved in its lifetime. Needless to say that (trumpet blowing time) the impact The Sonic Stadium has made on the Sonic the Hedgehog community is nothing to be scoffed at.

The Sonic Site Awards gave smaller Sonic sites (including TSS at the time) a chance to be seen amongst the big boys. The approach I made to Sega Europe in 2005 has led to the publisher gaining an interest in their target audience, which led to the creation of their Community department, the Sonic City website and the arrival of everyone’s favourite neighbourhood Sega-man, AAUK, to take pole position of what’s going on worldwide. The TSS Network helped raise the profiles of numerous fellow sites, including FastFeet Media and Sonic Cage Dome.

And then of course, you have my latest creation. Something that I am probably the most proud of besides TSS itself. The Summer of Sonic, which can essentially be called two creations under one name. Originally a website, it was born out of a concept I had waaaay back in 2001; that there should be a Sonic fansite where every single prominent webmaster should contribute to. At the time, the idea was to have a Community website that involved myself, Tristan from TSSZ (who was a lot less controversial than he is now arguably), Sonic HQ, The Sonic Foundation, Shadow of a Hedgehog… it would be a site where the whole community got involved and contributed to. Continue reading Happy Birthday TSS! PLUS BONUS ANNOUNCEMENT!

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Categories #Community, News

Happy 10th Anniversary, Sonic the Hedgehog!

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Author sonic_hedgehogs

Today marks the tenth Anniversary of the Way Past Cool video game character, Sonic the Hedgehog. His first game was released on June 23 1991, and this has been officially recognised as his birthday. So, happy birthday Sonic!

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