Sonic boom: how classic game got its legs back

The hedgehog's longtime caretaker, Takashi Iizuka, talks about going back to the 90s for new game Sonic Superstars and the blue blur's rivalry with Mario

- Tom Regan

For the first time since 1992, last month saw the release of a new Sonic the Hedgehog game and a new Mario game. The sass-spouting hedgehog has also enjoyed a new lease of life on the big screen, thanks to Hollywood blockbusters starring Idris Elba and Jim Carrey.

But on the games front, Sonic's appearances since his 1990s heyday have been ... mixed. From a misjudged sword-wielding Sonic on the Nintendo Wii to the baffling adventures of Sonic the Werehog in 2008's Sonic Unleashed, the poor old hedgehog stumbled and fell into something of a midlife crisis.

Like all struggling artists trying to recapture their former glory, Sonic's caretakers have taken their hero back to his roots. With its new release, Sonic Superstars, Sega has rejected the sprawling open-world freedom of last year's Sonic Frontiers and returned to the side-scrolling of old. And who better to help rediscover the unbridled joy of the blue blur than designer Takashi lizuka, one of the creative leads on such beloved entries as Sonic 3, Sonic & Knuckles and Sonic Adventure 1 and 2.

"Those games stand out in particular not only because they were amazing games, but because each of them felt epic or were a milestone moment for the franchise," reflects a cheery lizuka.