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We all know Sonic has gone through some highs and lows over the years, but according to head honcho Takashi Iizuka, Sega had gotten to the point where it wanted to cancel the entire franchise.
As reported by One More Game (thanks, Time Extension), this came prior to the first movie’s release in 2020, with Iizuka having to “fight… to keep the franchise as long as possible”.
“There had been good times, and there had been bad times… during the worst times, I was told by the higher-ups that we should cancel the entire franchise. I had to fight within the organization to keep the franchise as long as possible.”
It was the movie, however, that proved to be the turning point. Although it faced significant initial backlash thanks to Sonic’s dodgy design, this was soon fixed, and the movie went on to be a massive success, earning $320 million at the box office and spawning two sequels (with a third on the way).
“The biggest milestone for me was the first movie… that had been a great hit and definitely changed the course of this franchise.”
So Sonic is now a full-fledged cross-media franchise, but Iizuka notes that its core remains in games. He also says that while older fans are generally looking for straight-forward action-platforming, newcomers tend to lean toward something more story-driven, so expect to see more of this going forward.
Iizuka is keen, however, to continue fostering both 2D and 3D Sonic games. He definitely seems conscious of the fans who have been there since the beginning, and wants to continue creating games like Sonic Mania and Sonic Origins to appeal to them directly.
It’s curious, however, that Sega’s inclination to cancel the entire franchise seemingly came around the launch of Mania in 2017; a game that the vast majority of fans can agree was pretty darn great. It all comes down to sales, of course, but shifting 1 million units within its first year doesn’t sound too bad to us.