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When Sonic Lost World was unveiled, it got people talking, most likely for two reasons: it actually looked quite good, and it was exclusive to Nintendo platforms. Sonic Generations was a multiplatform title that made people take notice of Sega’s mascot after a decade of inconsistent releases, and Wii U was, and still is, a struggling console that can’t necessarily guarantee sky high sales, so it is easy to see why this might be a somewhat confusing scenario. It just so happens that Sega has not lost its mind and there is a reason for this direction:
“If we trace Sonic’s third-party roots all the way back to just after the Dreamcast, we released Sonic Adventure 2: Battle on the GameCube and it did phenomenally well,” said Aaron Webber, Brand Manager for the Sonic franchise, “We think that’s because there was a lot of overlap between the Sonic/Sega and Nintendo crowd at that time, and we just found historically that Sonic performs really, really well on Nintendo platforms. Sonic Colors did great, Sonic and the Black Knight did well and Sonic and Secret Rings did well– all Nintendo. When we look at the numbers, we thought– this is clearly where our audience is.”
I personally think it is also worth mentioning that not only did those games perform well financially, they also happened to be better games overall than the titles that found their way to other consoles. The mere mention of 2006’s Sonic the Hedgehog for 360 and PS3 is enough to make most gamers shudder. Also, let’s not forget that Sonic had his fair share of well received adventures on DS as well.
But what I think this all comes down to are the old-school gamers, the sort of people who remember the 16-bit console wars between Nintendo and Sega. All the animosity that once separated these two camps has long since faded away and everybody can look back fondly on both sides. Not to mention the fact that it is also this demographic that probably has the greatest appreciation for the platformer genre which continues to be neglected by most developers and publishers.
Source: Nintendo Life
