Oh! Free Stuff Friday! It’s tomorrow and we’ve not told you what this week’s fabulous prizes are!

This week returning to our normal day to day rhythm after a hectic week at E3 and the Sonic Boom event! We had so much fun at the show, we wanted to distribute some of the goods to those that couldn’t attend and have completely streamlined the prizes this week. You’ve waited long enough, we won’t keep you in suspense…

On the Block

We’ll have six packs total this week, each includes:

1. A Sonic Boom! T-shirt from our event in Los Angeles on June 8th. There are only about 1,500 total in existence, these are super exclusive!

2. Sonic Generations Buttons! Also a giveaway at the Sonic Boom event, these buttons feature both Classic and Modern Sonic and of a limited quantity as well.

How it Works

1. You must be following us on Twitter to be eligible. (If you don’t have a Twitter account, you can create one by going to http://www.twitter.com and click the green “get started — join!” button in the center of the page.)

2. At random times on Friday, we will announce the prize we are giving away, a word or phrase, and what number of response you need to be to win. Send us a direct message (DM) via Twitter and be that number to win the prize. (@ replies do not count as entries!)

Example:

We tweet “GIVEAWAY: Sonic T-shirt, size L. Be the 15th person to DM “Sonic Adventure” to win!”

You see this, and want to win it, so you send us a direct message that says “Sonic Adventure”. If you are the 15th person to do so, you are the winner!

Quotation marks do not matter, capitalization does not matter, but spelling does matter!

3. All followers are eligible to win all prizes, unless a restriction is noted. Restrictions are usually due to the prize being region-locked. For example, US games that won’t work on UK gaming systems. There may also be age restrictions due to the rating of the game.

4. We will announce the winner on our Twitter feed once eligibility is confirmed.

Make Sure We’re Following You on Twitter

If you are currently following us on Twitter, please be sure that we are following you as well. You can do this by making sure that SEGA is in your “followers” list, or by going to DoesFollow and typing SEGA in the first blank, your Twitter username in the second, and pressing the “check” button. You can reverse this to be sure that you are following us. If you are following us, but we’re not following you, please send a message to @SEGA and we will follow you. This is important, because only people we follow can send us direct messages (DMs), and DMs are the only way to enter the giveaways.

Important Note: Twitter limits us to following 1,000 new people per day. This is a limit imposed by Twitter and is not something we can control, change, or get around. We do our best to follow everyone back in time for the giveaway, but this is becoming increasingly difficult as our Free Stuff Fridays become more popular. Because we must be following you in order for you to send us a direct message, if we cannot follow you due to this limit, you will be unable to enter the giveaway. We do our contests by direct message to avoid having everyone spam their followers with giveaway entries. Please be patient, and we will follow you as soon as we’re able.

How to Send Direct Messages on Twitter

There are a few ways to send us a Direct Message on Twitter. The easiest way is to go to our Twitter page and select “message” under the “Actions” heading in the side bar. If you do not see “message”, this means that we are not following you. Please send a message to @sega to let us know, and we will follow you. When you click “message” you will be taken to a window where you can type a message and press send.

You may also select the “direct messages” tab from your Twitter homepage, and select SEGA from the drop-down menu at the top of the page. Again, if you don’t see our name there, it’s probably because we’re not following you. Let us know, and we’ll follow you.

There are also many Twitter clients that you can use instead of using the website. These include TweetDeck, Twitteriffic, Tweetie, and Twhirl. Each of these programs works differently, so you’ll want to figure out how to send a direct message on the program you use. If you want to send us a test message, we’ll let you know if we received it or not.

The revival of Sonic and his side-scrolling adventures now comes to Windows Phone 7!

If you want to go grab it now, here’s the link to the Windows Phone 7 page where you can buy it or get the free trial.

This is Sonic’s first appearance on the Windows Mobile platform, and the “built from the ground up” adventure takes place in the old-school chronology of the series, picking up where Sonic & Knuckles left off.

Sonic is back on the path to battle against Dr. Eggman, and his newly revamped mechas, vying to defeat the mad scientist in a race to save the world. Featuring immersive tilt controls, the familiar trademarked Spin Dash, and the newly incorporated Homing Attack, Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode I is a combination of reminiscent classic gameplay and innovative attributes that have popularized the franchise over the past 20 years.

Join in the fight once again to defeat the evil Badniks and end Eggman’s nefarious plot once and for all!

We’re excited to reveal the 20th Anniversary figurine for Sonic the Hedgehog! These are extremely limited edition, with only 1,000 made in the world. They feature modern Sonic with classic Sonic in the monitor, the 20th Anniversary logo, and a base modeled after Green Hill Zone.

One interesting note is that there are two different versions of these figurines, one specifically for the US and another one for the rest of the world. The reason for this is that the image in the monitor was taken from the original Sonic the Hedgehog game, which appeared slightly differently between the 2 versions. We wanted to be true to that history, so we made different versions of the figurine. The version you see here is the non-US  version.

These will not be sold anywhere, but you still might be able to get your hands on one… you never know when or where they might pop up! Here are some more photos of the figurines being made:

And here are the final versions! First, the US version:

And the non-US version:

“We got a Flat Stanley!” is what Aaron/RubyEclipse said to me as he excitedly approached my desk.

You might be familiar with a children’s book called Flat Stanley. If you are, I probably just brought back warm memories by mentioning it. If not, well… you will be soon. Flat Stanley is about a boy named Stanley Lambchop, who is accidentally flattened by a bulletin board. He makes the best of his altered state, and one of the advantages he has is that he can be mailed in an envelope to visit his friends.

This is where the Flat Stanley Project comes in. Schools can download or make a Flat Stanley and send him to visit other places. The focus of the project is to increase literacy and letter writing skills, while also helping students build relationships and learn about different places.

We recently received a Flat Stanley from Peter at the Manville School, which is a therapeutic day school for children (ages 5-16) who experience emotional, neurological, or learning difficulties that have impacted their ability to succeed in previous school settings. From the moment we received it, our office was divided into two types of people — people who knew of Flat Stanley and were excited, and people who didn’t know what the heck we were all going on about.

Stanley just completed his visit here at SEGA, and I wanted to share his visit. (Before anyone asks –  no, Stanley did not find Shenmue 3, Valkyria Chronicles 3, PSO 2, or any other games that are commonly asked about.)

Stanley started his visit at SEGA the way all visitors do — by checking in at our reception desk. Stanley got a name tag, and then went out on his tour.

Stanley visited our modern Sonic statue in the lobby.

Stanley also visited our classic Sonic statue.

Stanley toured the rest of our office, making stops in the legal department, the marketing department, the creative services department, the media lab, and the digital department. While visiting the digital department, Stanley got to wear Ken Balough’s E3 badge. We thought it was only fair, since just about everyone else at SEGA had worn Ken’s badge at one time or another last week.

Finally, Stanley spent some time on our Wall of Awesome. This is the place we post your fun, funny, cool, touching, inspiring stuff. All the great stuff we get from our fans goes up here, so we thought Stanley would be right at home. He didn’t even seem scared to be on a bulletin board — the very thing that made him flat in the first place.

Unfortunately, after a few days, he started to miss his friends in Boston, so we mailed him home today. We included a SEGA sticker to keep him company on the long trip back, though.

Thanks to the Manville School in Boston, MA for sending him to us!

Straight from the good folks at High Voltage Software, we have a two new videos to share from their super secret insider source. The title might also be a dead giveaway – Ask a Drudge is a new series of videos that help answer questions no else dare answer; today’s topics include Invasion Mode and controller preferences!

Ask a Drudge Part 3

Ask a Drudge Part 4

Got your own question for a Drudge? Ask away at: thex@high-voltage.com and you might find your email featured in a video!

One of the great things we had at the Sonic Boom event were photo booths scattered throughout the venue. These were there for people to gather friends and make photo postcards that they could upload to their Facebook and Twitter, or email to friends. They were also placed on our Sonic Facebook page. You can see all of the photo booth shenanigans here, and I’ve culled some of the best photos and placed them on our Flickr. I’ve placed some of my favorites below. Whether you were there as press, SEGA employees, or Sonic fans (or all of the above), it sure looks like everyone had fun.

This might actually be my favorite photo of the entire night.

All of these folks are SEGA employees! (L-R) Cindy, Greg, David, and Jerusha. Cindy and Jerusha work in our legal department, Greg works in our media lab, and David works in PR. This might also be my favorite photo of the night.

The Eggbot from the Needlemouse musical performance.

You’ll recognize Cindy and Jerusha from a few photos ago, but I wanted to point out that guy on the right… that’s William Mapother, who you may know from his character Ethan on LOST.

More SEGA employees! The guy on the left is Jon, who works in our publishing department. And you’ve already met Cindy.

This is Gregory, our graffiti artist. Which is why he has paint on his hands!

That ham on the left there is Derrek, who works for SEGA as a brand manager.

Speaking of hamming it up, that’s Dreadknux!

One of our surprise guests got in on the photo booth as well… it’s Yuji Naka!

Your SEGA of America community team… that’s Kellie on the left and Julian/ClumsyOrchid on the right.

That’s Jen, the Director of Creative Services at SEGA. She and her team made all of the signs, wall art, t-shirts, buttons, Sonic cut outs, and more for the event.

These are the performers for Needlemouse: The Musical!

I couldn’t decide which of those photos I liked better, so I included them both. That’s T-Bird on the left, and Aaron/RubyEclipse on the right.

Thanks again to everyone who came to Sonic Boom! You can still send your photos to us at communityteam@sega.com!

Some awesome news from the Clockworks — the Three Rings developed, SEGA-produced free-to-play adventure Spiral Knights is now available on Steam!

We couldn’t be happier to have this unique game joined with Steam. Seeing games by big developers alongside indie games, having the convenient friends and chat overlays and groups, and being integrated into a real community of friends and gamers — and the idea of introducing that community to the free-to-play world of Spiral Knights — is, I admit, tantalizing.

Spiral Knights itself is a massive & ongoing adventure which has seen numerous updates since its release several months ago. Designed around small group play (though you can solo as well), Spiral Knights is an action-oriented multiplayer adventure, where working together as a team and learning to survive the game’s dangerous and clever monsters and traps is paramount to success.

In the game itself you venture into the Clockworks:an ever-expanding series of dungeons which changes in real time — every time you take an elevator down you may encounter a different level as they shift and turn. What’s more, players influence the evolution of the clockworks themselves — the crystals you discover in your journeys are fed into machines which then influence the levels that appear. The full scope and story of the Clockworks has not yet been revealed — and now we have a chance to see what the unique Steam community can bring to the adventure.

If you’re just joining the action, here’s some of the recent updates the good folks at Three Rings have added to the game:

• New boss monster added to the Clockworks … the deadly Snarbolax!
• Added to Spiral Knights: Achievements and special deal packages!
• New for the town of Haven: an Auction House and Training Room

Stay tuned for more from Spiral Knights — and you can now join the official Spiral Knights group on Steam to receive news of updates as well as to get access to Spiral Knights avatars and other great stuff. The mystery of the Clockworks is now being unraveled with the help of steam power!

E3 is now officially over! Officially now that we’re in the office and the E3 smell has been washed out of our clothing and life for another year. With the return to the office and a steady connection to the outside world, we can do a bit of a round up on all things Aliens: Colonial Marines! As noted in our E3 Show blog, the Aliens: Colonial Marines booth was decked out and themed to the Aliens universe with a theater, live Colonial Marines (see above!) and even holograms of the Aliens on the sides. While the outside looked cool, inside was the only place to view the demo of the upcoming SEGA and Gearbox title. The demo ran for about 30 minutes and we had folks queued up all day long to get in and get a chance to see it; when they got out, they were excited for the upcoming game!

There’s certainly a lot of interest in the title, so I didn’t list everything, just the lengthier articles that had a different perspectives or notable moments that they could catch from the presentation. I know that there is much more on the way as far as impressions, so keep your eyes open for more links and articles from the E3 show floor!

Impressions & Previews

MTV Multiplayer Blog has impressions up from the preview, read it here!

“Gearbox Software has been developing “Colonial Marines” for years now, but they finally took the wraps off the game at this year’s E3. Randy Pitchford, the CEO of Gearbox, is referring to this game as the “true sequel to ‘Aliens.’

The Wall Street Journal’s Blog, Speakeasy, had a chance to check out the game, check their preview here

Fans will be happy that the first-person shooter has all of the familiar elements from the movies, including pulse rifles with over/under grenade launchers, flamethrowers, power loaders and acid alien blood that will do you serious damage if you get into a “close encounter.” The designers have even incorporated the sentry gun robots from the director’s cut of “Aliens.”

Ars Technica has a very in depth article about the demo, including a quote that I’ve listed below – be sure to read the full article here.

I caught up with Gearbox’s Minister of Art—his actual job title—after the event, and asked about the danger of dealing with a property so many people love, one that has been somewhat abused in the past few years. “There were a few figures that were made when the movie came out, like a xenomorph that’s a praying mantis, and we have them tacked on our wall at the office to remind us what mistakes to avoid,” he told Ars. He said that everyone on the team is a fan of the franchise, and they have a strong sense of how to respect it without crossing any lines.

Video Game Writers posted their impressions, you can read them here.

Before beginning the live gameplay presentation, Pitchford joked that the game industry has been ripping off ideas from Aliens for years, and it was awesome to finally do it officially.

Examiner.com has lengthy impressions up as well, you can view the full article here.

Using a shotgun and later a pulse rifle the demo showed that even with great firepower the marines are at a huge disadvantage. The battle moved from the blast damaged observation area complerte with the ruined atmosphere processor in the distance.

VideoGamer.com has an excellent write up that covers off so much, you can tell they are big fans of the movies and certainly anticipating the release of Colonial Marines. Read their full writeup here.

There’ll always be at least one ally to hand, however, as drop in/drop out co-op play is available at all times, for a maximum of four participants. Perhaps this shouldn’t be a surprise given the success of Borderlands, but it’s certainly excellent news all the same.

Kotaku has a long preview up, peppered with details from the demo and their interviews – a great summary and overall read!

The position beyond saving, Winter and his pal run back upstairs where they see aliens streaming into the room through vents in the ceilings and walls. The aliens drop to the floor, jump over crates, bound toward you. The lights go out, in the silence and the black you can hear the motion tracking beeps of an approaching horde.

Gamespot has a write up of their impressions of the demo, read it all here…

The main character whipped out his handheld radar scanner and soon found several blips dashing toward the unit from the west. Naturally, the creatures were the titular Xenomorph aliens. One of them darted through the broken airshafts, wiggled out the other end, and snatched up an unlucky marine. It was time for our protagonist to get out of this sticky situation fast.

Finally Joystiq has a preview up of the demo presentation that also has a ton of detail, don’t miss out on the full article!

Gearbox told us there are other throwbacks for fans, like seeing Bishop’s torn legs in the USS Sulaco hanger bay, checking out the vent where Vasquez martyred herself, and seeing Newt’s doll head. But the game isn’t all throwback; in order to deliver a compelling narrative of its own, Gearbox received some early help from Bradley Thompson and David Weddle of Battlestar Galactica fame to augment its in-house writing talent.

Please Hold Your Questions until the End

Previews from press are one thing, and questions to the Gearbox developers are yet another – while the folks at E3 had a chance to get in and see the game, we have an in at Gearbox to get your questions answered! Take a look at the previews and let us know if you have any questions about the game in the comments below.

A huge thanks again to all the fans, press, SEGA folks, and friends who came to Sonic Boom last night. It was amazing to meet so many of you, and to re-connect with some old friends. We’ve already seen some photos and videos on Twitter, but we want to see them all. Send us all your pix and video, including those from the photo booths at the event, to communityteam@sega.com!

The first people in the door went straight for the Sonic Generations game kiosks, which I suppose isn’t really a surprise. There were a lot of happy faces as people played Green Hill Zone as both Classic and Modern Sonic over and over again.

Club Nokia is actually a concert venue, so there was a huge stage on one side, and this swanky bar on the other side. The lights changed color with the music, and really gave a great feel to the place.

We had lots of swag available for the event, including these great Sonic Generations pins.

As we showed you earlier, we also had these great t-shirts for everyone. I’ve seen a couple people wearing them on the E3 show floor today!

We had lots of stuff to do at the event, including some fun photo/video booths! These seemed to be super popular, and we can’t wait to see all your photos! (Remember, send them to communityteam@sega.com!)

One of the other cool things we made were these Sonic Generations coasters for the bar. There were two versions — both had the Sonic Generations logo on one side, and half had Classic Sonic (seen here) and the other had Modern Sonic.

After an hour or so of playing, it was time to get the stage show started. This is a backstage photo of Iizuka-san, Naka-san, and Senoue-san chatting just before they went up to the stage.

Aaron Webber (better known to some of you as RubyEclipse), Assistant Brand Manager for Sonic the Hedgehog, was our host for the evening. He brought Iizuka-san on stage to address the fans and talk about Sonic Generations.

Soon it was time for our first musical performance, Crush 40. We knew a lot of fans wanted to see them perform, and this is one of the little secrets we held back from you. They were really great, and the it was cool to see many people dancing and singing along. After they performed, we had the winners of Sonic’s 19th Birthday video contest perform their winning entry, “Needlemouse: The Musical”, live on stage.

We also had a best-dressed fan competition to highlight the awesome and dedicated fans that came to the event dressed in costume. There’s some amazing work that goes into these costumes and we always love to see them!

In between stage events, we had Gregory, a well-known street artist in LA, come and make this graffiti piece live on stage.

Toward the end of the event, Naka-san came back on stage along with Sonic’s 20th anniversary cake and Sonic himself! The crowd sang Happy Birthday to Sonic, and then it was time for a special surprise. We recorded everyone at the event saying “Happy Birthday Sonic” in unison, and that will appear in Sonic Generations. All of the fans who attended the event will get their voices in the game!

As the event ended, I walked backstage to get a behind-the-scenes view. Iizuka-san said a few words, Gregory presented his artwork to Naka-san, and the entire crowd did the old SEGA start-up sound to end the night in true SEGA style.

We’ve got these photos and more on our Flickr set, and will be adding more soon! Send your photos to communityteam@sega.com!

Thanks again to everyone who attended! We had an amazing time, and hope you did too.

Renegade Ops is on the E3 floor and the response has been great. Developed by Avalanche Studios, the game features some incredibly satisfying action and excitement in a top down vehicular combat game. Most are surprised that the game is a digital title, as the visuals are crisp, the action is high, and the game runs at a clean framerate.

With up to 4 player co-operative play and a range of different characters and abilities – the demo is a blast to play (ok, yes, pun intended). With a few characters to choose from, my personal favorite is the vehicle with an area of effect EMP blast. It stuns enemy fire within a range and helps friends rush in and take them out. Alternatively you can have special abilities that feature an airstrike, a heavy gun for increased damage, or a damage shield.

It’s pretty fun to work alongside your friends to take out the enemies, but the game also features a full leaderboard system so it’s not all nice and friendly play! The competitive side of the game is all in how effective you are in dispatching enemies. All in all it’s a fun ride that quickly results in some trash talk amongst the big explosions.

We love the game and we’re also up for Best Shooter of show, so we’re not the only ones who think so! Thanks to everyone who came out to play Renegade Ops!