Reminder: Those coming to Summer of Sonic MUST register otherwise you are likely to be turned away!!! New guest Nigel Kitching (Sonic The Comic) has been confirmed. Those coming to Summer of Sonic MUST register otherwise you are likely to be turned away!!! Repeating helps mental retention.

After everything with Unleashed/Sonic World Adventure it turns out that the game WILL be called Sonic World Adventure in Japan after all.  Hey, I was told it was going to be Unleashed in Japan, but the new Japanese game website shows the SWA logo. (It’s still different to the one I mentioned before). Oh well people can change their minds can’t they? NO that doesn’t mean we’d consider removing the werehog.

The Sonic movie rumour has been doing the rounds again. Guys. Seriously….

And finally from the Summer of Sonic website:

I pity the poor soul who has to make all sixty-ish of them! -_-*

Have a good weekend!

As we near the event the website blog has truly begun - updates and events will be confirmed over the next couple of weeks as we are still finalising some items.  The site has also received a minor makeover with the official logo and supporting artwork (courtesy of His Royal Wongness, Darkspeeds).

Check it out at http://www.summerofsonic.com.

I have a headache.

Admittedly this is not really news but its a very head pounding experience setting up a convention when you’ve not done such before.  Anyway I’ve had lots of feedback recently on everything, and various questions/points have come up that need to be answered.

Q: “How much does it cost to get in?” / “I’m going to attend!”
A: The event is free to enter, however you must, must, MUST sign up and state your intention of coming on the Summer of Sonic website.  If you do not you may well find you are not allowed in due to the great demand on the hall - websites and press peeps need to do this as well! You will have to pass through a “checkpoint” where we’ll be checking you on the list - you’ll also (whilst stocks last) be receiving some goodies as well as a raffle ticket. More on this soon.

“…SEGA has organised…”
No. SoS is a concept not of SEGA’s but of the fans, SEGA are backing the fans and showing support by partly bankrolling/organising this event I say partly because the fans involved in the event themselves have invested their own monies into this in order to hire the hall, misc systems, etc.  Remember SoS was happening with or without our (SEGA’s) involvement!  Its got a lot of help from SEGA admittedly but there are a lot of fans out there bending over backwards to make it a success for everyone else and they deserve acknowledgement.  Because as you all know Sonic fans are THE BEST.

Q: “In which case why do you have a headache then?”
A: Because if you say the organisation of the event is a third Sonic Stadium, a third Sonic Wrecks and a third SEGA then two thirds of that is me! -_-*

Q: “When should I/we turn up?”
A: The numbers attending is expected to be large, so if you all turn up at once and stay for the whole thing we might have a problem.  Things won’t really start kicking into gear for at least an hour after the doors open anyway.  Once you get in we will mark you so you can leave and come back a bit later if you want to go off into town and get some lunch.

Q: “Ah yes lunch…”
A: There will be a selection of food available, but it won’t be a full scale banquet.  It’ll be lots of snack and nibbly bits.  If there isn’t a cheese and pineapple hedgehog I’ll be officially upset, considering.  A ready supply of soft drinks will be available.

Q: “Will I be able to show people just how good an artist I am / how much I OWN at game X?”
A: There will be contests in gaming and art, we’re inviting people to bring along fanart and we’ll have a mass wall of the stuff at the back of the hall in the Art section.  The art contest on the day will be to draw a subject matter within a strict time limit.  The best one will win a prize!

Q: “Will the prizes be good?”
A: Is Shadow a bit angsty?

Q: “If I need to ask someone for details at the event, who do I ask?”
A: “It should be pretty clear who’s doing what… however at the individual sections there will be at least someone around acting like the centre of attention. You can be sure by looking at the back of their hand as it will have been branded with the Sonic City logo by myself and/or Dreadknux.  This is someone you can trust to help out or who will be able to point you in the direction of someone who will be able to answer your questions.

Q: “Will I be able to play Sonic Unleashed at SoS??!?!”
A: Unlikely.

Q: “Is Richard Jacques coming?”
A: Alas, no.

Keep checking http://www.summerofsonic.com for details, more details should be going up soon.  We’ll probably do a supporting podcast at some point and we can go through all the sections and whats happening.  If you have any further questions, leave a comment on this blog and I’ll answer them next week.

Until the next blog - whatever that may be!

AAUK

Sonic is 17 today - huzzah! As such much will be going on across the interwebs, which I will put up here as and when I get it.

First thing I want to advertise is the Summer of Sonic - the very first full fledged Sonic convention (or SoniCon) which is something I have a rather distinct hand in being as it is a sort of joint organising venture between The Sonic Stadium, Sonic Wrecks and SEGA. If you are a big Sonic fan and want to meet other such fans the event is in London on AUGUST 9TH.

We’ve got people coming from as far away as Australia and America already and a vast array of fans all ready to decent on the hall in question. There’s going to be interactive displays, games contests, prizes and much much more. Special Sonicy guests are rumoured to be possibly making an appearance including Sonic and who knows if you turn up you MIGHT just get the chance to play a certain game that’s won’t be released for nearly two months after SoS! That and the odd World Exclusive, y’know, just saying…

The full program is still to be finalised, but if you are interested you will need to check out http://www.summerofsonic.com/ for full details and to register your intention of coming - if you do not you may not be let in by security!

Phastasy Star Universe time now, you may recall that the other year PSU had a Sonic event on his birthday with complimentary massive statue and Sonic and Tails mooching around the lobby for you to interact with. A similar event is happening today so check out http://www.phantasystaruniverse.com/community_events.php?item=20080619a

You may have missed the most recent Sonic Unleashed trailer, which also revealed the final logo. You can check this out below:

SEGASonic Radio bring three days of special birthday celebratory livecasts to an end tonight at 8PM BST.

The Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhoodwebsite is scheduled to launch very soon - keep an eye - beady stylee - out for it.

Are you signed up to SEGA Pass and the SEGA Newsletter? No?

Why not!? You get the chance to enter groovy competitions that more often than not give you the chance to win cool Sonic based prizes!

An example for this was the February newsletter which had a Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity contest; well the office Chao has again made the random draw once more- after complaining a lot and constantly bothering Martin The Fat Ninja and The Big Cheese with demands to play with its jack-in-the-box…. AGAIN.

 The winners are:

Helen Greenwood, Blackpool
Mary Volkering, Essex
Edward Plager, Seaford
Neil Kelly, Ellesmere Port
and Ninja_x from Parts Unknown (atm!)

They’ll be receiving a SRZG t-shirt as well as a very snazzy black SRZG beanie.

Mr. Jones rang me up the other day about the Play.Com LIVE event at Wembley Stadium which is happening this weekend.  Apparently if you are going to the event Bentley will be wandering around, most likely at the SEGA section as I told him there would be rather lovely looking ladies around the Football Manager LIVE area.  He’ll be easy to spot as he’s got that very vibrant red hair and he’ll be holding up a sign saying “I’m Bentley Jones!”

Not really, but it sounds good.

Sonic Wrecks/Radio Redux fans of mine are free to quiz him over his thoughts on the Wrecks Factor results. Poor Dreadknux… *snigger*

Alas atm I won’t be going in either a SEGA or fan capacity but if I do get there and you see me feel free to say hello.

There was due to be, yesterday, a Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity (out Feb 22nd on PS2 and Wii) community day but it had to be aborted alas.  Still a couple of the guys were going to meet up ay our regular community haunt the Euston Flyer so I naturally decided it was prudent to leave work early and meet them.

Now, those of you in the know will be aware my birthday on Saturday didn’t exactly go to plan, actually that’s rather an understatement, so imagine my surprise when I entered to find “a couple of the guys” was actually pretty much a full turn out.  The get together was actually a surprise birthday party for me, wool kept over my eyes with the aid of Dave K and a certain Ninja.

I had presents, a smashing card and a cake. A CAKE! Hopefully Rory will have a picture of it somewhere, it was a crafted by Mrs T-Bird and featured an iced Shadow on top (it was also delicious FYI). 

I was rather taken aback by all this stuff done just for me, so I took the opportunity to tell them the prize for the Mario & Sonic 100m sprint challenge. The winner of the Wii table will get a large skyscraper style poster of Sonic & The Secret Rings signed by Ogawa-san.  The winner of the DS table a Sonic Heroes t-shirt… signed by Yuji Naka!

All of a sudden DSes were being removed from jackets and bags and other hidey-holes and people started desperately trying to improve their DS times.  Some with more success than others if truth be told.  Now I know some of you are saying “yeah yeah, I’ve gone sooo much faster I can take them any time” but perhaps you’d like to prove it?

Send in your video clips on YouTube and general M&S related fun to blogs@sega-europe.com remember. What are you waiting for??

The result of all this was that we have a new leader! I’ve even been knocked down to third (we’ll see about that…), Sonic Yoda used Shadow and managed to clock a time of 9.417 moving up from eighth to top the table, Mike Taylor also made a massive improvement whilst Roareye Black finally gave up on Waluigi and joined the Sonic club posting a much improved time.

New tables are below:

DS SPRINT TABLE
[1] Sonic Yoda (Shadow) - 9.417
[2] Sonic Cage Dome: Mike Taylor (Sonic) - 9.438
[3] ArchangelUK (Sonic) - 9.448
[4] Shadow Urtheart (Sonic) - 9.455
[5] T-Bird (Sonic) - 9.628
[6] Sonic Stadium: Dreadknux (Sonic) - 9.654
[7] Sonic Spriters Network: Roareye Black (Sonic) - 9.789
[8] Sonic Spriters Network: Violet (Sonic) - 9.861
[9] Diogo (Sonic) - 9.886
[10] Fastfeet Media: Foreversonic (Shadow) - 9.891
[11] Emerald Coast: Vger (Shadow) - 10.010
[12] SEGA Sonic Radio: Roarey Raccoon (Sonic) - 10.100

 WII SPRINT TABLE
[1] ArchangelUK (Shadow) - 9.400

…and all through the office, not a creature was stirring - except AAUK.

Yes, I’m here in SEGAAUK HQ on my own. *Sniff* Everyone else has gone home for Christmas except me, who is still here because I’ve organised something verrrry nice for you.  If you go to Sonic City (as in now) you will find two Christmas presents from SEGA and myself.

First off, Sonic FM has gained three new tracks, two of which are from Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity, including the main theme ”Un-gravitify” by Cashell.

The second surprise is that Richard Jacques himself has written something for you, the first in a series of Composer Blogs for us on his work with SEGA Superstars Tennis - specifically the main theme of said game, and oh btw - WORLD EXCLUSIVE: YOU CAN NOW HEAR IT ON SONIC FM TOO!

Sorry for shouting, but WORLD EXCLUSIVE!  Yes, this doesn’t appear anywhere else on the web to my knowledge, so a proper Sonic City first. I told you to keep an eye on us didn’t I?

Now, this is the last blog of 2007 from me at least, so please put all comments relating to the tracks, Richard Jacques article and anything else you want in here and I’ll approve them when I can.

We’ve also got our new Facebook group you might want to join as well as the SEGA Christmas Newsletter competition you might have noticed if you received it.  If not, for the chance to win a Sonic X goody pack and a limited edition Sonic statuette answer the following question  - “What is the name of Santa’s reindeer in chief?”

Send in your answer to blogs@sega-europe.com (the usual Terms & Conditions apply), and we’ll announce the winner when we get back in the New Year as well as the winners of the Blognik “Interference” code contest for the Sonic Rivals 2 t-shirts.

Well that’s it guys, I’m off - Merry Christmas to you all from all of us here at SEGA, see you in 2008.

ArchangelUK

Are you entertained by our crazy misadventures over on these here blogs? Well tremble in fear for our craziness has spread to Facebook.  It had to happen really didn’t it?

Join our group here: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=19581119416

I thought you might be interested in a few tidbits of info that have flown past we weren’t able to report on in full…

Bioware have confirmed once and for all (”But…” “ONCE AND FOR ALL!”) that Sonic RPG is still in development, the title was under a cloud of confusion following parent company Pandemic’s acquisition by Electronic Arts. However, on a recent podcast they answered a fan question by saying that yes, the title is still under development. You can find it listed under the games section of their navigation system under “Sonic DS” confusingly.

Major Sonic fan awards the SSA (Sonic Site Awards) have been and gone, leaving behind a host of excitement and shattered dreams. Awards were voted on by Sonic fans and awarded by The Sonic Stadium on a variety of subjects, winners included Sonic Style who won best site whilst there was a tie between two of the major sites for the Elite award Sonic Cage Dome and Sonic Wrecks *cough*. The main winners however were forum NoMoreBlue who strolled off with a hat-trick of awards.

The boys from WiiDS.co.uk asked me for an interview the other day to discuss Mario & Sonic, the plans for the Blognik, future community days, etc. You can check it out (should you wish) right here.

Finally the Smash Bros. Dojo revealed one of Sonic’s taunt moves for the Nintendo game - in it Sonic revs up in a similar style to his Dash move from Sonic CD before yelling at his opponent “Too slow!” ah, that Sonic and his crazy antics…