The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise definitely holds a legendary status among gamers. It has been around longer than some of us, and is certainly more popular too. But what’s next for the speedster in blue? According to the recently published Licensing Sourcebook Europe, quite a lot, actually. The publisher promises new Sonic games, digital content, events, and more in 2021.
Additionally, next year marks the 30-year anniversary for the franchise, and Sega holds some impressive statistics to boast. Aside from the astounding success of the Sonic the Hedgehog movie earlier this year, the franchise has sold over 920 million games since it debuted in 1991. That’s over $6 billion USD to date, so there are clear reasons for Sega to keep it going.
Unfortunately, we don’t have much else to go on at this point. It’s clear Sega wants to collect more golden rings in more ways though. We know that a sequel for the Sonic film is planned for 2022, which will be produced by Paramount Studios. It’s also likely that Sega will bring Sonic games to more audiences in 2021, so PC versions seem like a reasonably safe bet. So many classic titles are available on Steam now, it would be a bit strange for Sega not to. The only exception would be if the publisher decided to focus on the mobile market. The ad does say “games” though, so we will see in due time. We’re certainly overdue for another Sonic Adventure.
New ventures from classic creators
Speaking of Sonic the Hedgehog, there’s an entirely new franchise coming from the original creators of the Sonic. Balan Wonderworld is a very trippy and polished looking game that falls into the same category as Sonic Adventure. This is the point where I’d normally say here, chew on this in the meantime. However, Balan Wonderworld is due for a Spring 2021 release. That may come during or before similar Sonic projects, but the new franchise looks amazing to be honest. It’s certainly worth checking out, and who said that a new Sonic-style adventure was a bad thing?
