Sonic Goes 3D and Escorts the Dreamcast to Gamers in Sonic Adventure - Today in History - September 9th, 1999

triverse (66)in #retrogaming • 6 years ago

Sonic is quite an enigma as far as company/console mascots go. Starting life on the Sega Genesis and hitting every Sega console ever released with at least one game, Sonic only lead one console at launch- the Sega Dreamcast. Sonic Adventure was also a unique title in the Sonic series since it wa the first fully 3D adventure for Sega's blue hedgehog. The mainstays are all here, Doctor Eggman (Robotnik for us old schoolers in the crowd), Tails and more that were new to the series made their first appearances here. The speed the Sonic games were known for was, mostly, kept in tact with the transition to 3D.

Originally intended to be a Sega Saturn title, Sonic Adventure was the showcase Sega Dreamcast game (did Sega know about Soul Calibur?). I remember downloading gameplay videos from the GameGo! guys (former Gamefan staff) and seeing Sonic Adventure in action for the first time- my jaw dropped. There was no way this was the actual game, but it was.

Sega knew what they were doing by having Sonic Adventure as a launch title. Sonic Adventure was alone as far as this genre at launch (and for a good while afterwards). Just like their launch of the Genesis, Sega had a good mix of original and arcade ports available on day one. This helped Sega set records, for the time, on revenue brought in on day one sales and set the record for most titles at launch for a console.

Play the snow level and try to not have your jaw drop. Sega showed that Sonic was more than just speeding through a level with Sonic Adventure.

Sonic saw a sequel called Sonic Adventure 2 on Dreamcast but other than that, there were few original Sonic games on the Dreamcast. Ports have appeared on other platforms such as Windows, Gamecube and Xbox Live and the Playstation Network.

Happy birthday to the first fully 3D Sonic game.