The detailed design of Sonic was aimed to be something that could be easily drawn by children and be familiar, as well as exhibit a 'cool' attitude, representative of the United States at the time. On return to Japan, Ohshima pitched this to the department, and the hedgehog was ultimately selected as the new mascot.

Ohshima felt that people selected it because it 'transcends race and gender and things like that'. Harinezumi ), led this informal poll, followed by Eggman and the dog character. Naoto Ohshima took some of these internal designs with him on a trip to New York City and sought feedback by asking random passersby at Central Park their opinions of the designs, the spiky teal hedgehog, initially codenamed 'Mr. Many results came forth from their experiments with character design, including an armadillo, a dog, a Theodore Roosevelt look-alike in pajamas (who would later be the basis of Doctor Eggman's design), and a rabbit (who would use its extendable ears to collect objects, an aspect later incorporated in Ristar). While Sega was seeking a flagship series to compete with Nintendo's Mario series, several character designs were submitted by its research and development department. Origins and history Sonic's character designer Naoto Ohshima (left) with level designer Hirokazu Yasuhara at the 2018 Game Developers Conference. His series had sold more than 80 million copies by 2011. Sonic is one of the world's best-known video game characters and a gaming icon. Sonic was redesigned by Yuji Uekawa for Sonic Adventure (1998), with a more mature look designed to appeal to older players. Ohshima designed Sonic to provide Sega with a mascot to rival Nintendo's flagship character Mario and used the character to flesh out a prototype programmed by Naka. Sonic made a cameo appearance in the arcade game Rad Mobile (1990) before making his full debut in Sonic the Hedgehog, released for the Sega Genesis in 1991. He races through levels, collecting power-up rings and avoiding obstacles, as he seeks to defeat the mad scientist Doctor Eggman. The title character of Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog video game franchise, Sonic is an anthropomorphic blue hedgehog who can run at supersonic speeds and curl into a ball to attack enemies. Sonic the Hedgehog is a fictional character created by Naoto Ohshima and Yuji Naka. Sam Vincent ( Sonic Underground singing voice).Paula Arundell ( Sonic Live in Sydney).Jaleel White ( Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic Underground).

Sonic 1 title sprites