Now that new Sega West president Mike Hayes is in place, we here at Sonic Retro must say we’re immediately pleased with his work. Pulling a Marty McFly on us, clearly Hayes went back in time to alter a 1991 issue of French magazine Club Sega to get us exclusive shots of Sega’s upcoming 2010 console!

Too bad these kids forgot to mention in their drawings that it would be invisible.

An expert at putting his foot in his mouth and insulting his company’s biggest fanbase, SEGA of America President and Co-Owner, Simon Jeffery, has packed his bags at SEGA. Jeffery will become an executive at iPhone developer and publisher “ngmoco,” a company founded last year by a former EA executive, Neil Young.

Jeffery has made it well known that he loves the iPhone. While the move might seem idiotic on the surface for a president of SEGA to move into another role at a smaller company, the move is likely a simple pursuit of interests. Whatever might have sparked Jeffery’s departure from SEGA, I know that some people are having a party regardless.

Jeffery will lead ngmoco’s Plus+ (redundant, much?) publishing group, “which integrates social networking and cross-promotional options into games.”

[via Kotaku]

After six months, Sega releases the final downloadable content pack for Sonic Unleashed, a new dual level contact pack for Empire City and Adabat, now available on Xbox Live for the price of 250 MS Points and on the PlayStation Store for $3.00, marking the first time both systems have gotten a content pack simultaneously.

Like the Apotos and Shamar Adventure Pack, this takes two continents and mixes them together into one pack. The pack adds five new day time levels and four new night time levels between both continent’s level arrays, with Adabat garnering three new daytime stages and two new night time stages and Empire City taking the other two day time and two night time stages. 20GB hard drive owners who’ve been following these releases should take note on how much more space can be squeezed from the hard drive, as this pack comes weighing in at 525MB.

For discussion about Sonic Unleashed, follow the link.

Sega announced Sonic and friends are getting back behind the wheel for some fast-paced kart racing craziness.

Sega of Europe unveiled the title today through their Sonic City Blognik in what can be considered a spiritual sequel to the two Sonic Drift titles on Game Gear. The title features characters from the Sonic franchise such as Sonic, Tails, Amy and Dr. Robotnik along with other Sega All-Stars like AiAi and Amigo as well as other unannounced competitors speeding for the finish line in a racer aiming to give Mario Kart a serious run for its money. Characters can utilize cars, planes and motorbikes around the tracks to offer different styles of racing.

“Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing is no ordinary racing game. Its huge variety of characters and vehicles, plus the ability to play both online and off set it apart from other games of this type” said Gary Knight, European Marketing Director of SEGA Europe Ltd. “The team have pushed the boundaries on what you would normally expect and created a different and unique party racing title whereby you really can’t take anything for granted!”

Characters have access to special moves called All-Star moves to gain edges in races, such as Super Sonic, Banana Blitz and Tails Tornado. Power ups and weapons can also be collected around the tracks and used against the opposition to ensure they don’t become a threat to that number one position. In addition to a single player mode, the title features a multiplayer mode as well, allowing up to four friends to race in split-screen action, or up to eight players to compete online.

By way of U.K. Resistance, Richard Jacques of Sonic R and Sonic 3D Blast fame is supposedly working on the music in this title. More on this as it becomes available.

The title is expected to come out on PS3, 360, Wii and DS in early 2010 and will likely be featured at Sega’s E3 booth in Los Angeles next week.

If you want to discuss the title, feel free to follow the forum post here.

Update: The pack is now available on the PlayStation Store for $3.00 as of June 6, 2009.

Continuing Sega’s release of downloadable content for Sonic Unleashed, a new dual level contact pack for Apotos and Shamar is now available on Xbox Live for the price of 250 MS Points.

Unlike the Adventure packs before, this takes two continents and mixes them together into one pack. The pack adds five new day time levels and four new night time levels between both continent’s level arrays, with Apotos garnering three new daytime stages and two new night time stages and Shamar taking the other two day time and two night time stages. 20GB hard drive owners who’ve been following these releases should begin taking extra precaution as this is the largest file yet, weighing in at 795MB.

This DLC pack has not been made available on the American PlayStation Network yet. However, it’s expected to be added to line up sometime today or next week.

For discussion about Sonic Unleashed, follow the link.

After several project leaders and restructuring attempts, the fan-game Project: Sonic Retro has been terminated by site staff.

The group had been given an ultimatum by forum administrators Tweaker and Scarred Sun to have a cohesive plan for the project as well as a new project leader by 10:00 a.m. CST on May 15 or face losing support from Sonic Retro.

The group had been given the ultimatum to have a plan for the project after weeks of no clear idea on where the project was moving after former project leader Chimpo left the group out of frustration. The group failed to provide such a plan by the deadline.

“Please note that any attempts to resurrect the project after this announcement will be stopped,” said Scarred Sun, “and any advertisement of an offsite version is prohibited.”

It is unclear as of now whether the project will be reaccepted if the team can restructure and create a playable demo of the proposed project.

For questions and forum discussion on Project: Sonic Retro’s cancellation, please follow the link

Update: The pack has hit the PSN store on May 7, 2009 for the price of $3.00. Thanks to synchronizer for the tip!

Continuing Sega’s release of downloadable content for Sonic Unleashed, a new level contact pack for Mazuri is now available on Xbox Live for the price of 250 MS Points.

Like the Adventure packs before, this adds four new day time levels and two new night time levels to Mazuri’s level array. 20GB hard drive owners who’ve been following these releases should begin taking extra precaution as this is another large file, weighing in at 611MB.

This DLC pack has not been made available on the American PlayStation Network yet. However, it’s expected to be added to the line up sometime next week.

For discussion about Sonic Unleashed, follow the link.

Six-year-old Christer was fed up with his name and sent a letter to Norway’s King requesting his name to be changed to Sonic X.

There’s a couple of things to explain before we continue with this bizarre story. Firstly, Christer wasn’t asking the King to change his name to Sonic X, though King Sonic X has a certain ring to it. Secondly, we’re not sure why Christer wanted the ‘X’ addition, since this was the simply title of the Japanese animé adaptation. Nevertheless…

Late last year Christer from Norway wrote a letter addressed to Norwegian King Harald V asking for his name to be officially changed to Sonic X, Norwegian newspaper and website dagbladet.no reports.

However, his parents were reluctant to send the letter. That is until months later Christer asked why they’d yet to post his heart felt request. The letter was sent and amazingly King Harald V replied.

Sadly, the King could not change Christer’s name, but not because the change would result in a child running around with a ridiculous video game character’s title. No, the request was rejected for the sole reason that at six-years-old, Christer was not old enough to make such a decision. Thus, the boy must contact King Harald V in twelve years time once he’s turned 18.

Christer admitted that he was disappointed, explaining that “it was a bit bad.”

(via gamezine.co.uk)

UPDATE: 4/23/09 – The Holoska Adventure Pack has also hit the PlayStation Store in an effort to help the PS3 catch up with the 360 DLC packs.

After a long and painful wait for American PS3 owners who glared at 360 owners for their plethora of bi-monthly DLC releases, two of the three currently released packs (Spagonia and Chun-Nan, in this case) have made their way onto the PlayStation Store. Both packs will cost $3.00 each and feature four daytime stages and two night time stages each.

Excerpt from Sony’s weekly press release after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

Adding to our growing record of soundtracks from across the series, the two Black Knight Soundtracks, Face to Faith and Tales of Knighthood can now be streamed, and downloaded from the Albums section in the Retro Wiki. To download to your hard drive, right-click and save target as the little icon next to the stream. Why not also check out all the other albums and lyrics available while you’re there?

Thanks go out to forum member Ashram for ripping, tagging and uploading the CDs.

If you truly enjoy the albums, please support the company by purchasing the albums at an imports site, such as Play-Asia or CDJapan, or through a service like iTunes. Though we may enjoy the series music much, purchasing the album will resonate more with Sega to show they’re still cranking out good tunes, game quality aside.

For discussion on Sonic and the Black Knight, check out the forums.