Originally wrote this up in the Mania thread (in light of Mania's recent performance on the eShop charts), but decided to move it here, since I think these sales charts suit this thread topic more. Just for fun, I went through Nintendo Everything to look at their backlog of eShop charts (which goes all the way back to June 2011 for the 3DS). From that I decided to hash together a list of how long other Sonic releases have coasted on the eShop weekly charts (original 3DS releases only, not counting re-releases on the Virtual Console. Though I will say this: Triple Trouble occasionally resurfaced at the bottom of the charts after years of absence for some odd reason, last showing up in summer 2016. The 8-bit GG version of Sonic 1 also resurfaced a few times, but it didn't have as much staying power.). Designations of the game's platform (3DS/Wii U/Switch) included. Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed (Wii U). eShop run: 21 consecutive weeks / five consecutive months. Debuted on 11/30/12 at #5 (first Wii U eShop weekly chart!), ended consecutive run / last charted on 4/22/13 at #16. Sonic Lost World (Wii U/3DS). - Wii U eShop run: Three consecutive weeks. Debuted on 11/4/13 at #6, ended consecutive run / last charted on 11/18/13 at #12. - 3DS eShop run: Two consecutive weeks. Debuted on 11/4/13 at #17, ended consecutive run / last charted on the following week, 11/13/13, at #13. 3D Sonic the Hedgehog (3DS). eShop run: Five consecutive weeks / one month; 14 weeks total. Debuted on 12/11/13 at #6, ended consecutive run on 1/6/14 at #18 (5 weeks). Reappeared at the end of January 2014 for one week, in July 2015 for 2 weeks, in November through December that same year for 4 weeks; and re-appeared August 2016, July 2017, and November 2017, one week each. Last charted on 11/15/17 at #3. Mario and Sonic at the Sochi 2014 Olympic Games (Wii U). eShop run: Appeared only once twice in the charts. Debuted on 11/18/13 at #19, last charted on 2/17/14 at #16. Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric (Wii U). eShop run: Appeared only once in the charts, on 11/26/14 at #17. Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal (3DS). eShop run: Never appeared on the charts. 3D Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (3DS). eShop run: Five consecutive weeks, 18 total weeks. Debuted on 10/14/15 at #2, ended consecutive run at 11/9/15 #8. It then appeared for only week across three weeks from mid November to early December, and stayed on for six more consecutive weeks. It re-appeared in late July / early August 2016, in late November / early December that same year, late June / early July 2017, and mid-October that same year; two weeks each for all four re-appearances. Last charted on 10/18/17 at #11. Mario and Sonic at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games (Wii U/3DS). - 3DS eShop run: Never appeared on the charts. - Wii U eShop run: Nine consecutive weeks / two consecutive months. Debuted on 7/1/16 at #17, ended consecutive run / last charted on 8/26/16 at #18. Sonic Boom: Fire & Ice (3DS). eShop run: Never appeared on the charts. Sonic Mania (Switch). eShop run: 25 consecutive weeks / (roughly) six consecutive months. First appeared on 8/17/17 at #1. Ended consecutive run / last charted on 2/2/18 at #16. Sonic Forces (Switch). eShop run: Three consecutive weeks. Debuted on 11/10/17 at #6, ended consecutive run / last charted on 11/24/17 at #18. So to rank the weekly total eShop appearances for Sonic games altogether... 1. Mania - 25 weeks 2. All-Stars Racing Transformed (Wii U) - 21 weeks 3. 3D Sonic 2 - 18 weeks 4. 3D Sonic 1 - 14 weeks 5. Rio 2016 (Wii U) - 9 weeks 6. Lost World (Wii U) - 3 weeks 6. Forces - 3 weeks 8. Lost World (3DS) - 2 weeks 9. Sochi 2014 - 2 weeks 10. Rise of Lyric - 1 week X. Boom: Shattered Crystal; Rio 3DS; Boom: Fire & Ice N/A: London 2012 (3DS); Generations 3DS; All-Stars Racing Transformed (3DS). Seems Sega only started digitally releasing Sonic games on the eShop on their launch day with Lost World. Reportedly some of these games got digital releases after the fact for certain territories, according to the Retro wiki. Bonus fact: The trailers for Lost World and Mario & Sonic Rio 2016 lasted longer on the charts (in the Videos category) than any version of both games (in the Software category), Lost World trailers were still showing up as late as early April 2014, while Rio 2016 was showing up as late as last month, December 2017). Feb. 2018 EDIT: Updated with Mania's original run having ended, also added sales data to Sochi 2014 I missed, among other edits.
23 weeks for Sonic Mania in the charts with the game still selling insanely well and only 3 weeks for Forces? Excellent post Yeow and yeah this pretty much confirms for definite or at least provides strong and compelling evidence that Mania annihilated Forces in terms of sales. Deservedly so given the relative quality of each of the games. Hope the sales response ensures a sequel.
I like DF, a lot, but this video highlights John's gross bias as a journalist. This video is literally "Generations was great. Forces was bad. Here's a mod. It runs great on older hardware. Forces sucked." No technical analysis or even discussion as to how it can manage to look so good and run so well on weaker machines.
It's an opinion, not really "bias" per se. They did cover Sonic Forces when it came out. Not quite sure what the point of the video was though - "you can play a non-recent game on non-recent hardware". I prefer DF Retro
Hey again, guys. This week I decided to make a video showcasing most (if not all) instances of unused lines/scenes/dialogues from SA1 and SA2 that ended up being reused for Sonic X's adaptations of those games' plots. There's some stuff in here I didn't mention (like Perfect Chaos having a barrier that one of Tikal's unused hints reference & the whole story with two capsules in SA2 which was probably derived from the SA2 Perfect Guide), but I think these are the most obvious examples. I'm fairly sure the anime actually uses a lot more unused ideas from those games than we think, but we have to wait for more prototype builds/materials to surface in order to confirm that first. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nk3qwDzK02M[/youtube]
Came across this June 1st, 1993 archived article hosted by Wired: "The Next Level: Sega's Plans for World Domination". In it, it has this bit about Sonic 2's sales: I think it's the only printed / article source available online that gives sales for a Genesis-era Sonic game shortly after its release. (Though I believe the Sonic the Hedgehog: GameTap Retrospective video did say that prior to Sega bundling Sonic 1 with the Genesis for the holiday season, it had already sold a million copies. I should rewatch to confirm.) And in that regard, Sonic 2 selling 4.5 million units in just seven months doesn't sound too bad in that regard. It's certainly far better than the numbers Sonic games have pushed since then.
I've seen Sonic 2 numbers before. Consult our magazine archives - it'll be there somewhere. It's a difficult number to relate to though - Sonic 2 was among the first games to be released worldwide on the same day, and was publicised far more than most games of the era. It's not like Call of Duty where similar budgets are put to the test every year. i.e. it can tell you Sonic 2 was successful, but not that other games weren't.
Here's your time to shine, Retro. Do we have a source that confirms that the second-to-last boss in Sonic 2 is called "Silver Sonic"? Our wiki says "Mecha Sonic" - which one is right (or are they both wrong?) Note: if no answer is found the only valid title for the wiki page will be "Death Egg Zone boss 1" or something of that nature.
The reason that Silver Sonic is used as a name is simply because it's a confirmed name in the Game Gear/Master System Sonic 2 so it made sense to people to call it that on the Genesis as well. Even the Archie comics went with that name when they first adapted the Sonic 2 story in the "Sonic Quest" Miniseries. On the other hand, people started saying it was Sonic 3's Mecha Sonic simply because of the move set. I don't think that was ever confirmed though.
It concerns me that piece of concept art isn't on our wiki. Not quite as concerning as our Mecha Sonic page which manages to cover half a dozen different bosses and really needs to die quite quickly I think. Don't make me introduce a big fat [citation needed] template
Sonic 2 Game Gear/Master System JP manual: Mecha Sonic NA manual: Silver Sonic EU manual: Silver Sonic Sonic 2 Mega Drive JP Official Guide Book: Mecha Sonic Sonic Jam Official Guide: Mecha Sonic (also written in English as "Mechanical Sonic") JP Sonic Mega Collection guide book: Mecha Sonic 2016 Famitsu Interview*: Mecha Sonic Sonic & Knuckles Sonic Jam Official Guide: Mecha Sonic JP Sonic Mega Collection guide book: Mecha Sonic Interestingly, the Sky Sanctuary Zone section of the Sonic Jam guide outright states that it's the 2nd generation of Mecha Sonic. It also confirms that Knuckles' story in S3&K takes place after Sonic's and that Egg Robo is Mecha Sonic's subordinate. (Weirdly though, the entire S&K section of the guide calls the Master Emerald the Super Emerald.) -- Whilst we're on the subject. Here's how the final Sonic 2 boss is referred to: JP Official Guide Book: Death Egg Sonic Jam Official Guide: Robo Eggman (also written in English as "Robot Eggman", or ROBOT EGG MAN if we're being pedantic) JP Sonic Mega Collection guide book: Death Egg JP Sonic Generations version: Death Egg Robo (written in English as "Death Egg Robot") -- I own the Sonic 2 and Jam guides. Unfortunately, I don't have access to a scanner, but I'll upload a few snapshots of the relevant pages either tomorrow or later in the week. The Sonic Jam guide generally doesn't have boss names in it - it'll just say BOSS EGG MAN. The Sonic 2 Death Egg Zone bosses are the exceptions, and the S&K Mecha Sonic is named frequently in captions and such. The JP Sonic 2, Sonic 3 and Sonic Mega Collection guides are where we got most of the boss names from. The boss names in the S2 and S3 guides match up with the boss names in the SMC guide, from what I recall. -- To throw a spanner in the works, the S2MD and S&K Sonic robots both show up in Lego Dimensions, which never got a Japanese release. The S2MD robot is called "Robo Sonic" and the S&K robot is called "Mecha Sonic". Video. *Has anyone properly translated this Famitsu interview? It has a lot of interesting stuff in it!
