Sega wants Sonic to become bigger than Mario

by Danny Craig  · 
Sega wants Sonic to become bigger than Mario
Sega

Sega executive Osamu Ohashi has stated that the company's goal is to grow Sonic's popularity to the point where he is more well-known around the world than Nintendo's Mario.

The details:

  • In a new interview for Sega's recruitment site, Ohashi, a longtime company executive, revealed that one of the company's goals is for Sonic to surpass Mario's popularity. “Simply put, we want to surpass Mario,” Ohashi said. “Sonic is a game that was originally developed to compete with Mario, and it still hasn’t achieved that goal. Because we respect Mario, our goal is to catch up and surpass him.”

  • Even though Sonic still has a dedicated fanbase, a string of poorly received titles and Sega's decline in popularity has resulted in the blue hedgehog falling levels below Nintendo's mascot in comparison to the 1990s. The classic feud between Sega and Nintendo is still one of the industry's most well-known, with both companies making fun of each other in various marketing campaigns.

  • Mario and Sonic have seen success in a variety of mediums in recent years, including animated films, with Sonic the Hedgehog 2 grossing $405 million at the box office, while the Super Mario Bros. Movie quickly became the highest-grossing video game adaptation, grossing $1.3 billion worldwide. The Mario franchise is also the primary theme of the Super Nintendo World areas in Universal's theme parks, with Ohashi stating that Sega also hopes to have a Sonic-themed area in the parks.

  • It's unlikely that Sega's dream will ever come true, as even though Sega appeared to be ahead in terms of game sales, claiming that Sonic had "sold" 1.5 billion units, compared to Mario's 832 million, it was later discovered that it had counted free-to-play downloads of its games.

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