The
Sonic the Hedgehog series is a franchise of video games released by Sega starring and named after its mascot character
Sonic the Hedgehog. The series began in 1991 with the release of
Sonic the Hedgehog on the
Sega Mega Drive/Genesis, in addition to an 8-bit version of the game for the
Master System and
Game Gear formats. Sonic was responsible for turning Sega into a leading video game company during the
16-bit era, and his first game soon replaced
Altered Beast as the default pack-in game for the Mega Drive/Genesis in North America and Europe. As of March 2007, the franchise has sold more than 45 million copies of its individual games.
The Sega division responsible for the first game in the series was called Sonic Team, and the group has since developed many titles in the franchise. Prominent members of its initial staff included programmer Yuji Naka, designer Naoto Ohshima and game planner Hirokazu Yasuhara. Other developers of Sonic games have included Sega Technical Institute, Dimps, BioWare, and Traveller's Tales.
