Franchise: Sonic The Hedgehog

Quik & Silva features many plagiarized characters as duplicated enemies, including characters from Nebulus, Bubble Bobble, Contra, and The Great Giana Sisters. Among these characters is Sonic the Hedgehog, whose first title had not released at that point, technically making it Sonic's first appearance in a home console video game, even if unauthorized and predated by the arcade game Rad Mobile.

Throughout 2023, Sonic Channel released a monthly series of wallpapers titled "Otherworld Comedy", each one featuring a what-if scenario involving an established character from the Sonic series, alongside another chosen by the community. The stories are comedic in nature, having unlikely scenarios involving the cast of characters.

Notably, the April wallpaper (centered around Silver the Hedgehog), "Story Act 4: In the Veil of Darkness", featured Princess Elise as the chosen character. This not only marks her first appearance in mainstream Sonic media since her cameo in Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity, but is also the first work she played an active role in since her debut in Sonic the Hedgehog (2006). A cutscene in the latter game, called "The Talisman", is referenced in the story when Silver gives Elise the blue Chaos Emerald, calling it a "lucky charm". Additionally, Elise herself received a slight redesign for her appearance here, being depicted in a more cartoon-esque style rather than the realistic design she had in her debut game.

In issue 21 of IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog comic book, two characters on page 20 resemble Marinette Dupain-Cheng and Adrien Agreste, the main protagonists of the animated series "Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Car Noir". These characters would later appear again in "Sonic the Hedgehog Annual 2020" on page 7, itself a reference to the events of this issue.

Prior to doing official work on the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise as one of its writers/artists, Evan Stanley worked on a fan comic called "Ghosts of the Future" based on the series. Set in an alternate reality where Sonic and his friends are defeated by Dr. Eggman with the aid of a mind-controlled Shadow, the comic featured Silver the Hedgehog as the main character, tasked with restoring the seven Chaos Emeralds that were removed from time as a last resort. After being brought on to do official work on the franchise, the fan comic has been referenced on two occasions in official Sonic comics. The first was in issue 257 of Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comic, which featured cameos from Richard and Deborah Erin (Silver's parents in the comic) during the scene where Rotor is directing rescue operations outside Twinkle Park (note that they are slightly recolored in this scene). The second time was in issue 64 of IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog comic, which featured cameos from Vanice the Hedgehog and Sicily the Hedgehog (Silver's sisters in the comic) during the scene where Silver and Whisper are trying to confront Duo.

This fan game is a direct adaptation of "Sonic.exe", a creepypasta story originally written by JC-the-Hyena, a user on the Creepypasta Wiki, about a cursed CD-ROM version of the first Sonic the Hedgehog game. The story is notorious for its malicious depiction of Sonic, giving him black eyeballs with glowing red pupils, and became popular partly through a genuine appreciation of the story's content and scariness, and from those mocking the extremely amateur, cliched and poor quality of its writing, which later led to it being removed from the Creepypasta Wiki. Sonic.exe received two lesser-known sequels, a rebooted story in 2017, many unofficial games based off of it, as well as other tributes and parodies. JC-the-Hyena would later resign from authoring new Sonic.exe projects after multiple allegations of pedophilic and predatory behavior surfaced in 2021, with the story's fan communities taking control of it since.

The story became so popular and attached to the wider Sonic the Hedgehog franchise that the series' official Twitter account has referenced the story on two separate occasions. The first was on January 13, 2017, where they posted a video of Sonic standing in Green Hill Zone as a black recolor of Big the Cat passes him by, changing him and the environment to something more akin to what is depicted in the story. The second was on April 14, 2021, where they posted an image of a pile of Game Gear Sonic titles, with Sonic.EXE being hidden within the pile.

In the early 2010s, Pop, a British TV channel that syndicated DIC's Sonic the Hedgehog cartoons, had the fanmade game Sonic on Clouds avaliable on its website.

Due to the cancellation of the animated series "Sonic Underground", its storyline was left unresolved. However, staff members involved in Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comics had considered finishing the storyline: writer Ian Flynn had thought about writing a new story that could serve to wrap up where the original series left off, but felt it would be "stepping on the original creatives' toes," and that even if he was allowed to do it the story likely wouldn't see the light of day for at least two years. Originally, "Sonic Universe" issue 50 was intended to be the official epilogue for the show, with a preview cover being released. However, the epilogue was cancelled, and the issue instead featured a story centered around Metal Sonic.

In early 2013, Ian Flynn revealed that material from "Sonic Underground" was off-limits: this was the reason why the epilogue was put on hold. He also stated plans to include the epilogue as part of "Lost Hedgehog Tales", a written document featuring Sonic comic material that will no longer be used, suggesting that the epilogue was no longer possible. In June 2017, any chance of a "Sonic Underground" epilogue by Archie was precluded when Sega announced that the comics produced by them had been cancelled.

The Sega Genesis' YM2612 sound chip is directly based on the Yamaha DX7, an FM digital synthesizer introduced in 1983 which became ubiquitous throughout popular music of the 1980s. These shared elements motivated composer Tom Holkenborg to use his own collection of vintage Yamaha FM synthesizers when writing the soundtrack for the 2020 film Sonic the Hedgehog. According to him, he aimed to translate the "noisy and harsh" sound of the 1991 game into certain parts of the film score with these synthesizers, while complementing more emotional scenes with orchestral pieces.

Sonic was originally planned to have a human girlfriend called Madonna, whose design was directly based on the sexually provocative American pop singer of the same name. In line with this, character designer Naoto Ohshima designed Madonna to be attractive and to chase Sonic around (similar to how Amy Rose acts in later games), which he described as a "male fantasy". Aside from concept art, Madonna's only known appearance was in a 1990 tech demo for the TeraDrive, a Japan-exclusive IBM PC with a Sega Mega Drive integrated into it. There are two separate claims as to why Madonna was removed. Programmer Yuji Naka originally claimed in 1993 that Madonna's planned role was to be a damsel-in-distress, with Sonic needing to save her, and that she was ultimately dropped because the team wanted to move the series in a different, more orthodox direction to set it apart from Mario. However in 2009, Sega of America product manager Madeline Schroeder claimed to be the one who removed her as part of an overall effort to "soften" Sonic's image for younger audiences and foreign countries under the belief that Madonna was too Japan-esque. In 2015, Madonna would be reimagined by comic book writer Ian Flynn and appear in Archie Comics' Sonic the Hedgehog comic book series, having been redesigned to be an agent of G.U.N.'s C.L.I.P. division named "Madonna Garnet".

According to writer Ian Flynn, while money does in fact exist within the series, Sega has issued notes to him and other writers on the series mandating that it is not supposed to be discussed or alluded to by the characters. There are exceptions to this as certain characters' motivations are tied to making money, such as the Chaotix Detective Agency and their rent problems, or Jet's hunt for treasure in Sonic Riders.

Sonic's favorite food is chili dogs. This trait was first introduced in the 1993 animated series "Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog" and was later officially incorporated into the video game series starting with Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood. Before the first appearance of the chili dog in the series however, Sonic's enjoyment of hot dogs in general was first established in Issue #5 of "Sonic the Comic", in a scene where Sonic is seen ready to eat three hundred hot dogs as a part of his breakfast. Since then, the chili dog has been established as Sonic's favorite food in almost every piece of Sonic media (for context, the only show to not reference chili dogs was "Sonic X", and even then a normal hot dog appeared in the episode "How to Catch a Hedgehog" during a scene where Sonic is stuck running in a giant hamster wheel), eventually making its way into the games as well, a rare example of something originating from the cartoons/comics being carried over into the mainline games.

To promote the release of the 2024 film "Sonic the Hedgehog 3", Paramount released a promotional Sega Genesis cartridge that was not only fully functional, but also included a cheat code that revealed the release date for the film's final trailer. The cartridge included three main features: "Characters" (a series of character posters that played a voice clip from said character when interacted with), "Posters" (a collection of posters used to promote the film), and "Unlock" (which starts a minigame where Sonic is chased by Shadow down an endless highway that the player cannot win or lose at). By entering the level select code from Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (up, up, down, down, up, up, up, up), Sonic will say "Hey, I said no cheat codes! ...Okay, just this one." before booting the player back to the main menu. A fourth option, "Trailer?", is unlocked, which revealed the release date for the final trailer as November 25, 2024, before booting the player back to the main menu once again.

Naoto Ohshima's first character design for Dr. Robotnik/Dr. Eggman was a fat, mustachioed man in pajamas. According to Yuji Naka, Ohshima made him rotund as part of their overall design philosophy to "create something easy enough so that kids would be able to draw the characters." While many have noted that this early design bears a resemblance to former United States president Theodore Roosevelt, Ohshima denied that he was meant to be based on Roosevelt in 2018, and believed the design was subconsciously influenced by a variety of characters he had seen before. Some have theorized that his inspiration was taken from a recurring character design seen in some works by animation director Hayao Miyazaki, including an episode of the 1979 anime series "Lupin the 3rd Part 2" (which Ohshima is a professed fan of), the 1986 film "Castle in the Sky", and later in the 2003 film "Spirited Away".

Tails' real name, Miles Prower, is a pun on "miles per hour", a reference to Sonic's speed. According to the character's creator Yasushi Yamaguchi, the pun "Prower" was used instead of just "power" because it felt "too forceful".

Prior to the release of Sonic the Hedgehog 3, the design of the Chaos Emeralds was inconsistent between each game, switching between color, shape and gemstone cut, and amount. From Sonic the Hedgehog 3 onwards, they would be finalized to be seven emeralds with the appearance of a brilliant cut diamond; due to the cut used, this would technically make them "Chaos Diamonds".

In Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comics, the G.U.N. Commander (who was unnamed in the games) was given the name "Abraham Tower". According to writer Ian Flynn, the reason he was given a name was because he "didn't want to be trapped by calling him 'Commander' or 'sir' every stinkin' time". The name (originally used by a character from a fan-made comic that Flynn never finished) was meant to evoke an idea of authoritative power: "Abraham", whether in regards to the biblical figure or the U.S. historical figure, lends itself to the notion of an influential leader, and "Tower" was in reference to how he was "tall, rigid, standing over all others". Although the name was exclusively used in the Archie comics, it would later be made canon to the game continuity when it was used for the character in the webseries "Sonic X Shadow Generations: Dark Beginnings", which was also written by Flynn.

In the continuity of Fleetway's Sonic the Hedgehog comics (known as "Sonic the Comic"), Dr. Robotnik was originally a kind human scientist named "Ovi Kintobor", who wished to rid Mobius of all evil using a device called the Retro-Orbital Chaos Compressor (or "ROCC" for short) to absorb all the negative energy on the planet, eventually using the six Chaos Emeralds as a vessel for the energy (Issue #181 would reveal that this was because the Drakon Empire had used them in the past to contain an experimental energy source known as "chaos"). However, six emeralds was not enough: he also needed the seventh Grey Emerald to stabilize the process. During this time, he met and befriended Sonic the Hedgehog, who used his impressive speed to help Kintobor in his search for the Grey Emerald, albeit to no avail (Issue #36 would reveal this was because the Grey Emerald was on the Floating Island with Knuckles). Kintobor would also run experiments on Sonic to test his speed, which eventually lead to him gaining his iconic blue form.

The day after this (according to Issue #71), when Kintobor went to go make them some food, he could only find a six month old rotten egg in the fridge. While going to add salt to the egg, he tripped on a cable and slammed his head against the ROCC's control panel, causing it to explode. Both Kintobor and the egg were bathed in chaos energy, transforming him into Ivo Robotnik, the main antagonist of the comic, and revealing that Sonic was responsible for "Creating the most vicious dictator on Mobius". All of this is revealed in Issue #8 of the comic.

Issue #71 revealed that the accident was actually caused by a time-travelling Sonic, who both placed the rotten egg in the fridge and pulled the cables loose. This was done to save the future from the Brotherhood of Metallix, who could only be stopped by Robotnik. Additionally, Issue #26 revealed that the explosion had somehow "burned" Kintobor's brainwaves onto one of the Golden Rings from which the ROCC had been built: it would later be used to construct the Kintobor Computer, an important part of the Freedom Fighters' resistance to Robotnik's rule.

In "Sonic the Comic, issue #8, The Origins Of Sonic," Sonic was originally a normal, brown, and very spiky hedgehog. He had met Dr. Ivo Robotnik (known at the time as Dr. Ovi Kintobor) by finding his lab, and they had become friends. Dr. Kintobor performed experiments on Sonic's super speed, which helped him to run even faster, and with the aid of the Power Sneakers Dr Kintobor invented, it allowed him to run so fast that he broke the sound barrier, turning him into a more familiar blue form.

In 2008, the series was awarded the Guinness World Record for the "longest-running comic series based on a video game". Archie Comics' run of Sonic the Hedgehog lasted from 1992 to 2016, resulting in the publication of 290 issues (including specials) over the course of 24 years.

According to Bug! executive producer David Warhol, developer Realtime Associates was at one point contracted by Sega of America to create a Sonic the Hedgehog game as a launch title for the Sega Saturn. However, shortly after Realtime Associates agreed on a contract, Sega of Japan denied them permission to use the IP. Realtime Associates instead continued with the project as a new IP, Bug!, based on a cancelled project for the Sega Genesis.