When Will Sega Accept That Sonic Is Never Going To Be More Popular Than Mario?

Suddenly, I’m standing on the blacktop at recess outside my middle school, a cool September breeze rustling my spiky Bart Simpson haircut and purple and neon green Body Glove windbreaker. It’s 1992. I’m 9 years old, and this chump from some other class is in my face trying shouting at me about how Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is just sooooo superior to Super Mario World because it has Blast Processing. Blast Processing! The commercials said it, so it must be better, right? I smugly grin back, knowing I’m on the right side of the console wars and don’t need fancy buzzwords to convince anyone of Mario’s superiority.

Suddenly, I’m sitting in front of a computer monitor in my study. I’m 41 and wearing a sweater, because natural gas is expensive, and I’m brushing Cheez-It crumbs off said sweater, because I am a slob. I’m looking up article topics that I could write about on DualShockers. I come across an interview on Sega’s official Japanese website. In it, Sega’s executive studio officer, Osamu Ohashi, says he wants Sonic to be bigger than Mario.

And you know, I really thought we were past this.

An Endless Rivalry

It’s a tale as old as time, just like in that Disney movie that came out around the same time as Blast Processing. Mario vs. Sonic. Nintendo vs. Sega. We all know who won that last war—it’s not like we’re being flooded with rumors about the Genesis 5 (Deuteronomy?)—but I thought this hatchet had pretty much been buried for good. I mean, if a spiky pseudo-rodent and a chubby Italian plumber have been doing gymnastic floor routines and playing pingpong together at the Olympics since 2007, you’d think we were in more than just a console ceasefire, right?

Apparently not, since Ohashi seems fiercely dedicated to supporting the blue team underdog, like an ever-competitive Vegeta from Dragon Ball Z striving to be the prince of all ’90s video game mascots, even three decades after the clock’s seemingly run out. “To put it simply, I want to surpass Mario,” he says in a translated snippet of the interview. “Sonic is a game that was originally developed to compete with Mario, and that has yet to be achieved. Because we respect Mario, it’s our goal to catch up and overtake him.”

Oh, you poor, sweet man. To be fair, Ohashi’s not new to this song and dance. In fact, he’s been with Sega since 1993, so by now, he undoubtedly knows all the steps by heart. Honestly, I admire his determination. Sonic’s already a well-recognized, worldwide brand name, and as Ohashi points out in the interview, about 95 percent of Sonic’s sales have been outside of Japan, so it’s not exactly like the series has been struggling to find its base over the past three decades plus. VGSales lists the franchise as having $12 billion in lifetime sales (including merch) and moving more than 1.5 billion units of software (including free downloads), which is a laurel most of us would probably rest on pretty comfortably. Not Ohashi, though; that guy’s got gumption.

It’s Hollywood, Baby!

Of course, it’s not just games that make the money anymore. As the runaway success of the Five Nights at Freddy’s movie has recently shown, gamers are now more than willing to shell out the bucks for a two-hour cinematic they can’t interact with, and that movie’s riding on the coattails (heh, Tails) of big-screen blockbusters starring both Mario and Sonic (though not at the same time; this ain’t the Olympics).

According to BoxOfficeMojo, the first Sonic movie (from 2020) has grossed more than $319 million worldwide, with the 2022 sequel coming in even bigger, exceeding $405 million. Each of those films set a new record for highest-grossing video game adaptation in North America, with Sonic 2 breaking the record set by the first Sonic movie. Again, those are major accomplishments.

“Sonic is a game that was originally developed to compete with Mario, and that has yet to be achieved. Because we respect Mario, it’s our goal to catch up and overtake him.” – Osamu Ohashi

And then this past summer, The Super Mario Bros. Movie came out and blew those numbers out of the water, grossing more than $1.36 billion worldwide. The plumber strikes again. Can we just let Ohashi and the rest of Sega be happy for a few years? Please?

Okay, you know what? I may be on Team Mario, but I’m starting to see why Ohashi has this chip on his shoulder. But at least he’s being a good sport about it. “I want people to play like Mario all over the world, including Japan, and I want movies to be more successful than Mario,” he says in the interview.

Maybe that’s the big takeaway here. It’s silly to laugh at Sega’s 2nd division for not being Nintendo. I’ve never created a character that’s moved 1.5 billion video games. Have you? And what’s more, Ohashi continuing a footrace with mustachioed one—even if it’s a footrace in which he’s been eating Mario’s dust since before that first Mario movie—is something to be admired. Just gotta go fast if you want to catch up. Just gotta go fast.