Happy Birthday, Sonic the Hedgehog

Sonic debuted in 1991 as SEGA's answer to Mario, and today is his 24th birthday. The longest surviving Mario rival to date, Sonic and Mario were once vicious rivals, each the mascot for their respective console. After SEGA was forced to bow out of the console arena, Sonic and Mario have been on friendlier terms, competing in the Olympics and presumably bonding over the fact they're the last surviving console mascots.

Sonic has had a life of ups and downs. He lead SEGA's charge against Nintendo's monopoly on the video game market, was tied to the King of Pop, has the world record for longest running comic book based on a video game (and it's still going strong), was the first video game character to become a float in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, has had several TV series, and remains one of the most recognizable icons in gaming today.

There are plenty of downs too though. Sonic didn't make the jump to 3D as gracefully as his mustachioed rival. Sonic Adventure was exciting when it first released, no one will ever forget the Killer Whale scene, but it was always buggy and did not age well. Each subsequent Sonic release continued a downward trend that bottomed out with Sonic 06.

SEGA has made great strides in rehabilitating Sonic's image. Yes Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric was a broken game that should never have been released, but the TV show has been a well deserved success. Sonic has also adjusted to the mobile market quite well, just recently announcing 100 million downloads. Last, but not least, Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice was announced for Nintendo 3DS. Without the shenanigans surrounding the development of its predecessors, it just might be a good game.

Happy 24th birthday Sonic, we're glad to see things are looking up for you again.