35 Years Later, Sonic the Hedgehog's Impact on Gaming Goes Far Beyond Speed

It honestly doesn't feel like Sonic the Hedgehog should already be 35 years old, but here we are. The original game launched all the way back in 1991, and while plenty of franchises from that era have either disappeared or become something we only hear from every few years, Sonic has somehow managed to stick around through just about every major change the industry has gone through. He's gone from 2D to 3D, survived SEGA leaving the console business, experimented with several different styles of gameplay, and eventually became a movie star on top of everything else. There are even kids growing up with Sonic right now who probably met him through the movies before they ever touched one of his games, which is pretty wild when you think about where all of this started.