Summer of Sonic '09 was a shock to me. Why? Because it was far beyond my expectations. It was almost a little overwhelming that such an event for Sonic the Hedgehog could exist. Arriving at Liverpool Street at about 10:30am a bunch of Sonic fans were waiting up near the exit calling over anyone they could find who had Sonic related things on them (I was wearing that white Secret Rings shirt I showed you a while back).
This is when it started, before half the people sat down to draw together.
So many Sonic fans in one place is pretty surreal. Getting there at about 11 there was a big queue already waiting at the door of the Truman Brewery (well, part of it, It's a big old place that's quite often used for collage shows). Once it opened the queue was very speedily sorted out, it split up inside for people who reserved tickets and those who didn't. Not really sure what difference that made, but there were plenty of those art books to go around. The artbook is the same size and shape as a mega Drive manual and has a small collection of assorted artwork from both old and new games. It's very nice, especially for a freebie.
Even the DJ had dyed blue hair and Sonic ears! What kind of alternate dimension is this?
The stage screening one of the many fan animations.
There was little touches like this everywhere. Neat.The huge room had various areas dedicated to games, artwork, merchandise and comics, as well as a stage with a DJ playing every Sonic song you can think of, even scraping the bottom of the barrel with Right said Fred's Wonderman (which had a Pirate Sega themed music video) and SuperSonic dance Attack! On the stage they had events every hour or so including two performances by some guy Bentley Jones (don't ask me) who sang a lot of things in Japanese for some reason, and got a few laughs when he sand 'My name is Sonic'.
Two of the few cosplayers that were about (the Robotnik is a mate of mine). take a wild guess which one won a Xbox 360 for their costume.They also had competitions for a fan art (and there was a LOT of people at tables drawing for most of the day), cosplay and a quiz show type thing, all of which won various Sega bits and pieces and consoles for the top winners in some cases. A couple of times they also screened fan animations that got a lot of laughs too. maybe I should cook something up if I get time by next year's event. Apparently this venue is a lot bigger than last years event which I missed, and while it was busy it was never overcrowded to the point where you couldn't move (manily because so many were sitting down drawing).
Whoever that is playing Dynamite Headdy (and pretty far into it): you are awesome.
People weren't allowed to video footage of All-Star racing, but I presume photos are ok, not that I got a good one or anything.
The gaming area had a row of Xbox-360's running a Ultimate Mega Drive Collection as well as some of the newer games like Unleashed and Superstars Tennis. Two guys from Sumo Digital were there with a Playstation 3 running a recent build of Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing, and there was a Wii and DS in the corner set up to Mario & Sonic at the Winter Olympics. I didn't get time to play any of these because every time I got in the queue for a few minutes something would happen up on the stage and if I had to choose playing a game that will eventually be out and a one off event I'll pick the one off.
I did however give the Sumo Digital guys Steve Lycett and Travis Ryan this doodle I did on the train journey there that they had a good laugh about. We had a quick chat about anal fanboys and growing up with Sega games. I did watch others play in two player, though. A lot of people were picking Alex kidd, good on 'em He's spacial attack is jumping into his old helicopter! When the Q&A session asked the audience who they'd like to see in the game, I suggested Opa Opa. Who wouldn't want to drop 16 ton weights on characters' heads?
The merchandise cabinet. I'll have a whole article about it's contents later.I have a few articles planned to write up over the next day or two about the event, including hopefully some videos I took, and of course lots and lots of photos!
