Sonic Mania originally launched back in 2017, and by all accounts, was a massive success for Sega and the larger Sonic franchise. Not only did the game finally bring back the classic 2D style of play that the original Sonic the Hedgehog games first established back in the 1990s, but Sonic Mania on its own stood as one of the most well-received Sonic titles ever made. As such, a number of fans assumed that Sega and developer Evening Star Studios, which is comprised of developers that primarily worked on the game, would end up releasing a follow-up at some point in the future. Unfortunately, according to new information that has been divulged by a well-connected source, it seems like Sonic Mania 2 instead might never end up coming about.ย
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In a recent blogย by a video game industry insider that goes by the name Zippo, it was said that Sega had scrapped plans for a Sonic Mania sequel internally in the years since the first game’s release. Zippo explained that the reason for this seems to have been due to a clash of some sort between Sega and Evening Star Studios. The blog in question didn’t get into too many specifics about what happened here, but it did state that Sega of America was the division of Sega that proved to be the problem. Zippo claimed that Sega of America management was “extremely unreasonable”, leading to a “break up” between the publisher and Evening Star.ย
Within the past month, Evening Star has gone on to revealย that it is now working on a wholly original “3D action platformer”, which all but confirms that the studio likely isn’t making Sonic Mania 2 at this point in time. And while we might never know all of the specifics about what happened between those at Sega and Evening Star, it’s absolutely a bummer that the two entities seemingly won’t be working together again on the highly-requested sequel.
What do you think about potentially never seeing a sequel to Sonic Mania come about? Do you think Sega should try to rectify this situation and find a way to collaborate with Evening Star once again? Let me know your thoughts and reaction either down in the comments or on Twitter at @MooreMan12.
