Sonic Rivals

Sonic Rivals is a 2006 action-racing video game developed by Backbone Entertainment and Sega Studio USA, and published by Sega for the PlayStation Portable (PSP); it is a game in the Sonic the Hedgehog series, and follows the heroes needing to stop Doctor Eggman Nega from turning everyone and the world into cards. The gameplay involves racing against other characters to get to the goal before them, as well as defeating the boss before the opponent does. Development on Sonic Rivals originated from a traditional platform game Backbone was developing, before Sonic series producer Takashi Iizuka stepped in and changed its direction, as well as deciding on the PSP as the system it would release on due to having greater processing power than the Nintendo DS; the developers also took inspiration from the Sega Genesis games, as well as other games up to Sonic Rush (2005) due to wanting to return to the 2D gameplay style. Sonic Rivals released in North America in November 2006, and other territories in December; it is one of the few games in the franchise not to see a release in Japan. Upon release, it was a commercial success, but received generally mixed reviews from critics, who praised the graphics and audio, while the gameplay drew mixed reactions for its controls, level design, and rubber banding. A sequel titled Sonic Rivals 2 was released in 2007 for the same system, and handled by the same developers.