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SEGA Sonic Cosmo Fighter's english version found and dumped online

SEGASonic Cosmo Fighter, a 1993 Sonic Arcade space shooter title, was always a topic of interest between some Sonic fans due to its' extremely limited Japan-only run in the 90s. An official english version has been recently released and dumped online.

Found by Twitter user Iamamazing100 around June 2021, the english version of the game recently got its ROM dumped, although while there's still no way to play it through the well known MAME emulator at the moment, some fans have already made some discoveries.

Found by FrideyNehgGuy, the dialogue for the game in english features never heard before voices for Sonic and Dr. Robotnik. With Sonic sporting a deeper than usual voice.

The fact that an english version for this game was originally planned is a huge find for fans everywhere, and it'll be another landmark for those interested in preserving Sonic the Hedgehog history.

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A Brief overview of the world’s first Sonic Plush

…or, at least what’s rumored to be the first!

Legend has it that part of Yuji Naka and Naoto Oshima’s original pitch for Sonic the Hedgehog included a “small plush toy”, indicative of what was to come. No doubt a clever way to show off the versatility of the character and the potential for merchandise in the event that the series took off. This has been recorded in a number of places- books, interviews, you name it. The mythical plush has never exactly been revealed outright.

So, what does this have to do with this little guy?

Naoto Oshima posted these images along with a few others on his Facebook page in 2017. It isn’t outright confirmed, but we have substantial evidence to believe that this is The One! He’s a unique “product”, unlike any release we’ve ever seen. No Sonic plush of the era was anywhere near this level of quality. Come on. He’s Standing! And just look at him! This thing is gorgeous! Either this is a super old custom that’s been under wraps for 30 years, or we have a prototype on our hands. I’d be willing to believe the latter. Oshima himself confirmed the plush is from 1990. He was probably even designed before Sonic was finalized: check out the three back spikes!

And for those curious, he’s wearing a Tiger Electronics Sonic watch. Not “plush created before Sonic was even greenlit” special, but a pretty cool little gadget!

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My bad, everyone! I must’ve slipped into a warp ring back there. I hope we aren’t too far behind schedule. As far as I’m aware, it’s only been fifteen minutes since my last post!

No matter. What better third game for me to summarize than Triple Trouble?

Sonic the Hedgehog: Triple Trouble is a platformer developed by Aspect and published onto the Game Gear by SEGA, released in Japan on November 11th 1994. It’s the successor and intentional sequel to Sonic Chaos, which I probably should’ve covered first… This game brings a few firsts to this blog! The most important thing, obviously, is that this game has three primary antagonists: Nack the Weasel (later renamed to Fang the Sniper), Dr. Robotnik, and Knuckles the Echidna. Second of all, Tails’ introduction makes this the first game we’ve covered with two playable characters! We follow Sonic and Tails on their journey to gather all six chaos emeralds before Dr. Robotnik & company find them. Early Sonic media tends to confuse itself with how many chaos emeralds there are supposed to be... There are six in the first Genesis title, seven in the second, but most Game Gear titles are back to six. This game marks the first appearance of recurring character Nack the Weasel and the first appearance of Knuckles on a handheld game! Triple Trouble would be regarded as the best of the Game Gear titles by fans, garnering a warmer reception some time after release than at launch.

As a bonus, here are some sketches by Greg Martin that would be repurposed for the game’s box art! Riveting!

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The next game I'm going to cover is Sonic Triple Trouble, but I'd like to say a few things that wouldn't fit in a post going over information about the game.

First I'd like to talk about the American Box Art. WOW. I'm a big unapologetic fan of American Sonic and I think the Mobian characters look great here! Sonic's looking rad as ever, Knuckles is the perfect amount of "slightly off-model", and Fang is a new enticing character altogether! This cover does a great job of showing off the three antagonists of the game. This being said, what the HECK is going on with Robotnik?

Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog's Robotnik design being used in box art is pretty common to this era, but what did they do to his EYES? It looks like they combined black-eyed cartoon Robotnik with a weird attempt to give him eye whites. I know he's the villain and all, but this is terrifying!!!! Oh, well. The game itself looks promising. The Knuckles sprite is a little bit pink which I appreciate. It's a good look on him!

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Waku Waku Sonic Patrol Car (Also known as Hedgehog Sonic the Police Officer) is a children’s arcade game from 1991. It is very similar to SEGASonic Cosmo Fighter in the sense that it’s played inside a plastic tilting vehicle. Although the game was released in both English and Japanese, it never left Japan. 

The game is primarily controlled using a steering wheel, which tilts the cabinet in sync with Sonic’s police car in-game. There are buttons to jump out of the car and hit Robotnik, start the game, and activate the siren. This game is slightly less obscure than SEGASonic Cosmo Fighter due to it’s...interesting story!

Sonic the Hedgehog, known speedster who disrespects authority, plays the role of a cop! He starts the game by explaining his role as an officer and jumping into his car to patrol the streets. Eventually, Robotnik appears to shove cars off the road and the player must peruse him. Sonic avoids projectiles while spindashing into his enemy until defeating him. 

Funnily enough, Waku Waku was referenced in issue #288 of Archie Sonic! This game also has the same Sonic and Robotnik voice actors as SEGASonic Cosmo Fighter (Takeshi Kusao as Sonic and Masaharu Sato as Robotnik)!

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SEGASonic Cosmo Fighter Galaxy Patrol (Also known as SEGASonic Cosmo Fighter) is a Japan-exclusive arcade game from 1993. It’s a single-player children’s shoot ‘em up that’s played in a plastic spaceship rather than the typical arcade cabinet. 

The player must insert 100 yen to play. Sonic explains that he must save his animal buddies from Robotnik as usual. Gameplay wise, Cosmo Fighter isn’t anything special! It takes place in space, Sonic being in a spaceship and shooting projectiles at Robotnik and obstacles to earn stars. There are two buttons. Both the joystick and a lever labeled “SPEED UP” tilt the entire ship. 

If the player manages to deal enough damage to Robotnik, he enters a green pod with mechanical arms. Sonic must destroy the arms to defeat Robotnik and save his animal friends. After beating the game, Sonic tells the player that the mission was a success and peace has been restored in space. 

This is allegedly the only photo of the controls that exists! Here you can clearly see the two buttons, joystick, and lever mentioned above. I couldn’t find much fun trivia about this game, but Robotnik does say “damn”!