Category:Sonic Team

Sonic Team is a computer and video game developer established in 1988 originally known as Sega AM8. It is today established in #650-650 Townsend Street San Francisco, CA 94103-4908. In 1991 AM8 took their name from their phenomenally successful Sonic the Hedgehog series and became Sonic Team. They are one of Sega's most popular creative teams. Sonic Team was headed by the famed video game designer, producer, and visionary Yuji Naka. Under his leadership, Sonic Team has become a creative powerhouse in the video game industry creating some of the most popular games ever made before Sonic Adventure 2. The joint creator of Sonic, Naoto Oshima, left Sonic Team to form his own studio, Artoon. Recently on May 8, 2006, Naka left the group with ten other members of Sonic Team to establish an independent game developer, PROPE.

Sonic Team has also worked on a television series adaptation of one of their most popular games they've developed and the basis of the name for the development team, Sonic.

In 2003, United Game Artists (formerly Sega AM9) merged with Sonic Team. In 2004, Sonic Team once more became an internal division of Sega after being spun off as a second-party developer in 2000. Unlike most of the other divisions, Sonic Team still retains its internal structure and name.

Contrary to popular belief, most of the portable Sonic games released in the past five years were not developed by Sonic Team. Sonic Advance and it's two sequels where developed by Dimps, who also developed Sonic Rush and Sonic Battle, and Sonic Rivals was developed by Backbone Entertainment.

Sega Studio USA
Sega Studio USA was the United States division of Sonic Team located in San Francisco, California. The division was formed in 1999, when a group of Sonic Team decided to move to America to make international releases for a few games, and so that they could develop games to receive feedback from the Western Market. The division first worked on ChuChu Rocket! and Sonic Adventure's international release. In 2005, the division changed their official name to Sega Studio USA, for unknown reasons.