There was a time when Sonic was able to compete with Mario, both in terms of game quality, popularity and commercial success. But those days seem to be over. Taking a look at the sales of games and consoles in Japan for the week of October 16 to 22, 2023, we see that SEGA’s blue hedgehog is only a shadow of itself. According to figures given by Famitsu magazine, 4,128 copies of Sonic Superstars were sold in one week on Japanese soil, all platforms combined. This shows the sadness of these figures when we know that Super Mario Wonder sold 638,634 over the same period. It must be said that SEGA was super confident in launching its game the same week as the release of its direct competitor Mario, knowing that a certain Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 was dragging its webs not far away either. The PlayStation game also sold 77,348 copies in one week in Japan, which is obviously a relatively low score compared to American sales. Still, Sonic Superstars is off to a fairly disastrous start for SEGA, which had sold 26,067 copies of Sonic Frontiers over the same operating period. Would Sonic still be bankable in his country of origin? Nothing is less sure…