Well, this is unexpected! Following on from yesterday's touching trailer accompanying the announcement of a 30th anniversary Sonic stream to be broadcast tomorrow, it seems that the character's erstwhile voice actor (in the games, that is) is returning to lend his vocal talents to the hedgehog's upcoming game projects.
That Roger Craig Smith is slipping the red sneakers back on might come as something of a surprise considering he only announced his departure from the series back in January this year. The performer has a sizeable list of video game credits and seemingly no shortage of job offers, but his retirement here came after a decade of voicing everyone's favourite blue video game character (yeah, take that, Mega Man!) and some fans were taken aback by the news.
Having provided the VO for yesterday's trailer (seriously, if you haven't watched it yet and you've got the slightest sliver of nostalgia for Sega's speedy mascot, prepare to be hit squarely in the feels), the voice actor broke the news of his surprise return on Twitter with a picture of a broken blue heart all sewn back together and mended:
The reason for his original departure was never officially confirmed, and he had reached out to fans thanking them for their support. There were rumours that Sega was in talks with Sonic's voice actor from the Dreamcast era about a potential return, although it would seem that that's off the cards now. Unless we're looking at some timey-wimey metaverse meeting of all the Sonics, perhaps?...
Let's not get ahead of ourselves! We'll surely get answers tomorrow as to what Sega has in store for the fastest thing alive — be sure to check out the stream and watch along live with us tomorrow at 9am PT / 12pm ET / 5pm BST / 6pm CET.
So did his replacement not work out or something? Was this the plan all along? Let us know below how you feel about RCS' unexpected return as Sonic.
[source twitter.com]
Comments 34
Guess who's back. Back again.
Craig is back. Tell a friend.
In the words of Roger, "No copyright law in the universe is gonna stop me"
Good for you Roger and long live the sonic revival, apart from the films!
@Pacmanrace It's more like, "Looks like I renewed my contract."
**sigh**
Glancing through the headlines, y'all got my hopes up that Jaleel White was coming back.
This other news is still fine, I suppose.
I was kinda looking forward to hearing a new Sonic voice to kick off a new generation. But that said, Roger carries the Sonic role pretty well, so good for him~
(And please, PLEASE, don't let this be a sign that we're exclusively sticking to a post-Colors tone shift...)
Yes happy to have you back.
Just give him a better scipt. I like his voice work with what little chance he has to shine.
Lame PR stunt.
I was actually looking forward to a new Sonic VA.
The voice in the sonic adventure games was my favourite sonic voice
@Bibi that’s great. But I still want a new adventure era just for Roger.
So it was a PR stunt?
@Marioracer
They try as hard as they can to make Sonic uncool, every other line of his in TSR sounds like a bad dadjoke, they want to make him wise cracking like Spider-Man but you can’t do that with D grade comedy writing skills and it’s made even worse when it’s being delivered by a guy in his mid 40s.
yeah definitely a stunt to stir up talk about sonic
talk about lame
I was really expecting him to be gone for good! If it was true, Max Mittleman would've been perfect for the role (he voiced Ryuji in Persona 5 and Filbo in Bugsnax! Look up his persona voice clips, he sounds perfect for sonic)!
Cool, I love Roger as Sonic so glad he's back but...why was his departure even announced at all if he was just going to return not even half a year later? What's going on over at Sega?
I'm used to RC, so that's cool.
All I want from that Sonic stream is Sonic Adventure 2 on Switch, don't care if its a straight port of the GC version, the XBLA one, or a full remake. Just SA2 on Switch.
RCS is a big faker and does the worst Sonic voice, and voices the worst iteration of the character.
I wanted Griffith back. Much disappoint. Thanks SEGA.
@Jackpaza0508 Now I want to hear Sonic constantly saying, "For real?!?"
Very unexpected but welcome news. I've always liked Roger's take on Sonic, in spite of the iffy writing of more recent Sonic games (which is hopefully going to improve considering that Pontac and Graff are out of the picture)
I just realized Roger Craig Smith was also Chris Redfield... What a world.
"Unless we're looking at some timey-wimey metaverse meeting of all the Sonics, perhaps?..."
Ah, man, why do I want this now?
Why bring our hopes up just to smash them down SEGA?
so I haven't actually played any Sonic games since '06, but I think it's great that this guy is back on as Sonic. I think his rendition is solid.
Feels either like a PR stunt as everyone mentioned, or just crappy and slow decision-making from Sega. Either way, I welcome him back.
Ryan Drummond >>>
And this is not up for debate. 🙅🏽♂️
I was hoping for Jaleel!
@ModdedInkling @NikHogan @ALinkttPresent No, I think this was real, and related to the Netflix series. That's going to have a different cast due to it being made in Canada, and the contracts for the current Sonic game cast were up so it seemed likely that they were going to be replaced for the games ala Sonic X, and so the cast decided to announce they leaving of their own accord because that's better than being dumped, but later they worked things out. They had to reaudition.
A big clue is that when Mike Pollock reauditioned and got the Eggman role again, his statement said to expect to hear his voice in future Sonic games. Just games. Tails's voice actress said the same thing, she succesfully got the role back after reauditioning, but clarified she won't be involved with the Netflix show.
I would have been okay with another actor, especially Drummond, but Roger I also love. Even if this was a PR stunt, I'm glad he's still here.
@AlienX Not his fault his iteration is written poorly.
why am I so happy? This man's voice is iconic, please never leave the role of Sonic!
Dang I read the title and immediately thought of Ryan Drummond
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