Sonic appearance at old Toyland ride at Alton Towers!

The Sonic Spinball ride currently residing at Alton Towers here in England is not the first time Sonic has appeared in a ride at the theme park! As brought to my attention by Tracker on Tumblr, there was a ride called Toyland Tours which had a Sonic dedicated section! He posted this photo above and shared his fuzzy memories of the discovery from ten years ago:

Sonic was at Alton Towers BEFORE Sonic Spinball! The Willy Wonka ride used to be called ‘Toyland Tours,’ and in one part this charismatic animatronic of Classic Sonic showed up! Thankfully my mum caught it on camera-this photo is around 10 years old! *and it still sits beneath my desk, next to my Game Gear and MDII and with my Sonic comics*

Also the game in the background is Sonic CD, the Special Stages particularly. I thought it was SA2 when I first saw it, but that was effectively the only Sonic game I’d played! No idea what happened to the animatronic after the ride was converted, sadly.

We found more of this ride cameo, including more photos, a video and even music after the jump!

Sonic Spinball @ Alton Towers

So this weekend me, my parents and my girlfriend spent the weekend up at Alton Towers, where we stayed in one of the hotels in the park, went out for some lovely pub dinners in the local village and larked about in the park and water park. But this is Sega Memories so let's get straight to the point: the Sonic Spinball ride. It opened this year, as did a Sonic themed hotel room (we didn't stay in that) and we had a go on it. Impressions and photos of the ride and the general Sonic-ness added to the park after the jump!

Sonic Spinball @ Alton Towers in February

I'm sure many of you have probably already heard about this by now, but it couldn't be more appropriate to mention here, what with all our nostalgia fueled posts about London's old SegaWorld park and the reveal of Sega Republic in Dubai. While it's hardly the same as having a new Sega park here in the UK again, it's about as close as we're gonna get at this point: a Sonic Ride at Alton Towers!

New Sega Themepark under Construction ...in Dubai

We all know about Segas theme park ventures over the years, including the still running Joypolis in Japan, Gameworks in America and the no longer existing Sega World parks in London and Australia. Well it looks like Sega hasn't given up on building brand new parks as they are now construing one called "Sega Republic" in a huge Mall in Dubai, of all places. Sonic Retro has the info:

"SEGA Republic, is a two-level, 76,000 square feet indoor theme park, featuring a diverse line-up of rides and amusements. It will be the first of its kind in the region, and will serve as a benchmark for future SEGA indoor theme park developments across the Middle East and North Africa region and the Indian Subcontinent. With zones themed to reflect the experiences on offer, from the thrill of the ‘Speed Zone’, the active ‘Sports Zone’, the major rides and simulators, and huge redemption zone."

Concept art of the 'Sonic Hopper'

"SEGA Republic offers visitors of all ages the opportunity to discover the worlds they wish to explore through a variety of themed zones: Wild Adventure Zone, Speed Zone, Cyberpop Zone, Sports Zone and the Redemption Zone. Near the entry, is ‘Sonic Hopper’ (pictured) a drop tower offering thrills for all age groups in a family-free-fall experience. The ‘Wild Adventure’ zone includes motion simulated rides with an extreme adventure theme such as ‘Wild Wing’ that allows visitors to experience a dramatic aerial tour of the countryside or also explore nature up-close on ‘Wild Jungle’. SEGA Republic® also features ‘Spin Gear’, a full-scale indoor horizontal spinning-coaster offering several surprise twists and turns. In the Sports Zone, visitors can enjoy games and rides based on real-world sports, such as the signature attraction, ‘Halfpipe Canyon’."

"Another large attraction at the SEGA Republic is the ‘Redemption Zone’, a themed arcade and gaming zone, where tickets can be won and redeemed for a large range of merchandise. SEGA Republic at The Dubai Mall is a fully-themed indoor environment and will be one of the largest of its kind in the region. From the roller coaster, to the ride simulators, and arcade games, from its redemption activities to the physical sports games, SEGA Republic will thrill all its visitors."

Along with this info, photos of the park currently in construction can be seen over at this thread on Theme Park Review. One photo shows a Robotnik styled coaster cart. All this park needs now is some bottomless pits and they could call it "Eggman land".

No, really, Japan still likes Sega Pt. 1

Right, as one or two of you may recall, I did promise an article ages ago about my trip to Japan, specifically about Sega stuff there (because noone wants to know about the arduous cultural stuff and the epic journeys I entailed climbing up mountains, walking around a volcano and staying in a very dodgy capsule hotel in Osaka’s probable red light district). Well, I finally got around to writing the article which, like Guns N’ Roses’ Chinese Democracy, definitely isn’t worth the wait but should be mildly enjoyable none the less!

^ Authentic photo taken by me. ‘Deckss’ was the name given to this huge department store-esque complex assembled in Odaiba.

More after the jump.

Sonic 6th Birthday event in Hamleys, 1997

Sonic the Comic were good to me. Hell, Sega in general have been good to me as a fan, but Sonic the Comic really did throw some good stuff my way when I was a wee lad. Not only did I win a Sonic 2 patch from them when I sent in some self drawn Sonic comics, get my artwork in an issues Graphic Zone section which won me a watch, but I also manged to win a competition they held in 1997 for a exclusive 6th Birthday party event in London. Only 100 invites could be won and you could take a mate along with you, so there was a total of 200 of us (excluding parents) going to this one-off party.

Here's the invite they sent me when I won. Yes, I still own it. How sad is that? I also have a letter they sent along with it..

 

Photos of the event after the jump! Whoopie!

Sega World Videos!

There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of love for the old SegaWorld Indoor Park that used to be in London (now just one floor of arcade games called 'FunLand'), but at least there is Arcade Heroes, who back in October got their hands on some juicy SegaWorld videos! The first video they managed to lay their hands on was is a promotional video showing off all the 3D concept planning of the place, and a bunch of footage of the rides that were there which bring back vague but fond memories. It also shows brief clips of what appears to be a Pirate Sega commercial for Virtua Racing on the Mega Drive!

Videos after the jump.

SegaWorld Part 4.5

Okay, well, I haven't actually got any new information for you readers regarding the wondrous SegaWorld unfortunately. However, I did dig these up;
First, the weird SegaWorld Sonic pom /banner thing. Apparently there were several different designs, but I only have this one myself. It proudly rests, stuck to my CD rack.
This is the glorious badge I was trying to get from the broken badge machine dispensing thing. Well, I got given it by staff along with the pom above as a friendly bonus.
And this is a pin I didn't know I had. I don't actually remember getting it, but I will make sure not to lose it now. Something about it's nice and stylish, even though it's just a little SegaWorld logo. I couldn't find the SegaWorld pen I used to have, but it wasn't all that fantastic. It was just a clicky white pen with the above Sonic / SegaWorld logo. So there you go, those a few of the pointless items I've acquired in my Sega fandom.

SegaWorld Part 4

Clearly SegaWorld was something extremely important to Sega fans. And by Sega fans, I mean Sonic freaks like Gagaman and myself. As such, I feel it’s only appropriate for me to write about this glorious place in my first entry for this blog.

I actually lived in London whilst SegaWorld was up and running, which meant I got to visit it a good handful of times, which was great for me. However, I’m pretty sure these trips were about 7-9 years ago, so a lot of the details are hazy, but whatever – I can remember a few things.

SegaWorld Part 3

While I have run out of photos I took myself of SegaWorld, I've stumbled across some more SegaWorld related stuff I had up in the loft with my countless other Sonic junk. Firstly, here's a three-page preview of the place featured in a 1996 Summer special Sonic comic, and contains many details (such as the names of the areas and rides) which I had forgotten. Just click to full view and try to ignore the awful 'radical' talk throughout it.

More after the jump.

SegaWorld Part 2

I promised I'd scan in some photos (what small amount I have, anyway) of the now closed down SegaWorld (see further down for the previous article about it) and here they are. Click to full view.

This is the photo you could pay to have done as you walked in from the two flights of escalators. We had two done on this first visit, and I've scanned the one with the least people, as it's the Sonic statue your all interested in. Seesh, I'm even doing a Sonic-ish pose, judging by the hands and feet. I'm surprised I wasn't wearing one of my jackets smothered in Sonic patches, actually.

More after the jump.

SegaWorld Part 1

One of the reasons I wanted to set up Sega Memories was to, quite simply, reminisce about some cool Sega related stuff from the past I remember, particularly the stuff you can't find anywhere on the Internet. One of these is the SegaWorld indoor theme park that was located in the Trocodero, Piccadilly Circus, London from 1996 to around sometime in 2000/2001, when the seven floors were blocked off and one floor has been made room for some of the arcade cabinets in an area they now call "Fun Land". I have some proper photos and other random stuff from the place to show, but for now here's some screen caps I took from an old home video of my first visit, back around the time it opened with a bunch of school mates. Take note these are grabbed from a DVD rip old video cam footage, so there not the best of shots.

More after the jump.