Iizuka is a Sonic Team stalwart. He worked as a designer on Nights Into Dreams and the first Sonic Adventure, before heading to San Francisco in 1999 to head up Sonic Team USA, later renamed Sega Studio USA. There he has acted as director and lead designer of the controversial (but successful) Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic Heroes and Shadow The Hedgehog.
What was Segaâs thinking behind setting up a Sonic Team studio in the US?
I wanted to move there! I thought Sonic was very suitable for the US market, so I wanted to develop the character and the games in the US. I think itâs easier to understand the market if you live there.
What have you changed about Nights to make it appeal to western audiences?
For example, the child characters have more suitable names. And also the voice-acting â we recorded the character voices in British English. I tried to make the gameplay as simple as possible, so you could play for a long time; easy to pick up and play, but difficult to master. Thatâs the global standard.
