User blog comment:Pinkolol16/Why... do... people... haate... Sonic... the... Hedgehog.../@comment-115265-20110801231203/@comment-1669199-20110801232409

Sonic fans officially went bonkers when Sega released promotional artwork of Shadow the Hedgehog (game) because, in the fans' eyes, Sonic had jumped the shark at that point (meaning that he was trying too hard to be cool) and was gonna go downhill from there. The fact that there were 8+ different continuities of Sonic didn't help matters either, not even when th Blue Blur debuted. Contrary to popular belief, there were problems even during the Genesis days.