An independent archive of typography.
Topics
Formats
Typefaces

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 level titles

Contributed by Cody Boisclair on Jun 25th, 2015. Artwork published in
November 1992
.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 level titles 1
Sega 1992. License: All Rights Reserved.

When I saw Roco featured in the Letraset International Typeface Competition Winners 1973 post, my mind immediately went to where I, and likely many other ’90s kids, most vividly remember having encountered it: the title screens shown for each level in Sega’s Sonic the Hedgehog 2 for Genesis/Mega Drive.

Some of the thinner lines are inconsistently thick in Sega’s bitmapped rendition of it, compared to the reference specimen (compare, for instance, ACEGHOU to LPQRTV), but aside from that, it’s a surprisingly accurate reproduction of the original. The only significant difference is that the thin line of the “1” digit goes all the way down, rather than stopping halfway.

Anyone know which of Sega’s artists was responsible for this digitization, out of curiosity? I’m guessing it’s probably Yasushi Yamaguchi, but not completely sure.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 level titles 2
Sega 1992. License: All Rights Reserved.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 level titles 3
Sega 1992. License: All Rights Reserved.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 level titles 4
Sega 1992. License: All Rights Reserved.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 level titles 5
Sega 1992. License: All Rights Reserved.

Typefaces

  • Roco

Formats

Topics

5 Comments on “Sonic the Hedgehog 2 level titles”

  1. NeoTechni says:
    Jul 4th, 2019 9:07 pm

    What’s the name of the smaller font?

  2. [Translated from the Spanish by moderator:]

    I don’t understand why ITC is having such a hard time digitizing Roco if they could have done it in the 90s at the very least. 😒

  3. That font was named Gaslight.
    If I know this font correctly, then not my problem.

  4. I mean, Roco and Gaslight are similar, but they do share the same font.

  5. Thanks, Aleks. Gaslight (anonymous, 1993) is similar, but not the font that was used here. While its caps and numerals are loosely based on Roco, the lowercase has caps based on Peignot. Gaslight has several differences compared to Roco, see especially A M U V W. Also, its numerals are largely ligning, unlike in Roco.

Post a comment