Sonic Creator Yuji Naka Has Joined Square Enix

Naka took to Twitter to confirm the news, writing, "I'm joining game development as before, and strive to develop games at Square Enix".

While Yuji Naka's last credit for Sega was Sonic Riders in 2006, the programmer's history with the speedy blue hedgehog goes all the way back to the first title in the series.

Naka joined Sega in the early 1980s and stayed with the video game giant until 2006, when he formed his own studio, Prope. Even if Naka chooses to divide his attention between Prope and Square Enix, the drying trickle of updates from Prope and the slowing of mobile releases in the past year is a bad sign on its own.

I aim to develop an enjoyable game, please look forward to it. "One of the reasons I left Sega was, if I stayed there, I would have had to just make Sonic games", said Naka. If I had to guess, I'd say Square Enix is more interested in his work with Phantasy Star Online than with Sonic the Hedgehog, but who knows?

Naka-san did not provide any further information on the game he is planning, but it's certainly intriguing to see him work on the development side once more.

Seeing how Naka enjoyed his freedom after moving on from Sega's top franchise, we can expect whatever Naka is cooking up with Square Enix to be an original IP.