Sonic trades in his sneakers for a hot rod in Sega’s speedy arcade racer.

Sonic is trading in his trademark speedy feet for a sweet convertible in the upcoming Sonic’s Sega All-Star Racing. Coming in early 2010 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and Nintendo DS, the game is an arcade racer that stars more than 15 of Sega’s popular characters from the publisher’s long history. We had a chance to check out the game on the show floor of Comic-Con 2009.

The demo at the show featured two courses and four playable characters–the titular Sonic, Aiai from Super Monkey Ball, Amy Rose from the Sonic series, and Amigo from the Samba de Amigo games. The characters will have their own special vehicles, such as Sonic’s blue hot rod or Tails’ airplane. In addition, the characters will have their own special powers that will be activated at random during races. For instance, Sonic will temporarily transform into Super Sonic; Amy will have mallets she can use to bash her opponents with; Aiai will let loose with a torrent of monkey balls; and Amigo will form impromptu conga lines that any racer will be powerless to resist joining.

The special powers will give you a power advantage on the tracks, but they won’t be the only way of getting an upper hand. There will also be on-track pick-ups, such as homing missiles, land mines, Sonic shoes (for an extra boost of speed), and shields that will protect you from harm. Of course, you’ll have your own skill on the sticks to rely on, as well as the game’s simple controls–R2 (on the PS3 controller) to accelerate; L2 to brake and drift around corners (when combined with the gas button). Pulling off drifts and midair tricks (the latter executed with the R1 and L1 buttons) will earn you turbo boost as well.

All-Star racing will have more than 15 tracks available and feature locales inspired by Sega’s many games. The courses shown off in the demo were impressively large, featuring brilliant bright colors and a good amount of variety in layout–including massive spiraling corkscrew sections and huge jumps. Sega fans might get a kick out of the more nuanced nods to Sega classics, such as the bumpers that line certain parts of the track that are straight out of classic Sega games.

Clearly aimed at both the kart-racing crowd and nostalgic Sega fans, Sonic’s Sega All-Star Racing seems like it will be a good match for kids and parents alike. Look for more on the game in the coming months ahead of its release in February 2010.

Check out the source at GameSpot

Well, this was quite the weekend for yours truly. Mainly because I was without cable and internet all weekend. I will say that in the year 2009 we have become 100% dependent on these two sources for news and entertainment. I was stuck looking for updates on my iPod Touch and watching 1970’s style blurry blue/green/red local TV stations. It was like being in the past and the future at the same time. Ok, my rant is over on that, just wanted to put it out there, also it’s the reason why there was no episode of Do Work Friday last week. Don’t worry, it will be back this week and I may even hit you with a double dose of awesomeness!

Yes, today is in fact Monday. The last Monday in the first month of tenth year of the twenty-first century to be exact. So, what does Nintendo have in store for us on this epic Monday? We will be getting two games today, WiiWare will be getting Niki – Rock N Ball, while the Virtual Console will be getting the classic Sega title WonderBoy in Monster Land.

Niki-Rock ‘n’ Ball is a supposedly new take on classic arcade gaming, you know the ones where the only objective is to kill everything and make it to the end of the level. In the game you will be a ball rolling along collecting pearls and medals and killing monsters. You can transform to “rock” form to take even stronger monsters out, all the while hopping and rolling along different stages. The game is developed by Bplus and can be played solo or co-op with a friend. It is available today for 500 points, check the trailer below.

WonderBoy in Monster Land is a title that was originally available for the Sega Master System way back in 1987. The original title was considered ridiculously hard, mainly for the fact that there was no continue or password system on the consoles. This game takes the WonderBoy of the original title and transports him from prehistoric times to medieval times. He will have a sword as his main weapon and can barter for upgrades to armor and magic. The title, developed by Sega and Weston games is a 1 player game and is available today for 500 points.

Check out the source of this item Virtual Console and WiiWare Update Monday!