Sonic Writer Talks About His Love-Hate Relationship With The Fandom
In the same interview on the YouTube channel RebelTaxi, Sonic the Hedgehog writer Ken Pontac – who has seemingly moved on from Sega, spoke about his “chequered history” with the Sonic fandom over the years.
As much as he loves them, he admits a “vocal group” who hated on him for “dumb reasons” have essentially “screwed it” for any other fans who wanted to see him do a panel at a convention.
“You know, I love my fans – like all of them, except for the ones that just hate me for dumb reasons…They don’t understand how the world works, how things work, and it’s just kind of childish…whatever vocal group is behind all of that, they definitely screwed it for any Sonic fans who wanted me to do a Sonic panel at any cons I have ever gone to subsequently or in the future, and I won’t do it.”
He was also apparently told by higher-ups at Sega to not “engage” with this crowd, and just not communicate with them.
Pontac originally started out on Sonic alongside Warren Graff (who is also believed to have moved on from Sonic). The pair worked on the story, dialogue and English translations for Sonic games from Sonic Colours (2010) right through to Team Sonic Racing (2019).
Before Sonic, Pontac contributed to MadWorld, the graphic cartoon Happy Tree Friends, the fighting series, ClayFighter, and created the stop-motion animation, Bump in the Night.