Sonic Classic

Sonic Classic is an online community made up of, among other things, Sonic the Hedgehog fans. Today, it is a wide-encompassing board with over 700 members and growing.

History

The Beginning

In early January 1999, Simon Wai's Sonic 2 Beta Page was born, dedicated to the prototype version of this great game. The very first edition of the site had an animated gif of the title screen, and featured white text on a blue SONIC/MILES morphing background.

The discovery of Sonic 2 Beta ROM marked a significant point in the Sonic Secrets scene. Before the ROM was available, groundless speculations were made based on some poorly scanned pictures, and lots of faith was required in order for many theories to stand. After the ROM was released, investigations were made by means of "hacking" the savestates or the ROM directly. Hacking is now a foundation for new theories, which brings the sonic community as a whole another step closer to the truth of what Sonic 2 was intended to be.

Ownership Switch

In early 2001, Simon Wai decided to put his focus towards college, and left the Sonic 2 Beta page to his friend Pelord. What no one knew was that Wai would not return for nearly two and a half years. During that time, "Sonic 2 Beta," as it was known, competed with Area 51 and Tom's SoStH Page in the original Sonic Stuff Research Group. Though little of the actual site Wai had made was recovered and updated during this time, one section — letters to the site — flourished. Several injokes, including the famous i wod lick a Sonic 2 ROMs spawned from this staff-edited mailbag.

On March 24, 2001, Pelord created the ezBoard edition of the Sonic 2 Beta Messageboard, a switch from Simon's AnyBoard creation. From here, he hired a staff of moderators and administrators. The first hired administrator of Sonic 2 Beta was Sonic Sue. Early moderation staff included Terunaga, Bryn2k, Ashura2k, L0st and others. pub56.ezboard.com/bsonic2beta

As time passed, Sonic 2 Beta found itself drifting away from Sonic research, becoming outpaced by the quickly-growing Sonic Cult and the prime days of Area 51. Thus, too, the mood of the forums started to drift toward Sonic information compilation, with things such as manual translations from Japanese Sonic games, and became more of a social center for those in the scene.

'The Wars'

However, things weren't always rosy at Sonic 2 Beta. A series of conflicts between Sonique, PACHUKA and the staff at S2B resulted in multiple board hacking and various petty issues being blown out of proportion at the time. A friction between Sonic 2 Beta and Sonic Cult, PACHUKA's site, lasted for approximately a year.

The Return

In late 2002, Simon Wai returned from seemingly thin air to announce his return to the community. By then, the site he had left had radically changed, with the dissolving of the SSRG and a shift in board purpose. Therefore, Simon set up his own new site, and Pelord retained control, changing the forums' name to Sonic Classic, after his very first Sonic site. Shortly after this, the forums moved from the ezboard on which they had been hosted for about three and a half years to an Invision Board system, where Sonic Classic remains today.

A New Name

After Simon's return, Simon made an offer to the ezBoard staff claiming that they could keep the name 'Sonic 2 Beta Message Board' and just be another fan site. Pelord and the staff decided to instead choose a different name. One of the few names put on the table was 'Sonic Classic', which was the name of Pelord's old Sonic-related website. The name stuck and it became official in December 2003. (At the time of the switch, Sonic Classic was located at pub10.ezboard.com/bsonic2beta)

The current ezBoard link is http://p212.ezboard.com/bsonic2beta