Translation: [Interview] SEGA’s Arcade Initial D Team Also Working on Sonic Racing CrossWorlds — A Racing Game Full of Excitement and Surprises

Scheduled for release on September 25, 2025, Sonic Racing CrossWorlds (PC / PS5 / Xbox Series X|S / Nintendo Switch / PS4 / Xbox One) is a co-developed title by Sonic Team and SEGA’s arcade game development team.

Recently, a media hands-on event was held, and following the demo session, a joint interview took place with the game’s producer, Ryuichi Taki, and creative director, Masaru Kohayakawa. Savvy readers may already know that both of them are arcade veterans, having worked on rhythm games such as maimai and CHUNITHM.

Before and after the COVID-19 pandemic, several arcade development teams, including those behind music games, were consolidated into one group, leading to the present structure. In this title, a collaboration with the console (CS) development team has been realized, and the know-how cultivated through arcade game development has been put to good use.

To create a sense of excitement not found in traditional racing games

—How did the concept for Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds come about?

Ryuichi Taki:
The first thing we thought about was wanting to create an exciting experience that couldn’t be felt in traditional racing games. To do that, we didn’t want to just add more rules or complicated controls. Instead, we focused on creating a sense of surprise and freshness that you can feel just by driving.

The core idea to achieve that was: “warping to different worlds by passing through rings.”

When I was a kid, I lived in Hokkaido. I have a vivid memory of driving in winter, going through a long tunnel, and suddenly finding myself surrounded by a snowy landscape. That impactful experience became the inspiration. I thought replicating that feeling in a racing game could bring a real sense of wonder and excitement.

So if we were going to build a system like that, we thought, “Why limit it to just Sonic’s world?” It would definitely be more fun if players could move between all kinds of worlds. That’s how the concept of CrossWorlds was born.

Masaru Kohayakawa:
Based on that concept, I wrote up the initial draft of the plan. In the Sonic series, there’s already the concept of warping to special stages through rings, like the “Big Ring” in Sonic 1. That idea was later expanded in the Sonic movies.

In the films, rings allow travel between different worlds, creating a fast-paced experience where the scenes change rapidly. As someone who works on arcade games, that felt similar to the experience of a theme park attraction.

What we’ve done with this game is create that same kind of experience within a single title.

As the name CrossWorlds suggests, we’ve built a game design that connects various worlds, and that’s what made the collaborations we announced at Summer Game Fest possible. Leveraging the concept of “connecting to other worlds,” we plan to offer content that fans beyond just the Sonic community can enjoy.

—If there are any memorable episodes from the team around the idea of “racing across different worlds,” please share.

Ryuichi Taki:
As I mentioned earlier, the surprise of emerging from a tunnel into a new world is just a moment, right? Deciding where to place that moment was something the whole development team struggled with—but also had fun figuring out.

In the early stages of development, we tossed around a lot of obvious ideas like, “Wouldn’t it be crazy if a giant dinosaur suddenly appeared?” But as we progressed, we came to the conclusion that the game needs to constantly deliver varying scales of change and surprise in how it plays—not just rely on one big shock.

Each race consists of one round and three laps, but after running through another world in the second lap and returning to the original course, things tend to feel a bit stale. To address this, we added a gimmick called the “Fever Gate,” where unexpected events occur, and we made changes to item placements and shortcut routes.

We also designed it so that intense mind games involving items and boosts unfold, making the third lap the most thrilling part of the race. Crafting that gameplay experience was challenging but very exciting.

Masaru Kohayakawa:
Since this is a game where you can go to various scenes by passing through a ring, we really got into the process of figuring out where to transport the player within a single race.

It’s a bit of a cheeky topic, but from the planning side, the idea that “you can go anywhere if you go through a ring” really amped up our excitement (laughs). We announced our collaboration with Minecraft, and we had a blast discussing what other kinds of collaborations we’d love to do. Please look forward to future developments as well.

—We were surprised by the return of the Extreme Gear. How did you integrate the machines reminiscent of Sonic Riders into this game’s racing experience?

Ryuichi Taki:
This title is positioned as a culmination of all Sonic racing games, including Sonic Riders. That’s why we’ve incorporated land, sea, and air elements as seen in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, and there are still unannounced features to come. The game combines evolved versions of elements from past titles with new features unique to this installment.

Of course, fans want to see their favorite characters riding in their favorite vehicles. In the previous title Team Sonic Racing, there were some limitations, but this time around, we wanted to let players fully enjoy mixing and matching to create their own personal machines. That’s when our team came up with the concept of “vehicle types.”

As one variation of that concept, we introduced the Dash category: the Extreme Gear. To incorporate elements from past titles, we carefully built a full system that brings cohesion to the game as a whole.

Creating the Extreme Gear was incredibly difficult (laughs). Unlike cars, the character’s full body is visible, so we had to prepare unique animations for every character. Even so, there’s just something so exciting about racing while flying through the air on a board. It brings out Sonic’s coolness in a way that we felt was worth the challenge.

Masaru Kohayakawa:
One of the biggest appeals of the Extreme Gear is that the characters’ stances are fully visible. We created a wide variety of animations to really show off each character’s personality.

SONIC RIDERS was a game where pulling off tricks was part of the fun, so we designed the Extreme Gear in this game as a Dash-type, meaning it gains speed through tricks and drifts. Naturally, the handling feels different from the original, but we’re confident that it delivers a fresh Extreme Gear experience.

—Were there any challenges in building the world or balancing the game?

Ryuichi Taki:
In the single-player Grand Prix mode, rival characters appear and engage in dialogue with the character chosen by the player. This creates interactions between characters that have never been seen in the Sonic series before.

These are essentially “what-if” scenarios, and the conversations even change depending on the stage, so the amount of content is enormous. I truly think the team in charge did an incredible job putting it all together. The scenes are fully voiced as well, so I hope players will really enjoy that aspect.

Always Striving for “Exciting Surprises”
Refined Through Expertise in Arcade Development

—This title has an entertainment-focused game design. How is it differentiated from existing racing games?

Ryuichi Taki:
We put a lot of emphasis on handling and competitiveness, but if I had to highlight one major differentiating point, it would definitely be the versus play. Especially online matches — we support crossplay across all platforms the game is available on. That means players from all over the world can compete across platform boundaries in highly competitive races. I think that offers huge value.

Of course, if everyone ends up using the same car, that kills motivation. So we’ve prepared over 10,000 possible customization variations. Between performance tweaks, visual changes, and gadget setups, the action and strategy can vary dramatically. Players can take their personalized racing style and challenge the world. And the opponents you’ll be up against are players from every platform — that alone is pretty exciting, don’t you think?

Our cross-IP collaborations — both internal and external — are another obvious point of distinction. But we believe the concept of “crossing” boundaries, in every sense, is what defines this game.

Masaru Kohayakawa:
You can customize everything, from the seat to the steering wheel colors. Add decals and stickers too — so in races, there’ll rarely be two identical designs on the track. I think that level of individuality is a real strength of ours that you won’t find elsewhere.

Taki mentioned the word “competitiveness,” and that’s something we were especially focused on. This game was primarily built by the arcade development team, who handled the core systems.
Some people may not know this, but Japanese arcade games were among the first in the world to build robust network infrastructure. Arcade visitors here are very serious about their 100 yen — if they lose because of the system or environment, it feels incredibly unfair.

We take pride in creating network-based titles that ensure players don’t feel cheated out of a single 100 yen. We’ve poured all the know-how we’ve gained from building highly competitive arcade titles — from racing to rhythm to card games — into this project.
With Sonic Racing CrossWorlds, we want players from all over the world to engage in fierce competition.

—Compared to previous titles in the series, what kind of new experiences do you hope to offer players?

Taki:
I’ve probably said “exciting” more times than I can count today (laughs), but delivering exciting surprises and changes has been the heart of our development approach. Whether it’s connecting to different worlds or evolving gameplay and customization mid-race, we focused on delivering those surprises to keep players engaged and competing.

However, surprises are inherently fleeting — the same trick won’t surprise you twice. So we’ve implemented many systems to keep the experience fresh.
In versus games, things quickly become boring when the environment becomes too static. That’s why we’ve worked to build a constantly evolving gameplay experience, so that races never feel repetitive.

Kohayakawa:
From a systems perspective, I really want players to experience the gadgets. In this game, gadgets are a major system that lets you customize the game itself.
The key feature is that you can create your own optimal racing conditions based on your strategy. In online races, this becomes even more interesting. You’ve got up to 12 players, each bringing their own interpretation and configuration of the system — that creates intense, unpredictable races.

All players can bring in their own gadget-customized machines, and even change setups during race wait times, so even if the same player races the same course, no two races will ever play out the same way.
Delivering this thrilling competitive experience has been my biggest mission as development director.

—A Closed Beta Test was held in February. What kind of feedback did you receive from users, and will any of it be reflected in the final product?

Taki:
The CBT only covered the online versus component, lasted just 48 hours, was limited to PlayStation 5, and had a narrow selection of characters and courses. There wasn’t even a tutorial — players were thrown straight into PvP. It was a pretty aggressive setup (laughs), so we had some concerns going in. But in the end, we were thrilled to see players from over 130 countries participate, with more than a million races played.

The mechanics of the Travel Ring, land-sea-air transitions on the courses, the freedom of customization, and the fast-paced nature where rankings change constantly — these all received positive feedback.
On the other hand, we did receive constructive criticism regarding item balance, and we’ve already made adjustments in response. Thanks to everyone’s feedback, we were able to improve the game’s quality, so we’re really glad we ran the test.

Kohayakawa:
The survey response volume was incredible. We leveraged our know-how from arcade online games to extract various data from over a million race logs.
By analyzing details like “who used what item where,” we were able to understand player behavior and adjust accordingly. Regarding the frequently raised concerns about item balance, we believe we’ve reached an optimal solution.

—It’s been said that the arcade Initial D team is involved in development.

Taki:
I think the greatest value the Initial D development team brought to this project is their expertise in what makes racing games feel satisfying and intuitive. They’re a team with deep experience in racing game development, so we can have conversations like “let’s make this section feel like OutRun” or “give this part a SEGA Rally vibe,” and everyone gets it instantly (laughs).

With that solid foundation, combined with the Sonic Team’s expertise in dramatic presentation and character flair from console games, we were able to create a title that is both stylish and delivers fun, exhilarating races.

Kohayakawa:
Initial D has been running for nearly 20 years. In the past, its winding mountain pass gameplay was incredibly difficult, but the latest entry, Initial D THE ARCADE, has become surprisingly accessible. I believe we were able to bring that refined feel to this title because the development was led by the Initial D team.

—You both have a strong association with rhythm games. Has any of that experience helped in this project?

Taki:
It’s a completely different genre, but the feel-good, hard-to-define sensations in games are definitely something we carried over. The skill system in CHUNITHM, for example, was one of the inspirations behind the gadget system.
Even in our post-launch update plans, I believe our arcade development experience is paying off.
That said, we’ve made plenty of non-music games too, so I honestly couldn’t tell you which know-how came from which title (laughs).

Kohayakawa:
To get into specifics, one of the first things we built for this game was the course editing tool. Level designers used that to construct the tracks, and the know-how behind creating such tools stems from years of trial and error in rhythm game development.
In fact, a rhythm game editor joined the team and helped with the course design, and you’d never guess this was their first time designing tracks — the quality is that high.

Another arcade-style approach we used was recruiting specialists. We gathered talent within SEGA skilled in racing games, held in-house competitions, and brought those top players onto the development team. That kind of grassroots method is very much born from the arcade scene.

—Have either of you worked on the Sonic series before?

Taki:
This is my first time as a lead producer, but after the company’s development teams were consolidated several years ago, I did have opportunities to be involved with the series.
Sonic is one of SEGA’s flagship IPs — he’s even featured on our business cards. I’ve watched not only the games, but also the animated works. Since working on this title, Sonic has been a big part of my life over the past five years, to the point that even my child has become a Sonic fan.

My first professional interaction with Sonic was when we added “Reach For The Stars,” the main theme from Sonic Colors, to early versions of maimai. I loved that song personally, and I still remember asking Iizuka-san (Takashi Iizuka) for permission to use it.

Kohayakawa:
This is my first time working on the Sonic series. Personally, I’ve always felt that despite its global popularity, Sonic doesn’t have as strong of a foothold in Japan. So I really want this game to appeal to people beyond just Sonic fans.
We’ve included many non-Sonic characters, and the banter with rivals should be enjoyable even if you’re not already a fan. I hope everyone gives it a try.

—The “Air Trick” system felt like it had both visual flair and strategic depth. Do you have any advice for using it well?

Taki:
Air Tricks are easy to pull off with simple inputs, so beginners can use them right away. Each trick you perform gives you a boost. Advanced players will use it even in small hops or chain as many as possible during big jumps. Finding spots throughout the track to actively trigger tricks is key to maintaining speed.
With the right gadget enhancements, you can perform them faster, so building your race strategy around that is one valid approach.

Kohayakawa:
When you successfully perform an Air Trick, it displays the trick name with angles like in extreme sports. There’s definitely a strategic layer to mastering them, but more than anything, I just want players to have fun seeing how much they can spin in midair.

—Gadgets are expected to enable unique playstyles, but isn’t there a risk that the game will lose its appeal if players discover an overpowered combination?

Taki:
That’s certainly a valid concern. In competitive games, if a “strongest combo” becomes dominant, it can reduce the overall fun.
However, the gadget system in this game varies significantly depending on the player’s skill, the characteristics of the course and machine, and the dynamics of the race itself. Because of that, we believe there isn’t a single universal “best” setup.

Especially from the second lap onward, randomized elements like Travel Rings and Fever Gates come into play, which further reduce the chances of a fixed optimal combination taking over.

When it comes to gadget stats and balance, we’ve fully leveraged our experience with online arcade games. Thanks to that, we’re confident that gadgets won’t break the game’s balance.

Kohayakawa:
After joining SEGA, I worked on arcade card games and spent a lot of time adjusting balance between different combinations. In fact, a perfectly balanced setup isn’t always fun.
Slightly unbalanced or “sharp” designs tend to be much more exciting, because they lead to counterplay and evolving strategies. That’s why we always aim for a balance that’s intentionally a bit edgy yet still fair.
We’ve brought in race game specialists and fine-tuned the gameplay through trial and error. Development will continue as we strive to make it even better.

—What are the differences between online and solo play?

Taki:
In solo play, you race against AI, but what works against AI may not work against human players. That’s the major difference.

To make solo mode feel more engaging, we’ve implemented a Rival System. This encourages constant competition and gives players a sense of progression as they overcome increasingly strong rivals.

While many racing games offer speed-based difficulty settings, this game allows you to adjust the rival’s strength in detail — something quite new for the genre. It’s designed to make solo play a richer experience.

Online play, on the other hand, introduces strategic gadget battles and unpredictable matchups, offering a completely different kind of thrill that can’t be replicated against AI. We think players will really enjoy it.

—Thank you for your time today.

Source: 4Gamer