The title of the new Sonic game has been doing the rounds on the trademark circuit for a while now. But as of today we can confirm that Sonic Unleashed is the next game in the blue hedgehog's shaky 3D platforming career - because half a ton of screenshots have been leaked to the internet.

The official word from Sega is "no comment," but apparently the mass of screenshots appeared on a Sega FTP by accident, and now the internet is going mental.

The last instalment was disappointing, but from theses images Unleashed is looking like good news for the blue fella; sunny skies, wicked platforming circuits and absolutely no useless friends with guns at all.

The first details, according to Sonic Stadium, are as follows: For the next outing Sega's apparently taking loads of elements from Secret Rings on Wii, including (cue applause) the occasional 2.5D platforming sequence.

Check out this video and be shocked and surprised at being excited over a Sonic game again.

There are also whispers of another new character and a Sonic werewolf form. We'll pretend we didn't read that bit.

There's no official word from Sega yet, but it looks like Sonic Unleashed will be out on all three consoles (that's 360, PS3 and Wii) before the year's end. Let's hope the second character is Super Sonic.

Mar 25, 2008