If 2024 was the year of Shadow The Hedgehog, 2025 sees Sega shifts its marketing budget back to promoting its blue mascot.

Sonic The Hedgehog’s 2025 brand campaign theme is “Racing Around The World,” highlighting “Sonic’s speed and adventurous spirit,” just in time for the release of Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds.

To kick off the brand campaign, Sega has partnered with Red Bull and Canadian rally driver and mountain biker Brandon Semunuk for a special video.

Nothing too wild for a Red Bull stunt video, just Semunuk and his co-driver navigating a special rally stage in “Sonic Speed Training Course” (the coordinates listed in the video points this to being filmed in Vancouver). It’s a normal rally montage… until a portal opens up mid-way into Green Hill Zone and the car drove on a loop-the-loop.

“Before I ever sat in a real race car, I was playing Sonic the Hedgehog, racing games, really anything with speed. That was my intro to racing. It all started with pixels and a controller, but the obsession with going fast was real from day one,” said Brandon Semenuk. “Getting to work with SEGA on this project was full circle—bringing racing into more people’s hands the same way it started for me.”

It’s nice to see Sega remembering its racing pedigree. Having this shot as a rally promo obviously brings back memories of 1994’s Sega Rally, but the little decal on the blue Subaru WRX, an image of Sonic’s legs pushing the pedal to the metal, is a nice call back to the Williams Formula 1 team in 1993, which had Sega sponsorship.

This is one of many content to come as part of this brand campaign. If Atlus (which is under Sega) can partner up with an F1 team last year, surely nothing can stop Sega with crossing over to various other motorsport, to promote Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds and Sonic The Hedgehog.