The Mangaka Bringing Sonic Around the World

The art of Yuki Imada.

Yuki Imada began his career as an illustrator in 2011, originally making money by drawing commissioned fan art. It wasn’t until 2016 that he got his first big break at Japanese publisher Shogakukan, where he illustrated the Kagaku Gakushu Manga Crisis Series, an educational title that is a Japanese analogue to America’s Magic School Bus, which depicts the protagonists exploring phenomena like the human body by shrinking down to microscopic sizes.

He followed that up the serial story Schwarz Ragnarok, a fantasy story with nods to Norse mythology about Gram the Black Guardian, a hero fighting to protect his sister in a world where humans and gods are pitted in a tournament to decide the world’s fate. By 2021, Imada had become a regular contributor to Shogakukan’s CoroCoro Comic magazine, a serialized title that has been running since 1977. He teamed up with fellow artist Hiroyuki Takei on the series Mini4King, and expanded his talents from illustration to writing as well.

It wasn’t until 2024 that Imada settled into some of the CoroCoro titles that would bring awareness of his talents to a larger fandom. He began adapting the video game Sonic X Generations into a manga called The Jet Black Hedgehog: Shadow the Hedgehog.

It ran for six chapters from CoroCoro’s October 2024 issue through its March 2025 issue, and Imada once admitted that re-reading the heartbreaking final two chapters of the saga brought him to tears. By April 2025, a tankōbon compilation of all six chapters was published, as well as a bonus epilogue titled “Calling Your Name.”

It didn’t take long for Sega and Shogakukan to get Imada straight to work on another Sonic-related project. Kicking off in the July 2025 issue of CoroCoro, the new series Sonic and the Blade of Courage puts a different spin on Sega’s speediest character.

Although the series features Sonic as a main character, it also introduces primary school student Yuuta as a secondary antagonist, wielder of the titular “Blade of Courage” that has the power to slow down time. The series is still continuing monthly and has progressed to include other fan-favorite characters like Miles “Tails” Prower and perennial Sonic villain Dr. Eggman (more commonly known as Dr. Robotnik stateside).

To celebrate the release of Sonic CrossWorlds and Sega’s foray into partnerships with the world of professional racing, Imada was tapped to make the Blue Racer manga, which debuted alongside Sega’s Racing Around the World campaign.

First released in July 2025 at the McLaren Racing Live London Sonic Racing Challenge, it’s the first Sonic the Hedgehog manga to be officially published outside of Japan. Variant covers have been used to celebrate other challenges in Singapore and Sao Paolo, Brazil. In addition to Imada’s original black-and-white art, the international version also features a colored iteration by Korean artist Min Ho Kim.

Blue Racer also serves as a graphic source for the upcoming HIDDEN x Sonic collaboration, releasing this weekend. When he’s not illustrating, Yuki Imada enjoys hobbies like stargazing, and in addition to Sonic, Imada’s a self-professed fan of other games like The Last of Us, Uncharted, Dragon Quest 4, and Portal 2.