Sonic Co-Creator Proposed a Bold Title for GameCube’s Billy Hatcher Game

Yuji Naka, the legendary co-creator of Sonic the Hedgehog and director of the infamous Balan Wonderworld, recently made headlines after being convicted of insider trading at Square Enix. However, a quirky tidbit from his past has surfaced: during his time at Sega, he attempted to rename the 2003 GameCube title Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg to Billy Hatcher and the Giant Cock.

This revelation comes from an engaging interview with Mike Fischer, a former VP and product manager at Sega of America, who shared a treasure trove of stories from his Sega days, spanning everything from the Pico to the Game Gear and iconic franchises like Sonic and Streets of Rage. Among these tales, Fischer’s account of Naka stands out, revealing a clear disdain for the designer through his humorous jabs.

Fischer sets the stage by discussing his suggestion for Sega to explore more mature, M-rated games for the U.S. audience, a proposal that Naka vehemently opposed. “Naka just went ballistic on me, yelling that I wanted to make porno games. I’ve never seen someone so furious, with foamy spit at the corners of his mouth. ‘How many games have you made? How many hits have you delivered? Who are you to come here and tell us?’”

Shortly after this confrontation, Naka developed Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg with Sonic Team. Initially, Fischer reveals, Naka wanted to call it just Giant Eggs. However, he was informed that the phrase “laying a big egg” is a colloquialism in the U.S. for failing miserably. They settled on Billy Hatcher, even compromising with the full title, but Naka was still not satisfied.

“At one point—this is a true story, and I have two witnesses!—when Naka visited the U.S., he suggested, ‘Well, I know another name for the boy wearing a rooster suit. Another name for rooster is cock. Can we call the game Giant Cock in English?’”

Fischer, along with everyone else, shot down that idea, so Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg it remained. While it’s debatable whether that alternate title would have boosted sales, it certainly would have sparked some memorable media coverage.

The interview is packed with other entertaining anecdotes, like Fischer reminiscing about taking Michael Jackson to a Sega arcade and recounting a moment when a Sonic mascot character hugged a Mario mascot in an effort to mend relations between Sega and Nintendo. Fischer also expresses his frustration with Naka for claiming sole credit for Sonic’s creation, but he wraps up the conversation with a more positive note. He shares that when Naka learned about a group of Chinese pirates making bootleg Dreamcast games, instead of shutting them down, he bought their company and hired them for porting work.