If it seems like almost every country of Europe had at least a few Sonic things, that's correct! Italy certainly wasn't left out either. However, Italian Sonic items aren't common. Did they not make very many? Did the items not tend to leave Italy? (Things like UK made stuff tend to show up in other countries, but Italian items don't seem to do this) Whatever the reason, these things are more difficult to collect, but they are interesting to see!
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Knuckles Top Perfume Bottle Jump right in with this rare and interesting item!
This is only the 2nd known Sonic perfume. The first was French and had a Sonic face topper. This one is rare-er than that, & has a bit better bottle design. They chose a classic running/walking Sonic (though his hands seem oddly small) rather than a distorted-body wrap-around for the bottle graphic. The 'cap' that covers the spray-head is a plastic 3D Knuckles head. His spikes have been shortened so they don't interfere with putting the cap on. While his expression isn't the best, he's super interesting to see like this. Photo & owned by Oliger77
Pencil Cases of Italy Here are 3 soft-sides pencil cases. One was made each year from 1992 through 1994. The bottom one with dots is 1992, the Sonic 2 one is 1993, and the squares one is 1994. They each have a zip top, and were made by "Giochi Preziosi". You can see the company logo in 1 corner on each of the cases. (Do note it has been rubbed as the cases were used) Photo & owned by Oliger77
You can see the progress of the logo for Giochi Preziosi here, it starts off as a sitting girl doll on the earlier cases but on
the final one, it's just the words. These cases are made of a canvas like material, as seen in the detail shots.
Italy Panini Sonic X Sticker Book This is an Italian sticker book by Panini. Panini has existed for quite a long time, selling stickers & sticker books all over Europe. You can find their items in several countries (likely in several languages too) This one happens to be in Italian. It's a modern sticker book for Sonic X, and it is empty. These books don't come with stickers, you need to collect sticker packs (much like trading card packs) to fill them in. This retails for around 5 Euro. You may still be able to get this book at Muscara.com in 2011. (though it was made closer to the time of Sonic X) Photo discovered by Luke.
Italian Game Magazine Sonic CD Article Of course, there are Italian game magazines, and naturally they'd want to cover Sonic games. Here you can see Sonic CD in the spotlight, with pictures from the anime styled opening, and various screen shots for the article. The magazine in the back has Ecco the Dolphin strategy/maps with some drawn in art. Photo & owned by Oliger77
1993 STC Fleetway Magazine Comics 1994 Sonic the Comic Italian Issues Does this logo look familiar? It should! It's the "Sonic the Comic" / Fleetway of UK Comic book logo. These were localized into Italian, but they had sections added to them / it wasn't just the Fleetway stories. They may have also had variant covers (as seen here) You can see other games like Shinobi & Streets of Rage being announced for the interior.
So in this way, they acted as a sort of combo comic + game magazine for Sega.
Comic Magazine Italy Interior Page photo Just what was inside? This photo shows "Zona Lettori" (obviously Letter Zone" where fans could write in, as well as a "News Zone" which has some Sonic art, plus Terminator game/movie news & a bit of other games coverage. Beneath that, you can see the regular issue comic pages that Fleetway had, with everything translated to Italian so you could understand it. These issues appeared on news stands in 1993 and 1994. (November 1993 thru June 1994) However, there were only 8 made, and then they dissappeared from shelves. Did it not catch on? Why did they stop? Photo & owned by Oliger77
Italian Light up Eyes Sonic Pin Badge MIP Here is a pin badge from Italy with a special feature!
It lights up. Strangely enough, it's Sonic's eyes that light up and they are red. This is sort of...creepy? You can see the light-up area dots there because they're not right on the black part of the eye. The plastic is thicker to accomodate the button type battery on the back. The pin itself is pretty decent though, it's a semi-3D plastic with raised details & nice paint job. Making it even more unusual to see is that it's still in the original plastic package with card-stock top. It's labeled "Sonic Badge" This is an uncommon pin. Photo by Grafspee/Miyamoto , discovered by Spongebob the Hedgehog
3 Italian Zip Top Pencil Cases
Here are 3 pencil cases from Italy.
They're all soft-sides cases with zipper close tops. They are all also likely that nylon artificial canvas type material. Each has a different design, but they were all likely made around the same time. The first has the Sonic 2 logo where Tails was peeking out from behind the '2'. (This was always fairly seldom-used on merch) it's got the classic logo & probably an egg-o-matic there in the corner. Notice how the print is wearing off of this one--the ink that's required to print on this material is usually a plastic-based substance so it can flake or rub with use and age.
The next bag has a pixel-textured type look, with fully shaded stock Sonic & the full color logo. This zipper is purple. The last pencil pouch has finger waving/fully shaded Sonic but look...it's one of the Japanese type ways to place the logo on a flat line/no curve. This one is half blue/half gray-green with a sort of pixel-decay effect going at an angle. There are logos, copyrights & probably maker-names on all these (all the same company) but the photo is very old and small so you can't read them.
Coco Rico Super Magic Squishy Finally, in 2024, Italy gets something new and Sonic! The company Coco Rico and their "Super Magic Squishy" line brings lots of tiny 'chibi emoji' style mini squish characters to collect. Sadly, they're blind-bagged which will make trying to get all of them annoying because there are 12 to get. However, if they are reasonably priced, it could be ok. There are some interesting choices in here too, which is nice to see. The emoji-type style is also suitable for tiny squish toys like this/keeps the figure solid / a big head.
You can collect Metal Sonic, Rouge, Knuckles, gloomy Sonic, aggrivated Shadow, aggrivated Eggman, determined Super Shadow, normal Blaze, normal Sonic, laughing/closed eyes Tails, neutral Silver and looking over Amy.
Metal Sonic is their worst one, the eyes/face is not well done at all here. Having 2 of regular Sonic but letting Shadow have a super form is also a bit of an odd move. It is great though, to see Blaze, Rouge and Silver on the set. They seldom appear as 'chibi' anything.
That rectangle on the display box says the Italian equivlent of Series 1, so if these do well, probably expect more. Will they be sold outside of Italy? Discovered by Taaron