In April 1990, Sega requested a game that involved a mascot for their company.[29][30] They wanted a character to rival Nintendo's flagship mascot Mario; Sega president Hayao Nakayama in particular wanted a character as iconic as Mickey Mouse.[31] Sega had previously used Alex Kidd as their mascot, but because he was considered too similar to Mario, he was deemed unsatisfactory.[29] Several character designs were submitted by its AM8 research and development department. These included a wolf, a bulldog, a robot, and a warrior character. However, the team put emphasis on speed for the game, which came from Yuji Naka attempting to get through Super Mario Bros.' World 1-1 as fast as he could.[32] Due to this, Sega started to only consider fast creatures, such as kangaroos and squirrels, while scrapping designs not associated with fast animals.[29] One of these ideas involved a rabbit who could grab objects with prehensile ears. It showed potential, but was too complex for the Sega Mega Drive's hardware. Afterward, the team narrowed its search down to animals that could roll into a ball, based on the idea for an attack-based move, which led them to consider armadillos and hedgehogs.[31][33] The hedgehog character, which was proposed by Naoto Ohshima,[30] ultimately prevailed. After that, Ohshima went on vacation to New York, taking sketches with him. There, he went to Central Park, where he would ask locals for their opinions on them, which led to the hedgehog character being deemed the favorite.[34]