The Mod (重視,Jūshi?, lit. "Emphasis") is an object that appears in the Sonic the Hedgehog series and its spin-offs. They are upgrades for racing cars that can change the performance and appearance of said vehicles.
Mods are components for racing vehicles. In gameplay, they can be equipped to a character's racing vehicle before a race in order to alter one or more of its attributes, such as its stats, appearance, horn and so forth. However, no Mods are permanent, and can be changed freely between races.
Some games show them only as items that affect a racing vehicle's stats, while later games would expand upon the scope of the Mods by introducing Mods that both alter a racing car's appearance and stats at the same time, or just its appearance and other attributes.
Game appearances
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed
Mods first appeared in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. In this game, they only change the stats of a certain character's vehicle. Mods are unlocked by leveling up the characters, with the exception of Console Mods, which are unlocked in World Tour with stars earned from beating missions. Mods also come in the following types:
Normal Mods:
Standard (White): The basic Mod of the character which comes automatically. Can be either one of the below by default depending on the character, with the below-mentioned Super Mod being an enhanced version of the standard one.
Balanced (Yellow): A Mod that evenly balances statistics, via removing one point in one stat (X) in favor of another (Y). Nearly all other Mods are based off of this Mod's stat distribution if this type of Mod acts as the second one to be unlocked.
Speed (Red): A Mod that increases the maximum speed of the vehicle, but lowers Handling stat in trade.
Handling (Green): A Mod that increases the handling (turning ability) of the vehicle, but sacrifices some of the Speed stat.
Acceleration (Blue): A Mod that increases the acceleration (rate of reaching max speed) of the vehicle with lowered Boost stat. Despite there existing the Balanced Mod, these Mods are usually the most well-rounded ones for most vehicles in terms of overall stat distribution.
Boost (Purple): A Mod that increases the vehicle's overall speed gained from boosting, but lowers Acceleration stat.
Super (Gold): An enhanced version of another Mod different from the Standard and Console Mods (symbolized by a golden-version-Mod emblem instead of the usual color), and enhances Y stat by 2 points while lowering stat X by the same number as well (or two different stats each by one). Differs for every single character, but the enhanced stat normally applies to the highest one from their Standard Mod.
Console Mods: A majority of Console Mods tend to lower both Acceleration and Handling in favor of maxed out Speed and Boost stats. Some of the mods were named after Sega's past video game consoles.
In Team Sonic Racing, the Mods can change both the appearance, stats and horn sounds of a vehicle. In this game, some Mods can change both the appearance and stats of a vehicle while others can only affect its appearance and horns. The number of available Mods increase as the player progresses through Team Adventure mode and shop at Mod Pods. Mods also come in the following types:
Performance Parts: A series of Mods consisting of Front Mods, Rear Mods and Wheel Mods. Each Mod is visually distinctive when applied to a vehicle and directly affects a vehicle's stats.
Car Cosmetics: A category of Mods that exclusively alter a vehicle's visual appearance and other features besides stats.
Paint Kits: A series of Mods that determine a vehicle's color scheme and texture.
Vinyls: A series of Mods that add a vinyl decal to the vehicle.
Horns: A series of Mods that determine the sound a vehicle's horn makes.
Shadow is the only Sonic character to not use the Genesis/Mega Drive Mod in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed.
For a while, through an unknown glitch, Alex Kidd's Console Mod could not be unlocked in the Wii U version of Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. This also can persist in both the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita versions of the game.
Alex Kidd is the only character in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed to use the Genesis/Mega Drive Mod that is not a Sonic character.
Despite the fact that Amy and Metal Sonic did not make their debut on the Sega Mega Drive, they can use the Genesis/Mega Drive Mod in Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed since they made their debut on the Sega CD. However, the Sega CD is an add-on to the original Sega Mega Drive and cannot function independently, implying it is still a part of the main console.
Inexplicably, despite Shenmue releasing on the Dreamcast, Ryo's Console Mod is for the Saturn.
Additionally, both Willemus and Yogscast use the Saturn Console Mod as well, for unknown reasons.