If Sonic Team made a 2D game as a flagship Sonic title, then you would know that they had lost all creative desire on their part. They would do this just to pander to old-school fans for the sake thereof, and, as Punch-Out!! and Bionic Commando can tell you, you're not going to get very far that way.

3D Sonic is the present and future, and is certainly a formula that can be done well. Secret Rings, certain features of Black Knight, and the day stages from Unleashed can be combined to make a winning formula. (the key feature from Black Knight was that in that game, you could play the same stages as different characters, bringing variety into how you tackled each stage. This is something they were willing to do in the 2D Sonic games, but have since ditched)

Looking back at SA1 and 2, it's not the 3D gameplay that is the problem. It can be done right. It's all the unnessesary fluff that they are adding that ruins the experience.

I bet if they made Sonic the only playable character and made the presentation and story like Sonic CD and Sonic SATAM the game would have GOTY potential.

Also, how come they never remix master pieces for the soundtrack like these? Sonic has such a great legacy to tap into, if only Sonic Team would become smart enough to realize it.

Just look at this. Why can't a 3D sonic game be this psychadelic?

Agreed. Original Sonic is where its at. I remember when i rented Sonic Heroes for the GC , and quit after an hour of playing cuz it was so terrible

I think it's a pretty sad irony that the Sonic CD special stage is my second favourite 3D sonic game.

i think sonic unleashed in a step in the right direction and hopefully unleased 2(sans the daft werehog) will be the long awaited game most fans have waited for...

definitely..SU is a big step forward, but Sonic still needs alot of work

Sonic adventure 2. Really?

That game was to me when it all started to go wrong. Shadow replaced Metal Sonic, who is a much more natural rival to sonic considering the robot theme. The story and art design had nothing to do with how a Sonic game should look and feel, and they had all these boring characters in between the Sonic stages.

*sigh* At least the gameplay was good, and the game had Green Hill Zone.

Well, there's a lot of problems it seems.

First, the 2D/3D thing. Can you actually think of a series that was big back in the SNES/Genesis or NES era that has been able to make the transition besides RPG's and Nintendo franchises? While Nintendo created the whole 3D thing with the N64 and made everything to get their franchises into the 3rd dimension, third parties were caught off guard and didn't really know how to make this transition.

Second, since Sega is a third party nowadays, they are more willing to go for the quick cash than before as a hardware manufacturer. This definitely hurts quality of some games.

And third, for some completely random reason, the people at Sega think that packing Sonic games full with rubbish which has nothing to do with the original experience is something people want. Many of you have already mentioned werewolf stages and other annoying things in recent games.
I think however that the worst has been the Sonic Rush subseries lately. While the original was a fine game with some great stages and a story, but one that wasn't too much in the centre, Sonic Rush Adventure does everything to keep you away from playing platforming levels. You are on an island and to reach the levels, you have to use a boat. So after playing two stages and one boss, you usually have to collect items to build a new boat, and then you have to reach the islands somehow. So after all, you spent more time replaying old levels and being on the water than you are playing new levels. This is just stupid.

I definitely agree with SONIC RUSH thing..I hate that series and i blame it for the sonic must go fast craze...Boss fights and music are good everything else sucks