Fun game that keeps you playing for hours
So this was my first Sonic game (in memory at least) At the time the graphics were mind blowing and even had my younger sister scared at it's reality. She was terrified of the scene where Eggman blew up the moon and to this day skips that scene every time she plays. Must have been some good graphics...
As far as story line goes I think it was pretty good. Maybe the best even now. I don't really think anything tops it in the Sonic series. It's exciting, and has a good ending. If it were a JRPG it would be a great plot.
As far as game play goes, once you beat any mission past "find the lost chao," the game gets challenging. And even if you manage to finish all the missions the game isn't over until you've completed every mission with an "A" rank. Which sounds easier than it actually is. The unfortunate part for me is that I racked up most of my playing time when I was 12 and so it's grown on me at this point, so I don't think I'll ever completely finish the game. Characters are very easy to control. There aren't 50 buttons mashed onto a gamecube controller so every action in the game is controlled by "A or B".
The game also features a fun multiplayer system. The only thing wrong with it is that you can't play with up to 4 people, you can only have 2. Chao is also a fun thing that you can do if you're taking a break from completing missions. Training chao were made more fun and interactive in SA2 in comparison with SA. While you can train them to be the best at a skill and win you tons of game rewards, What I found the most fun was experimenting with the types of chao you could get. I'm not sure if this is normal, but I took a black chao and mated it with a flying dark type (Who was originally the default chao, resembles "Knights" when a flying dark type) and for some reason got a blood red chao and a navy blue chao. I also had a running neutral type that are supposed to be green and shaped like sonic turn out white with pink and yellow stripes.
Problems with the game? Well when I first got the game I was too little to notice or care, but the camera occasionally gets stuck, but this happens mostly in Knuckles/Rouge levels which isn't too much of a problem because it has a free roam camera system in a free roam area. There a a few other glitches which I have abused because they are funny, but they don't really affect gameplay so they aren't worth mentioning, but you can look them up for amusement.
As a side note, I don't think Sonic died exactly when he went 3D, I think he died when Sonic Heroes came out. The game was fun yes, but they completely messed up the story for this game when they brought shadow back to life and confused children by saying he was a robot. If only they had just played this game... They also stoped making any of it make sense after this point. It's games like Shadow the Hedgehog and 2006 that ruined this series. I truly hope Sonic Colors will be enough to bring back the hedgehog that I once loved.