Upon playing this properly, I realized that Gamespot were right about this game.
I suppose what it really took was adjusting to controls in good games; this game's controls are incredibly sensitive in a majority of situations. I noticed that the faster you run, the harder it is to control your character with comfort. It's even worse in the mach-speed stages with Sonic, as turning him even slightly will lead to him moving quite a lot.
The three main characters are Sonic, Shadow and Silver. Sonic is the speediest of the lot, or he's supposed to be. I'd like to know WHERE his speed has gone, because it only really shows itself in the mach-speed stages. In actual stages, Sonic seems to move slower than what he did in the Adventure games and Heroes. Sonic is meant to be FAST. Mach-speed stages look fun, but the loose controls pretty much kill any enjoyment you can get from it.
Shadow is even slower than Sonic, despite how fast he was in his own game, Shadow the Hedgehog. He doesn't use guns anymore (thankfully) but he does use vehicles on occasion, sometimes needing them to complete a section. His controls feel even looser than Sonic's, if that's even possible.
Silver is mildly fun to play as, but not enough to save this game from it's awfulness. He is the slowest of the three hedgehogs and uses telekinetic abilities to pick things up, throw them and create paths for himself. The good thing is that throwing things at enemies is actually kind of cool in that they will be more likely to hit, even if the camera's not facing where you want it to.
Aside from the three main characters, you also have amigos, who help you on your journey. Sonic is assisted by Tails and Knuckles, both of whom play awfully. Tails is incredibly slow, and his Dummy Ring Bomb attack leaves him vulnerable. He can fly, which is an improvement over him being stuck in a vehicle in SA2, but still the bad controls make it difficult to get Tails where you want him to go when he's in flight. Knuckles is also terrible - he's not only painfully slow, but his attacks, like Tails, can leave him vulnerable, for he has to attack enemies in close proximity. He can glide, which is a bonus, and he can climb, but his climbing is ruined by a glitch which causes him to become stuck to a wall, and you cannot jump off.
Shadow's amigos are Rouge and Omega - Rouge plays almost exactly like Knuckles, except for the fact that she runs faster and has different attacks. She throws bombs, which is an improvement over both Tails' and Knuckles' attacks as she can do it at a somewhat safe distance. Still, she can glide and climb, but she also falls victim to the awful glitch which makes her get stuck to walls. Omega plays fine, apart from bad controls. He has weapons with which he can shoot enemies, which is decent as it enables him to attack from a distance and closely without becoming vulnerable to attack easily.
Silver's amigos are Blaze and Amy; Blaze is easily the best amigo in the game. She plays like Sonic, with homing attacks as well as various attacks of her own. The only gripe I have here is that Blaze seems to run faster than what Sonic does in his own levels, but if you can put that aside, all you need to worry about with Blaze is the bad controls. Amy, however, is the worst amigo in the game. Not only is she the slowest character, but her hammer also makes her vulnerable to attack and she is so SLOW at attacking. She can also go invisible, which, while it's a handy ability when trying to sneak past enemies, it also feels like it was randomly added in to make Amy seem more likeable in terms of playability.
The story is dark; it features Eggman trying to kidnap a young Princess called Elise because she has something known as the 'Flames of Disaster'. Sonic comes to her rescue and tries to keep her safe. That's pretty much the outline, but the story could have been so much better. I fail to see why they needed to try and 'darken' the Sonic series.
The town missions would have been a tad more likeable if they didn't feature annoying load times. Unfortunately, that's not the only time the game features long load times. The long load times are terrible and are another downside to this already bad game.
The graphics look decent, though certainly not the best the Xbox 360 has to offer. Despite this, they do look quite nice, though the only problem is, it almost feels like they focused a little too much on the graphics and not enough on what's the most important thing; the gameplay.
The music is awesome. Easily the best part of the game. From the vocal tracks to the level music, it's nice to listen to, so at least one area of the game is very good. However, with the gameplay as bad as it is, itit doesn't mean that much. The voice-acting is terrible, barring a few characters such as Blaze and Eggman, who sound really good. Knuckles, Shadow, Amy and Silver are tolerable. Sonic lacks emotion and speaks in the same pitch and tone for everything, Tails sounds feminine, Rouge also lacks emotion as well as sounding so much older than what she is meant to be, Omega sounds strange and Elise sounds pretty bland.
So what can I say? Buy this game because the music's good? No. I cannot really recommend this game at all. I love Sonic, really I do, and seeing him in games like this make me sad. I also feel pretty angry at myself for denying all the flaws in this game because of my blind fangirlism. I won't deny this game is rushed; several factors make this obvious, such as Shadow's Chaos Boost not making him invulnerable despite the manual saying it would. I know people are not going to like this review, but all I have to say is; I do care for Sonic, but I'm not going to be a blind fangirl and deny how many flaws this game has anymore.