The screen crunch destroys this game. You move so quickly and enemy placement is so dogshit I genuinely just wish there weren't any enemies at all; the game would be more fun. Bosses start okay but get to be rather bullshit around the halfway mark. The level design itself isn't great because they had to try and accommodate for the screen crunch so, in an attempt to not make the game torture, they made it super automated, except for the parts where it isn't. Funnily enough, the parts where it isn't are the parts that're the least fun, because who would have thought when you can cross the distance of the whole screen in three frames that you wouldn't be able to react to a bottomless pit. Whoops. Skill issue, I guess.

cons:
- shitty bosses
- flying levels
- shitpost story
- bad voice acting
- shadow has too many moves and they're clunky to use

pros:
- looks very nice
- good soundtrack
- mostly original levels (albeit ones clearly inspired by the adventure games)
- excellent level design (mostly) that knows how to organically blend boost and platforming in its own unique way
- controls effectively blend boost era speed with adventure era precision; this is the best sonic has ever controlled.
- sonic calls eggman robuttnik which is so bad it's good

in conclusion yes the controversy about the dev team's patreon and whatnot really sucks but why do people act like this is the worst fangame ever created, it's genuinely really good in a lot of ways lol. It's just, bad in a lot of ways too. In other words, it's just another day at the office for sonic.