Sonic 3 is widely consistent and widely improved over its predecessors, and among the classic trilogy, is some of the best Sonic has to offer. You can play as Sonic and speed thru the levels at top speed, play as knuckles and glide thru the level and climb up walls that Sonic could only dream of traversing, or play as Tails and fly all around the level. Sonic 3 introduces the elemental shields to maximize abilities, such as bouncing and immunity to drowning, double jumping and attracting rings to you, and immunity to fire and electricity, with the ability to do a midair dash. The designs for the levels are breathtaking at times, and are the best aesthetics of the trilogy, with a wide range of scenery, from machinery created by Robotnik, to large mushroom forests undergoing seasonal manipulation. There feels to be an equal amount of speed and adventure in this game, compared to 1 and 2, which focused on one or the other, rather than both. There is a lot to do in this game besides just beat the main story, with the introduction of bonus stages, to help you earn a little bit of extra goodies. The wide range of things to do in this game is really cool, even if I don't end up going out of my way to utilize those. The game runs well and has no real major bugs, which is good. The level design for the most part is pretty great, sometimes a little confusing, but never too simple or headache-inducing. They go all out with the gimmicks in this one, and a lot of them are relatively fun to play with. There was really only a couple levels that I did not like. One, really... Carnival Night was just... meh. The bosses in this game are kinda easy for the most part, but they are pretty creative, which I like. What Sonic 3 does over its predecessors is have a story play out in front of your eyes aside from just the main story. Knuckles having a character arc in a 2D game from 1994 with zero dialogue is really cool. Going from helping Eggman by thwarting Sonic, to discovering he had been used by Eggman, who was taking the Master Emerald, Knuckles then helping Sonic the rest of the way to make it to the Death Egg and stop Eggman, its really cool to watch play out, and it is really what makes this game stand out as so great compared to its predecessors. It is a little too long with some weaker levels for me to confidently call it a personal fav or perfect game, but it is a very good one.