Before I go any further in this thread, I guess I should mention that I've barely played any Sonic games. I've only played Sonic 1 and 2 Advance and Sonic the Hedgehog Genesis for GBA.

So, the general consensus among Sonic fans is that Sonic was awesome when it first came out. Then, practically every game after Sonic the Hedgehog 3 sucked. The only games that are mainly considered good are all the games between and including the first and third Sonic games.

Why that is, I still don't know to this day. I keep hearing a lot of different responses, like they added way too many characters, the controls aren't good anymore, the games aren't fast enough, or that Sonic fanboys are just impossible to please.

So for those of you that have more experience with Sonic, do you think you could explain why most fans think Sonic sucks now?

On a side note, I'm well aware that Sonic Colours and Sonic 4 are an exception to the "all Sonic games past the 3rd one suck" mindset that a lot of people have. I'm even thinking of renting Sonic Colours, since even watching the gameplay amazes me.