Man, I'm really keen for this. The GBA Sonic games are often slept on but I think they were amazing at recreating the feel of the original Mega Drive games, with great music and sprite work too. I've long thought they deserved a modern PC port in the style of Sonic 1 Forever or Sonic Origins, to free them from the cramped GBA screen.
Sonic fans have been making a lot of these unofficial, enhanced, moddable PC ports using decompilation, recompilation and emulation techniques, including Sonic 1 Forever, Sonic 3 A.I.R. and recently, the Sonic Unleashed PC port. PC (including Linux) is getting to be the definitive platform for playing a lot of these older Sonic games, which is great to see.
Agreed, when Sonic Mania came along I often heard “the first 2D Sonic game since 3+K” and thought that people were forgetting the advance series. You could tell they were crafted by a team that respected the feel of the games that came before and understood that Sonic was a solid platformer with speed as a reward gameplay mechanic. Not to mention it had a colour palette that never confused the main character from the background, something I think mania gets wrong from time to time.
Sonic fans have been making a lot of these unofficial, enhanced, moddable PC ports using decompilation, recompilation and emulation techniques, including Sonic 1 Forever, Sonic 3 A.I.R. and recently, the Sonic Unleashed PC port. PC (including Linux) is getting to be the definitive platform for playing a lot of these older Sonic games, which is great to see.