Basically that linked essay hit everything on the head. Sonic and The Secret Rings was a step in the right direction, but some glaring issues kept it from being a classic like the Mega Drive games were.
Also, the 4kids voices are horrid. Thank god the for the Japanese voices, pity they are forced to work with crappy scripts, but could the wording of the scripts (namely from 360 Sonic, Rings and Adveture 1 & 2) have been changed in the Japanese version?