Sonic Adventure is the quintessential Sonic game. By that I mean the way you feel about this game can be used as a barometer for how you'll feel about almost any other game in the series. For whatever reason it may be, some people's brains are willing and able to forgive the obvious unavoidable jank, the cheesy writing, dated voice acting, unintentionally hilarious cutscenes, and Amy and Big's sections. I will completely agree with anyone who says all those things are glaring marks against this game, but I genuinely believe the high points make up for it and turn it into one of my favourite games of all time. Sonic himself plays better than any future 3D attempts, and the level design complements his play style perfectly. Linear moments of spectacle interspersed with more open sections for pathfinding and experimentation is the perfect 3D Sonic formula for me, and outside of the two characters previously mentioned, the other gameplay styles fit really well into their respective parts of the levels.

To put it into perspective how much I love this game, the first way I played it was a dodgy download of the 2004 PC version that I played with a keyboard, and the download had replaced every single music track with the first part of Windy Valley, and I still played through the whole thing. This Xbox 360 version may be the absolute worst version of Sonic Adventure, but for being the first actual version I played it'll always be the one that holds the place in my heart.