I first played this great game over 10 years ago at a friends house, and fell in love-I actually like this better than the Mario series. I recently found a Genesis system by sheer dumb luck, and along with it Sonic 1 and 2. I popped it in and was re-united with a long, lost friend. And the music! That is one of the reasons I got the game! The graphics are "outdated"-so what? The gameplay on this blows away many of today's games. We are all bombarded with life-like games today, but this classic and others like it are what set the stage for the current wave. Right now, a lot of people are out getting the newest games, I am going against the grain and playing the classics. While I intend to get a "next gen" system soon, I refuse to put these old games out to pasture. Sonic will live forever!