I'm glad that no one is saying that the protagonist should never gather companions for his journey

Over two decades ago, when Sonic Heroes came out, some part of me was excited for it because of its teamwork gimmick. Like I played a lot of Japanese RPG's at that time, and enjoyed the reoccurring trope of the protagonist gathering a diverse range of different companions for his journey. And Sonic Heroes featured that trope front-and-center, but as a 3D mascot platformer rather than a JRPG.

But then I read and watched the reviews. And a lot of professional journalists who played and reviewed Sonic Heroes criticized Sonic's friends in that game, and just wanted Sonic the Hedgehog to fly solo in his own game. But they never really explained why, when the protagonist gathering companions for a journey was a reoccurring trope in a lot of media, especially JRPG's, and those exact same journalists don't mind that trope in said media. And it confused me, and made me think that all protagonists should just fly solo and not gather any companions for their journey.

Well, I'm an adult, and looking back at Sonic Heroes, I know the reason why: Because the flight and power characters were going to be Sonic Heroes at its absolute worst, made even worse than that split across four near identical campaigns that were all required playthroughs, alongside the special stages, just to unlock and complete the true final boss fight.

Like if this were almost any other game that used team-based mechanics, it would have just used the Holy Trinity of class roles, including tank for defending allies, DPS for attacking enemies, and healing for replenishing allies' health. And not gimmicks like the flight and power characters split across four near-identical campaigns like in Sonic Heroes. Because at the very least, they're basic game design 101 that a lot of games are expected to have, rather than needless gimmicks that would have hurt said games rather than help them.

In fact, Sonic already had those since his own series' premiere back in 1991. One of them being the rings for protecting and healing Sonic repeatedly with, and the other being his various spin moves for attacking enemies and bosses. And if his friends were like this -- which they were in that BioWare Nintendo DS RPG, Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood -- fewer people would have gotten as upset over them as they did with them in Sonic Heroes.

Anyone agree with me?