>something botches at Sega, maybe someone didn't want to put more budget into another 2D Sonic game despite Mania selling gangbusters, maybe someone on the project wanted to just break away, no pun intended
>Sega then outsources a successor to Mania to the fucking mediocre Arzest folks and surprise, it shits the bed
I'm not gonna believe the whole "IIZUKA EMBARRASSED BY WESTERN INDIE DEVS" bullshit, but it's clear something went very wrong since Lopes and Whitehead still seem very fond of the pitch to unify these releases and talk about it this way. And clearly Sega of Japan wasn't insulted if they literally used assets, sounds and jingles, even the damn the physics basis of Mania for what they wanted to be their own shitcessor.