I haven't tried Galaxy on handheld mode yet. I might take Mario 3-D All-Stars with me today and play it on my lunch hour to see how it works!
Good comparison about Sonic Team. I feel that Sonic Team has a lot of good ideas, they just don't implement them in their games very well.
Yeah that rainbow carpet ride level in 64 is tough! Sometimes when I'd play through Mario 64, I'd question if I really wanted to do that level or not. Remember when I said I got all 120 stars in Mario 64? Well I only did that once! Not in any other playthrough of it.