Michael is using Sonic Boom as a prime example of the slippery slope of diminishing quality that SEGA's western half had fallen into or, more exactly, as the last straw on the camel's back. If you read the rest of the article, he gives a dozen or so other notable examples of tragic flaws and bumbling blunders that cover practically SEGA's entire genre bandwidth. I would say this whole mess started back around a decade ago and things have been continually and gradually getting worse and worse. It finally piled up so high that risks had to be made and with something as big of a gamble as the $20 million investment of Sonic Boom thrown on the table, nothing less than a smash hit was needed to save the sinking ship. Fortunately, SEGA is, in essence, a vast fleet of enterprise interests, but this final blow took a huge chuck out of their game creating firepower and may never build itself up again to what it once was.