I always found it reminiscent of the first part of Azure Blue World (Emerald Coast) from Sonic Adventure and it's for that reason that Splash Hill: Act 3 has always felt a bit unfinished to me. Where Azure Blue World goes into another couple of sections (a "pre-chorus" and "chorus" if you will), Splash Hill: Act 3 just goes back to the intro after the "verse". Originally, my idea was to do a medley of Splash Hill: Act 3 with the "pre-chorus" and "chorus" of Azure Blue World, but then I thought I could work the "pre-chorus" and "chorus" of Splash Hill: Act 2, as I also find those sections to have a somewhat similar feel, while maintaining the style of Azure Blue World.
For years, this was just an idea I had that never went anywhere. But recently, I was able to obtain an IR of Jun Senoue's guitar tone in SA2 as well as a bunch of drum samples from the Adventure games, thanks to ‪@NUKELEDGE‬, which rekindled this idea. While the guitar tone and drums are actually from the SA games, the bass and synths are approximations of the SA sounds using what I have, mostly the Korg M1 and Roland D-50 (for the synths). Overall, I'm quite impressed with how much I was able to replicate the Sonic Adventure sound, and this mix turned out REALLY nice.