Something i think would be pretty neat for a Sonic 3 & Knuckles reboot

[Macfarlane]

Now i doubt this will ever happen, but after seeing Sonic Team redevelop Hidden Palace Zone for the recent Sonic 2 ports, and after playing Sonic 3K competition mode, it would be cool to see what the 5 competition mode stages would be like if they were actual zones in the main story.

Azure Lake would be kinda like a tutorial level, where you start off with all the chaos emeralds and the objective is to reach the Tornado.

Chrome Gadget would take place after Marble Garden

Balloon Park would take place after Chrome Gadget

Endless Mine would take place after Ice Cap

Desert Palace would take place after Flying Battery

Just saying...

[Ioshyriku]

I think the term you are looking for is remastering rather than reboot. I am also a big fan of the competition stages, mostly thanks to the music. But I was thinking of another layout of the stages.

1. In my opinion Azure Lake Zone should be somewhere between Launch Base Zone and Mushroom Hill.
-First, we have the similar background theme to Launch Base, with a huge lake surrounded by green scenery. After stopping the Death Egg from launching, there is clearly not much distance from the Launch Base, so the platform Sonic and Tails were on would crash pretty close, albeit a less industrialised version, so it would make perfect sense for this to be Azure Lake Zone.
-The snowy mountains in the background can also show the distance they are from Ice Cap Zone, as that is the closest area to Launch Base Zone it would make perfect sense for them to be able to still see it.
-As the area is overgrown with vegetation and are quite a lot of trees around it could make quite the smooth transition into a dense forest area like Mushroom Hill.
- We could also take in consideration the fact that Azure Lake is pretty much an ancient overgrown ruin with mountains and forests in the background and connect it to Marble Garden Zone but the big lake makes this placement a bit better.
- We can also see a cultural difference between the stages, Marble Garden is pretty much inspired ancient Greek architecture with some a few Mayan influences while Azure Lake looks more like the remains of what used to be a medieval European castle, so I'll continue to stand by my first opinion.

2. Let us go to Chrome Gadget Zone now and let's use the original level placement, where Flying Battery was placed between Carnival Night and Ice Cap. Not much to say here, this place would come right after Carnival Night Zone and before Flying Battery Zone.
- If we consider Carnival Night Zone either standalone or as part of a large urban area, it would make sense to be close to an industrial zone full of power plants and factories like Chrome Gadget.
- It could be connected to Flying Battery in a few ways: an area to get fuel and repair the ship, being a place to store the capsule that are being built on the ship or a factory where pieces for those and/or robots are being built.
- We can also see that it's also night time, the moon clearly being visible in the sky. As Carnival Night Zone took place from evening to, let's say, midnight, Chrome Gadget could take place between midnight and morning
- The Flying Battery Zone could take off from this area at dawn making a nice transition to the next stage.  

3. Let's make Sandopolis a three act stage, Desert Palace Zone being in the middle.
- As our heroes get to the end of the ancient Egyptian inspired area they reach what used to be a great palace, this the Desert Palace, taking the role of the second act.
- As the level doesn't give us many things to work it, let it be a short act (especially since the first one was way too long) that would end it in an open area surrounded by ruins, giving the impression that something was supposed to be there, and here will be the place where the great pyramid, that is going to be the third act, will rise from the ground.

Damn, I think I wrote more here than in what will be my dissertation thesis.
I may come back later to the following level connections:
4. Balloon Park + Carnival Night Zone
5. Endless Mine + Lava Reef Zone - At first I wanted to place it somewhere close to Hydro City, but I think it fits better here.

[xXtrollfaceXx123]

Yeah it would be neat if there is a reboot of the game

[jerbear64]

Actually, Sonic Team didn't work on the remakes of the classic Sonic games at all.

That was done by two people called Taxman and Stealth, and their "Retro Engine." SEGA just published them.

They has a proof of concept S3K port but for whatever reason SEGA hasn't gotten to them to release anything yet.

[BigT]

true

[Niko]

A reboot? Is that even a thing? The only thing I've heard about was the Christian Whitehead S3&K remake and that too was delayed because he started working on Sonic Mania.