I suppose that's a fair point for long time fans, but Tangle and Whisper are more in tune with modern Sonic and this is just me speculating, I'm thinking Sega is more hesitant to use any characters from the bygone era after the mess they had to deal with Penders. Tangle and Whisper are completely free from that drama which would make them much more appealing to use in other media, plus I believe they are actually fairly popular with the kids. That said, I wouldn't mind seeing the FF in modern games, but it is what is.