^AFAIK, only the PS1 version forces it on you. I've heard the Dreamcast version has it as an option, unfortunately can't confirm, but Revolution has it as default and does keep the gibberish as an option (and they even recorded new gibberish for the new lines and some others). You do need to set it each time you start the game but it's not too much a bother.
And yeah, Revolution adds a lot of new stuff. New levels, bosses, a hub world, you can officially get the 1,000th lum, some new minigames, an ability store, new and enhanced visuals and animations; some people call it a straight up remake and I can definitely see where they get confused on that. It wouldn't surprise me if this is the version Ancel wanted to make but had to compromise.