Gentoo in run level 3 looks exactly like SuSE, RedHat, Slackware, Debian, Libranet...You get my point. It's the same thing, just SuSE comes with a **** load more.
If SUSE comes with more, how can it be the same thing?

BTW, I use Gentoo occassionally and it works quite well. Yes, it does take a long time to install, but you learn a lot in the process (it's about as close to Linux From Scratch as you're going to get from a proper distribution).