I do gotta say, this is definitely an enjoyable experience especially for being a mobile game. It's a pretty unique take on a Sonic game that sort of feels like it blends elements of the Adventure and Boost formulas, even a few from the Lost World style. Level design and controls are generally pretty solid here - having a lot of freedom to move around and explore the levels with the different paths and whatnot (including some that take advantage of character specific abilities).

Which, on that note, worth mentioning that this game also offers 6 playable characters that are essentially grouped into 1 of 3 categories based off of their abilities - Sonic and Amy being the "speed" types with the Air Dash and Light Speed Dash, Tails and Cream having "flight" abilities, and Knuckles and Rouge being able to glide and climb certain walls. It isn't quite as varied as the different playable characters offered in the Frontiers: Final Horizon update (especially with Sonic and Amy playing the exact same here), but it is nice to see this feature present in more recent Sonic titles while doing so in a way that doesn't feel too intrusive. Plus it's especially interesting since this is the first time that Rouge and Cream have been playable in a Sonic game (at least as far as platformers go anyway) since 06 and Advance 3 respectively. The visuals also look really good here - very colorful on top of having some surprisingly good animation with it's character models.

That being said I do kind of feel like this is a game that's held back by the fact that it is a mobile game. What's there is definitely solid, but with how short the game is there's inevitably a bit of padding in the form of the missions that you have to do to obtain 'Dream Orbs' in which you need to progress, with that count of course getting higher even just between stages as you progress. I will give them that you can at least choose the missions you do to unlock the orbs and as such you are able to just go at your own pace, but I can't really deny that I did start to feel pretty burned out especially towards the end when I was just kinda playing the same levels over and over again in order to collect enough orbs. It's understandable as to why the game is structured as such as yeah, it's... kinda sparse on content and even with that requirement it only really takes a few hours to beat, but given the groundwork laid here, it really feels like there's potential to expand upon this formula but it does feel held back by being an Apple exclusive, and even while you can play it on a Mac computer if you have one, it definitely feels designed more around the limitations of mobile gaming with the intention of being played on an iOS device.

Kinda doesn't help that the only (actively supported) Apple device I have is a 6th gen iPad in which the performance in this game was rather... mixed. It wasn't completely unplayable or anything, but the game would often drop frames, sometimes to the point of feeling like a complete slideshow. In all fairness I should probably be thankful I had an Apple device at all to play this game because I'm sure there are a lot of Sonic fans who don't, but it all just serves to make me wish that this was more accessible on other platforms rather than just being locked to an Apple subscription service. And unfortunately since (from what I've gathered) Apple did help produce this game, those odds... aren't looking too great right now.

Overall, if you do have a supported Apple device, I'd definitely recommend trying this with the free trial of Apple Arcade, although I do hope some day that this game gets ported to other platforms. Even if it doesn't... well, I can at least hope Sega/Sonic Team builds upon and fleshes out this style of gameplay perhaps in a mainline title.

Incredibly shocked over the game's quality being somewhat superior to the most recent Sonic Team games. Game flow, level design, animations (like how do they do it even better than Sonic Team), music and replayability are all highlights here. A few things I'm critical about personally is the short length, stiff turning for the characters, Knuckles/Rouge gameplay (specifically them feeling much heavier than they usually do) and Rouge's voice acting (like how the fuck did they mess it up that bad). Other from those, the quality for this game is extremely surprising for an iOS game. Recommend playing this game with a game controller for the best experience.
Shame that it's an Apple Arcade exclusive, but if you ever get a subscription or use your trial, this game is a must play for the service.

Please Sega give Sonic Team more development budget or allow Hardlight to assist development in the next game. And I pray for this game to get ported to consoles in the future.

what a nice surprise! sega hardlight has consistently been crushing it on the sonic mobile market but this being their first attempt at a 3D action game in the sonic universe is wildly impressive.

graphically i love how it looks! tons of color and charm, and a lot of the acts particularly in the last 2 worlds are very distinct and unique. something like this is for sure the art style i’d want the series to continue on. the animations and whatnot are also insanely well done, to be fair there’s not a ton of actual animated cutscenes but the ones that are there look great! music was nothing too special, i don’t see myself actively searching up anything i heard here but it wasn’t bad by any means just didn’t stick with me.

story was cute, love seeing cream and rouge back, especially cream as she’s a big driving force of the story. it’s not the most engaging story and i wish there were a bit more character interactions but what’s there is solid. rogue’s voice actor is pretty rough though LOL.

gameplay wise i was impressed at how well made each major act in the worlds were, i wish it got slightly more challenging but at the same time it’s got to be a bit more generous since it has to cater to touch controls. the gameplay loop wasn’t my favorite thing, i kinda wish you could just do all the main acts and the other objectives were entirely optional. they aren’t particularly fun, they aren’t insanely bad or anything it’s just usually replaying the level or finding items in a small section of the level. it’s very sonic colors esque in where the main act is really solid and then the next couple shorter acts aren’t all that interesting. i would have played them either way but requiring them to make progress is a bit lame. the bosses are way too easy but still pretty fun! the final boss though was actually a ton of fun, those are my favorite style of sonic boss fights that aren’t super sonic, is big levels where the boss is attacking you as you platform and whatnot! controls are overall really solid, not as fun as something like the adventure games or frontiers but still feel really good. i have a couple nitpicks, my biggest one being no stomp. boost sonic always feels so much better with the ability to stomp after a homing attack chain or with a big drop below you and then boosting forward immediately after. it felt a bit awkward hanging in the air as long as i did cause i’m so used to stomping down. the character specific moves are cool, and i’m really glad in the main acts you can swap to whatever character you want mid stage but i do have a few gripes. the air dash for sonic/amy is pretty sick, but sometimes it feels like you go absolutely nowhere with it and it can feel awkward when that happens. the glide knuckles/rouge have works well enough but i wish you didn’t fall so fast. the worst one though is flying with tails/cream, it’s just so slow and sluggish unfortunately. i wish you could boost midair or something to make up for that. aside from that though each character feels solid, and it’s really cool to be able to play as rouge and cream again.

a really good showing for sega hardlights first 3d action sonic game, no real major downsides or complaints just a few small very fixable things. excited to see what they continue to do with this game and if they get to make another game in this style in the future cause it shows a lot of promise.

Gave this a whirl for my friends who are Sonic fans but don't have a Mac. All-in-all, I think it suffers from being basically a mobile game.
In general... It's, uh, Sonic? I don't have much of a reference considering the last time I played a 3D Sonic game was in Colors.
The stages are fine enough and don't feel linear at all, but having to replay them over and over drains my motivation, and that's the game's biggest downfall. The "beat the level while hitting all the checkpoints" and "collect the orb" are the only tolerable replays since they're so short, but then the "collect all six shards" or "beat the level in under 2 minutes) objectives don't feel different from the first run-around, which makes it boring to replay.

As for the characters, there's 3 groups (Sonic and Amy, Knuckles and Rouge, Tails and Cream).
Sonic's Group is the most fun to control because it feels like you have a lot more momentum and maneuverability.
Knuckles' Group is generally fine. I'm not a big fan of the climbing aspect but the game toys with it in interesting ways so it's not all too bad, and the gliding's good too.
Tails' Group is the one I find to be the most unwieldy. Flying lasts too little in the game and hitting the rings midair to recharge your flight meter can be a little tough to measure.

I was concerned about the lack of colorblindness settings, but I don't believe there's any mechanics that require colors, so it's fine.

This game is really really good and although i don't consider it a "mobile" game (because you can play apple arcade in other devices besides a mobile phone) most of the negatives i have with this game exist because it was designed so it can work well in mobile devices, so it has some limitations, also people need to stop shitting on apple/sega for the exclusivity, apple IS THE REASON this game exists in the first place, you rather have no game at all because you can't play it? lmao
Besides the community is so talented that it wouldn't surprise me if they ended up remaking, porting or decompiling the game so it can work on pc like they did with project-06.

The animation in this game is wonderful, the characters look really cute and fluid, it can look awkward sometimes but those are really small moments, when the cutscenes are fully animated is when they shine so whenever the game starts using slides and static pictures for the cutscenes is really boring in comparison, at least they are better than the ones in generations 3d lol.

The controls are fine, i still think frontiers has better control and movement especially in platforming, but the level design complements the movement options you have really well, i think the game is lacking from a stomp/bounce attack because falling sometimes feels slow and i don't like losing the rhythm/momentum i have, also people seem to complain about the knuckles/rouge glide? the glide is fine, you're supposed to glide in pretty much straight lines and the level design is made so you can do it in straight lines, is not like sa2 where you had more mobility because the game expected you to move around all over the place to explore (sam really exaggerated that shit when he was playing lmao).

The music was good, i don't know if it was just me but the music was really low when i was playing so i couldn't focus on it that much, but i would say that this is tee lopes weakest soundtrack, there's nothing really THAT memorable in the game except maybe the final boss music, but is far from mediocre, i would say that probably sonic runners had a better ost than dream team.

I also saw a few people saying that this is how sonic is supposed to look in aesthetics? but i doubt that, because this is just lost world's aesthetics, sure they are better executed and a little less saturated in colors but they are pretty similar, and most people didn't liked how lost world looked so i don't trust that statement lmao, this aesthetic felt a more like "classic sonic" than "modern sonic" to me, not that modern sonic shouldn't look like that but this is far from my "perfect sonic aesthetic" lol.

The gameplay and level design were really good but i'm not a fan of the mission style levels like in sonic colors where the levels end up being really short, except the ones when you need to finish before the time limit, those work perfectly, the wall running was awkward sometimes because the camera changed positions quickly and disoriented me, the multiple characters returning in "duos" reminded me of sonic advance 3 and i love that and how they use them in the final boss, even though it was really easy and kind of underwhelming lol.

I have lots of thoughts on this game so i'll stop writing already, but in conclusion this game is really good, really fun and really worth it to play if you can, just borrow an apple device and try the free month of apple arcade and you'll be able to beat it, is really short (and that's another negative lol).

In my opinion the perfect sonic game would be the fusion of sonic frontiers and sonic dream team, using the strengths of both games, and for that reason i love both of these games : )))))

somehow the best sonic game in like 5 years lol. it's simple with an arcade-like repetitiveness that feels great to play in small doses. the story isn't anything crazy but each character finally feels like themselves and it's sweet and charming all around. played this with a controller on mac so i cannot vouch for how actual mobile controls feel, but with a controller it's clean. the level/world design is also fun and fresh, unlike sonic frontiers.

i cannot see this getting ported anywhere anytime soon since apple directly funded it, so get a free 4-month trial from best buy while you can. the game is only like 3 hours.

Sonic Dream Team is a good game...and that's all it will ever be.
I finally completed the game on something that isn't an iPhone 12, and I definitely had a better experience. The platform says "Mac", but I played it on my dad's Apple TV with a Dualsense. If you ever plan to play this game, definitely go for the Apple TV or Mac route. The game wasn't bad, but it just felt like an average game that you forget about a week later. To be honest, I'm already forgetting specific elements of the game already. The game didn't feel as grindy this time around, probably since I was able to actually enjoy myself more. My opinions on the story and line deliveries, even after finishing it, remains the same. On the other hand, the gameplay did become significantly better on this second go. The air controls weren't very good, but the ground control on each character gave me vibes of Unleashed and Generations if they were slightly more open. The missions were pretty decent as well, requiring me to take short cuts that I had to discover on the fly. The game is an overall decent experience, but I simply cannot agree with anyone calling this game "peak Sonic" or "goated". It may be more visually appealing than Sonic Frontiers, but it lags behind it in nearly every other aspect. I can only imagine myself going back to this game if the Apple TV is right in front of me when I have nothing better to do.

For what it is, it does its job well. A fun little arcadey experience with its repetitive missions, minor story, semi-reliable controls, but all carried by its fun and replayable level design. I mean, other than the fact that its locked behind apple arcade, this game really isn't worth keeping a subscription for. I think this game should've taken the Mario Run approach by charging you $10 for the whole experience since to me, this game is super short and having to pay $6 every month just to keep playing doesn't seem worth it.
If you do plan on playing it though, play on an ipad with a controller if you can, plus use up that free 1 month subscription while you're at it. Otherwise, you wont be missing out on much.

Also no this is not better than Sonic Frontiers.

As far as mobile games go, this one is extremely well made and high budget!
A lot of fun to pick up and play, though I don't quite understand when people directly compare this to something like frontiers or other mainline Sonic games.
It is better than Forces, though, lol.

Anywho, there's not much to say about this one?
It's fun, just extremely by the numbers.
I do appreciate the added polish in this game in regards to animation quality, but when there's as little animation as there is in this game, I'd expect nothing less.
Fun time!

Very surprised with how much I liked this, it feels like a very neat compromise between keeping the appeal of boost sonic with levels a lil more open-ended akin to older 3D Sonic game.
Due to the nature of the release and how it came to be there is some obvious corner cuts such as levels feeling like obvious fillers and controls being very simplified (probably likely due to touch screen controls players)
Otherwise it's a very good fondation and I can only hope that whichever big Sonic game comes out will attempt to follow up on these ideas for the stages

Sonic Dream Team is honestly what I want future Sonic games to be (sort of). I’m not going to act like this is a “Sonic Adventure 3” but if there is one, I want it to be like this. Is the rating I’m giving fair for the game? Probably not, but I had a ton of fun, even if it’s a bit safe.

The controls in this game are really solid. I played with a dualsense controller and had no issues. The same general movement is shared by all characters, but is divided further into Sonic and Amy who can air dash and lightspeed dash, Tails and Cream who can fly, and Knuckles and Rouge, who can glide. I actually prefer these versions to those found in Frontiers since they don’t have animations that stop all momentum. I wish Knuckles climbed quicker, and everyone had a quicker boost, but neither of these were that big of a problem for me.

I played this on an M1 Pro Macbook, and with all the settings cranked to the max the game was nearly flawless, although I noticed a few frame drops. It is sadly evident that it’s a mobile game, with some pieces that may not be as high quality as one might wish.

Level design is actually really good. There’s a ton of different paths that lead to blue coins and red rings, and you can change your character in an instant to collect certain items. It’s still somewhat linear, but I do think they have the potential to expand levels with this same control scheme and see great results.

The game is pretty easy which I believe stems from it being a mobile game. Being Apple Arcade exclusive is stupid and I hope it gets ported someday, but that Tim Apple money is probably how this game exists in the first place, so whatever.

Most cutscenes are also just pictures with a moving element or two, which is either a budget constraint or a hardware constraint. It sucks, but Sonic stories are just whatever to me anyways.

Overall I think with a few tweaks this is what I want sonic to be. Manages to outdo a lot of Sonic Team’s work and I hope Hardlight can develop more than just infinite mobile runners.

Overall this was amazing for a mobile game. It’s not doing anything that I don’t like in the game that I would want out of it. Rather, I just have things I’d want in it and that’s amazing for most 3D Sonic games (unfortunately). The music is also kinda okay for a Sonic game with me wanting more from most of the tracks, but this is the composer’s first time doing music for a Sonic game so that’s cool. The levels and platforming feel like a more fun and less of a Mario Galaxy knock off version of Lost World for me and I enjoyed all of them. The bosses are pretty fun too, and honestly, it’s just nice to play as Cream in a 3D Sonic game after idk how long? Since Heroes? It really does suck this’ll probably be stuck on Apple Arcade. Sorry for all my Android Sonic fans we’ll get em next time. (Hopefully this review ages like milk). Also also, I hope Sonic Team takes notes, I would love for these kind of levels to show up in Frontiers 2 or whatever they plan to cook for mainline Sonic games.