Whoa what? A new review?? Surely not! (YES I AM STILL WORKING ON MY RED DEAD REDEMPTION REVIEW FOR THOSE IN THE KNOW.)
Sonic Dream Team is a new Sonic game that has been developed by both SEGA Hardlight, the mobile division of SEGA, and Apple themselves, which led to the exclusivity in the Apple Arcade app. Now I can DEFINITELY understand the frustration of this move, because I was actually one of the people who complained. But now that I have an Apple TV 4K box, I can play this game. Let’s get straight into it as this is not a long game by any means.
STORY:
Sonic Dream Team opens up with Dr. Eggman trying to bring his dreams to reality with a new device called the Reverie. But due to its design, only the pure-hearted could have their dreams be reality. Eggman tries to go around it by using Cream and Cheese as a conduit. Ariem, the sheep Dreamweaver puts Eggman to sleep before he could do anything else. Sonic and co. arrive shortly and find Eggman conked out. They too are knocked out to sleep and end up in the Dream World where 4 stages reside: Scrambled Shores, Dream Factory, Nightmare Maze, and Ego City. Sonic gets as many Dream Orbs as he can to free his friends, and eventually, they face down Eggman and heal Ariem within the Dream Core. And that’s pretty much it! It’s a much simpler, yet effective story all the same, and this was written by Ian Flynn (who’s really surprised) and Dan Rossati. Amazing stuff all around.
GAMEPLAY:
The gameplay of Sonic Dream Team is what you’d normally expect from Sonic games in general nowadays: Boosting levels where you go up platforms and get to the end as fast as possible. Of course, the gameplay is Sonic Frontiers mixed with the controls of games like Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations. It is very fun and I’ve really enjoyed myself here. The game is structured kinda like Sonic Colors where there is a main act that has you collecting blue coins and red star rings combined with missions that are the same; Collecting 6 Dream Shards, time trial where you have to get to the end before the time limit runs out, finding a Dream Orb on the stage, and reaching checkpoints before the timer runs out. It COULD be repetitive, but for me, with the new levels in Sonic Dream Team, it can actually be fun exploring them. Of course, it would be even more fun if there was a DAMN STOMP! I have no clue WHY they did not include the stomp as it can make platforming precisely a chore. Something that I think Hardlight should add in the future. The levels in and of themselves are quite open. Not as open as Frontiers (obviously), but it’s not as linear as the previous boost games like Forces, Generations, Colors, and Unleashed. And all the playable characters are paired up into 3 duo groups kind of like Sonic Heroes: Speed, Flight, and Power. Sonic and Amy are speed, Tails and Cream are flight, and Knuckles and Rouge are power. But they all play the exact same. Not that there’s anything WRONG with it by any means at all though. And while you play the game, when you unlock the rest of the playable characters, you can actually switch to any of them with a press of a button, but you have to be idle for it to work. And can I just say this? How EMBARRASSING is it to be Sonic Team right now? If SEGA Hardlight can program the character switch actions to a single button, then SO SHOULD SONIC TEAM. IT IS NOT THAT HARD. But NO, unlike Dream Team, you have to go to the Master King Koco to switch characters. IMAGINE THAT.
And finally, you face off against bosses that are quite easy and I’m very happy it’s not the type of BS that the Master King Koco trials and the Superstars bosses were, because holy SHIT, THOSE were a mess. Dr. Crabulous, The Four Man, and Guardian Hunter are great bosses, especially the 3rd one in particular. That monster would honestly be quite terrifying to face in your dreams.
And that’s pretty much the gameplay. Yeah, this is a very short segment, but hey, this game was very fun to say the least. I loved it!
STAGES:
Let’s list off the stages that you can play in.
- SCRAMBLED SHORES.
Scrambled Shores is the first introductory stage in Sonic Dream Team, and I won’t really lie here, this was a very nice change of scenery after the Open Zone in Sonic Frontiers. It’s more akin to a Seaside Hill type zone with lots of water, sand, grass, hot air balloons, etc. It’s a really cool setting, but it’s not as visually appealing as the next three zones.
- DREAM FACTORY
Dream Factory is a very cool looking zone here. You can see Magination, a fuel used to…well, fuel your dreams. It’s a really fun zone to run around in. Not much to really say here, but Act 3 is fun. You get to see the LITERAL Nightmare Fuel that Eggman creates in this factory. But that’s no surprise to anyone really, Eggman really wants to make his dreams a living nightmare for the heroes.
- NIGHTMARE MAZE
Now THIS is the best zone in the entire game. This is a labyrinth of Eggman’s inner insanity. This is a pure anti-gravity zone and it makes it a lot of fun. The fact that you can explore the labyrinth-like zone with the fun anti-gravity gimmick makes it a based level on its own.
- EGO CITY
This is quite a fun final zone. And Ego is right, because holy shit, this zone is what Eggman wants the future to be, and we all know that it’s going to be QUITE a bad idea. Eggman IS egotistical after all. The final boss, while disappointing, does have some fun level design that you go through with all characters.
And that’s all the stages! If I had to rank them from best to worst, they would be:
1. Nightmare Maze
2. Ego City
3. Dream Factory
4. Scrambled Shores
All of them are fun in their own right, but if I was to come back and replay the levels, it’d mostly be in Nightmare Maze no question about it.
Now for the music!
MUSIC:
Sonic Dream Team does have a good soundtrack on its hands, but like Sonic Lost World, not all tracks are really memorable. However, I have some favorites. Let’s list them off.
1. Scrambled Shores/Dream Factory/Nightmare Maze/Ego City Ambient (Yes I’m grouping them together.)
2. Nightmare Eggman
3. Intro Song
4. Guardian Hunter
5. Green Hill Remix (even though it’s in the files, it’s not in the game, and not a Green Hill level in sight).
6. Nightmare Maze Act 2
And last but not least:
7. The Four Man
All composers of the tracks did honestly great with the OST overall.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
I really, REALLY enjoyed this game. Even with the honeymoon phase still in effect, I thought this game was very fun. The levels were great, the gameplay had a simple but effective loop to get more Dream Orbs, the music was fantastic, and the story is very simple, but for what it sets out to accomplish, I really like it! My only real gripes with the game are the voices of Rouge and Cream not being as good as they should be; Rouge sounding like an OLD WOMAN AT TIMES, and Cream having a nasally and squeaky as fuck voice (and I say this with no disrespect to Michelle Ruff, the voice actress for Cream), and my other gripe is that Knuckles and Rouge’s gliding controls are DISGUSTING. That is MUCH worse than Frontiers, and it got an UPDATE to FIX its gliding. The wall climbing is disappointing as well as you can only climb on certain surfaces instead of on any surface like in the Adventure games. And finally, while backtracking is not really an issue for me anyway, often times, if you go on really fast to try and beat the game, you’re pretty much going to have to play the missions I listed in the Gameplay Section to get more Dream Orbs. They shouldn’t really take you that long.
Is this game perfect by any means? Not even CLOSE. Is it terrible? HELL no. Is it good? Yes. Would I understand that it could be mediocre for someone? Absolutely.
Now, would I recommend Sonic Dream Team? Absolutely…if you have an Apple device, that is; a Mac, an Apple TV, an iPhone, or even an iPad. And considering this is an Apple Arcade exclusive…this might be a turn off to some people. I hope that Apple allows SEGA to bring Dream Team to consoles and PC. With that said, my ranking for this game is:
RANK: GREAT!
Sonic Dream Team is a new Sonic game that has been developed by both SEGA Hardlight, the mobile division of SEGA, and Apple themselves, which led to the exclusivity in the Apple Arcade app. Now I can DEFINITELY understand the frustration of this move, because I was actually one of the people who complained. But now that I have an Apple TV 4K box, I can play this game. Let’s get straight into it as this is not a long game by any means.
STORY:
Sonic Dream Team opens up with Dr. Eggman trying to bring his dreams to reality with a new device called the Reverie. But due to its design, only the pure-hearted could have their dreams be reality. Eggman tries to go around it by using Cream and Cheese as a conduit. Ariem, the sheep Dreamweaver puts Eggman to sleep before he could do anything else. Sonic and co. arrive shortly and find Eggman conked out. They too are knocked out to sleep and end up in the Dream World where 4 stages reside: Scrambled Shores, Dream Factory, Nightmare Maze, and Ego City. Sonic gets as many Dream Orbs as he can to free his friends, and eventually, they face down Eggman and heal Ariem within the Dream Core. And that’s pretty much it! It’s a much simpler, yet effective story all the same, and this was written by Ian Flynn (who’s really surprised) and Dan Rossati. Amazing stuff all around.
GAMEPLAY:
The gameplay of Sonic Dream Team is what you’d normally expect from Sonic games in general nowadays: Boosting levels where you go up platforms and get to the end as fast as possible. Of course, the gameplay is Sonic Frontiers mixed with the controls of games like Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations. It is very fun and I’ve really enjoyed myself here. The game is structured kinda like Sonic Colors where there is a main act that has you collecting blue coins and red star rings combined with missions that are the same; Collecting 6 Dream Shards, time trial where you have to get to the end before the time limit runs out, finding a Dream Orb on the stage, and reaching checkpoints before the timer runs out. It COULD be repetitive, but for me, with the new levels in Sonic Dream Team, it can actually be fun exploring them. Of course, it would be even more fun if there was a DAMN STOMP! I have no clue WHY they did not include the stomp as it can make platforming precisely a chore. Something that I think Hardlight should add in the future. The levels in and of themselves are quite open. Not as open as Frontiers (obviously), but it’s not as linear as the previous boost games like Forces, Generations, Colors, and Unleashed. And all the playable characters are paired up into 3 duo groups kind of like Sonic Heroes: Speed, Flight, and Power. Sonic and Amy are speed, Tails and Cream are flight, and Knuckles and Rouge are power. But they all play the exact same. Not that there’s anything WRONG with it by any means at all though. And while you play the game, when you unlock the rest of the playable characters, you can actually switch to any of them with a press of a button, but you have to be idle for it to work. And can I just say this? How EMBARRASSING is it to be Sonic Team right now? If SEGA Hardlight can program the character switch actions to a single button, then SO SHOULD SONIC TEAM. IT IS NOT THAT HARD. But NO, unlike Dream Team, you have to go to the Master King Koco to switch characters. IMAGINE THAT.
And finally, you face off against bosses that are quite easy and I’m very happy it’s not the type of BS that the Master King Koco trials and the Superstars bosses were, because holy SHIT, THOSE were a mess. Dr. Crabulous, The Four Man, and Guardian Hunter are great bosses, especially the 3rd one in particular. That monster would honestly be quite terrifying to face in your dreams.
And that’s pretty much the gameplay. Yeah, this is a very short segment, but hey, this game was very fun to say the least. I loved it!
STAGES:
Let’s list off the stages that you can play in.
- SCRAMBLED SHORES.
Scrambled Shores is the first introductory stage in Sonic Dream Team, and I won’t really lie here, this was a very nice change of scenery after the Open Zone in Sonic Frontiers. It’s more akin to a Seaside Hill type zone with lots of water, sand, grass, hot air balloons, etc. It’s a really cool setting, but it’s not as visually appealing as the next three zones.
- DREAM FACTORY
Dream Factory is a very cool looking zone here. You can see Magination, a fuel used to…well, fuel your dreams. It’s a really fun zone to run around in. Not much to really say here, but Act 3 is fun. You get to see the LITERAL Nightmare Fuel that Eggman creates in this factory. But that’s no surprise to anyone really, Eggman really wants to make his dreams a living nightmare for the heroes.
- NIGHTMARE MAZE
Now THIS is the best zone in the entire game. This is a labyrinth of Eggman’s inner insanity. This is a pure anti-gravity zone and it makes it a lot of fun. The fact that you can explore the labyrinth-like zone with the fun anti-gravity gimmick makes it a based level on its own.
- EGO CITY
This is quite a fun final zone. And Ego is right, because holy shit, this zone is what Eggman wants the future to be, and we all know that it’s going to be QUITE a bad idea. Eggman IS egotistical after all. The final boss, while disappointing, does have some fun level design that you go through with all characters.
And that’s all the stages! If I had to rank them from best to worst, they would be:
1. Nightmare Maze
2. Ego City
3. Dream Factory
4. Scrambled Shores
All of them are fun in their own right, but if I was to come back and replay the levels, it’d mostly be in Nightmare Maze no question about it.
Now for the music!
MUSIC:
Sonic Dream Team does have a good soundtrack on its hands, but like Sonic Lost World, not all tracks are really memorable. However, I have some favorites. Let’s list them off.
1. Scrambled Shores/Dream Factory/Nightmare Maze/Ego City Ambient (Yes I’m grouping them together.)
2. Nightmare Eggman
3. Intro Song
4. Guardian Hunter
5. Green Hill Remix (even though it’s in the files, it’s not in the game, and not a Green Hill level in sight).
6. Nightmare Maze Act 2
And last but not least:
7. The Four Man
All composers of the tracks did honestly great with the OST overall.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
I really, REALLY enjoyed this game. Even with the honeymoon phase still in effect, I thought this game was very fun. The levels were great, the gameplay had a simple but effective loop to get more Dream Orbs, the music was fantastic, and the story is very simple, but for what it sets out to accomplish, I really like it! My only real gripes with the game are the voices of Rouge and Cream not being as good as they should be; Rouge sounding like an OLD WOMAN AT TIMES, and Cream having a nasally and squeaky as fuck voice (and I say this with no disrespect to Michelle Ruff, the voice actress for Cream), and my other gripe is that Knuckles and Rouge’s gliding controls are DISGUSTING. That is MUCH worse than Frontiers, and it got an UPDATE to FIX its gliding. The wall climbing is disappointing as well as you can only climb on certain surfaces instead of on any surface like in the Adventure games. And finally, while backtracking is not really an issue for me anyway, often times, if you go on really fast to try and beat the game, you’re pretty much going to have to play the missions I listed in the Gameplay Section to get more Dream Orbs. They shouldn’t really take you that long.
Is this game perfect by any means? Not even CLOSE. Is it terrible? HELL no. Is it good? Yes. Would I understand that it could be mediocre for someone? Absolutely.
Now, would I recommend Sonic Dream Team? Absolutely…if you have an Apple device, that is; a Mac, an Apple TV, an iPhone, or even an iPad. And considering this is an Apple Arcade exclusive…this might be a turn off to some people. I hope that Apple allows SEGA to bring Dream Team to consoles and PC. With that said, my ranking for this game is:
RANK: GREAT!