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.

Amazing game. Played it with @Golin5660 and it was a blast all around. It's not a super complicated game but just the experience of playing with someone else is crazy. All of the Hazelight technology from A Way Out is here and I think it works better in a faster paced game like this where you would legitimately want to show something to someone else. The story was pretty good and while I didn't find the mocap to be amazing, when in doll form (95% of the game) the characters look fine enough. Highly recommend trying this out with a friend because you won't regret it.

I really want to like this game. The sense of speed is super satisfying to keep up, and behind some massive issues there is actually a good game. One thing I do like are the tricks, the upward one especially is super handy.

Screen crunch is here and worse than ever. The game wants you to barrel through it as fast as possible but you literally can't see what's happening.

Dimps is the developer so obviously bottomless pits galore. Need I say more?

All the boss fights suck. Half the time you can't even see most of the boss since the screen crunch cuts half of it off.

The lives are also super strict. 3 lives and that's all. Game over and you're back to Act 1 of the zone (luckily it keeps Zones with a save).

If Sega ports this game and makes it 16:9 and zooms the camera out this could probably gain an extra 1.5 stars but as of now it's just not very fun to play.

Lots to say about this one. This is both a review of Rayman itself and the DSiWare port of the game.

Rayman itself is fine for the first 2 worlds. Most of the hidden cages feel well designed and like I earned them. It was difficult, but I still felt like it was manageable (probably helps the default health is 2x the PS1 version). It's both lame and cool that you unlock moves, because it actually teaches you that running and punching aren't always the best moves at a certain time.

After that, the game immediately starts to just get more frustrating. Enemies will start spawning instead of triggering cages and such, and sometimes the placement is super frustrating. I heard the devs apparently didn't playtest the game very much, and it clearly shows. The balancing gets super bad, especially in Eat at Joes.

I'm sure I'm the first person to say the requirement of all cages is stupid. It actually bumps the game down a whole half star. I went ahead and got them all (I used a guide, since there was no way I was going to experience some of the levels again). For all of that work, the final level was a solid eh. Used some skills but other levels were definitely more difficult (or just stupid bs).

The DSiWare Port specifically is actually pretty nice. I don't have a frame of reference to the PC/PS1 ports, but the game definitely retains much of it's artstyle. Some songs are cut from the soundtrack which definitely sucks, since the few on display start to repeat a lot and get a bit grating. However, the quality of the songs is perfectly manageable.

The screen crunch is definitely real. Luckily, they put a map on the bottom screen at all times (that you can even scroll around on!) but it doesn't help that Rayman is glued to one side of the screen, so if something happens on the other end (like an enemy spawning), it is impossible to see. I wish they had put the effort in to making Rayman's sprite just a tad smaller to fit more on screen, but that probably would have required a lot of change.

The game is significantly easier. You only need half the tings for a life, you keep them when you die, your health is doubled, etc. I actually like this change, because it still never felt like I was just damage boosting through enemies (I think there's fewer I-frames?). It just felt more fair. I did end up grinding for lives in Allegro Presto just because the requirements were more relaxed, however (positive for me, maybe not for you).

Any problems I had with the DSiWare port were able to be overlooked by me. Sadly, the one thing holding this port back is the one new "feature" it has to claim for itself. Everytime you get your photo taken by the photographer, the game takes a photo of yourself in real life. Maybe the novelty is just different in 2023, but it just feels creepy. Even though the photos aren't saved, it just feels weird to have the game take a photo, even if you know when it's going to. The worst part is the DS/3DS makes a shutter noise that you can't turn off. This makes the game impossible to play in public, which feels dumb considering it's on a handheld. I wish there was just an option to turn off the camera feature entirely.

Overall, Rayman on DSi was fine. It's probably the best version to start with just because it's the easiest with fewer compromises compared to the GBA port. I would recommend trying it out, but if you don't like 100% completion in games, then you may want to skip this one. Or hate games that are wildly unfair at times.

I've heard Rayman Redemption on PC is good, so maybe start there. But for that original experience, this is also a fine enough choice.

Played with @jerwur. Doing pros and cons is probably the best way to review this game, so uh, I'm going to do that.

Pros:
-The story was good overall, I liked the starting 2 hours and ending 2 hours the most. The middle faltered a bit, but I still wanted to see it through to the end.
-Playing with a friend that chooses to make things silly instead of serious is pretty fun.
-The splitscreen concept works really well, actually. It sometimes dynamically changes the window depending on who is more important, and if you're playing online if you and your friend interact with different people at the same time, it will make the other person more muffled. Nice touch.
-The game is very forgiving in terms of checkpoints, so if you die you are likely to not have to redo a large portion of gameplay.
-Minigames were fun time wasters
-Vincent Ass

Cons:
-This game is not focused. Sometimes it's a walking simulator, sometimes it's a third person shooter, sometimes it's stealth missions, and other times it just wants to be completely storybased. It just throws a lot of things at the board and hopes it all sticks
-The game is basically just a set of QTEs surrounded by a world. Could be better.
-Most of the activities you perform are just not very fun. Fishing was actually the hardest part of the game and it had no right to be.
-Animations on the whole were a little rough. Mouth movements weren't amazing in cutscenes and a lot of the time they just looked kind of robotic, which is hard to take seriously.
-Sometimes movement and overall game feel just aren't very polished.

Even with all those issues, playing with a friend just makes the game so much more fun. It's not the best game, but I definitely enjoyed my time with it.