Video Game / Sonic Dream Team

Turn dreams into reality.

Sonic Dream Team is a 3D Sonic the Hedgehog platformer developed by Sega HARDlight (developers of Sonic Jump, Sonic Dash, and Sonic Forces: Speed Battle), released on December 5, 2023 as part of the Apple Arcade service on iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, and Mac.

Dr. Eggman seeks out an ancient artifact known as the Reverie, which has the power to bring dreams into reality. In order to do so, he has kidnapped Cream the Rabbit alongside Cheese and is almost successful, until "Ariem," the guardian of the Reverie, stops him by trapping him in his own dream and sending Sonic and his friends into it as well when they made their arrival. From there, it is up to them to traverse through a series of twisted dreamscapes and stop Eggman from turning his dreams of world domination into reality.

The game features a total of twelve acts across four zones, with six playable characters. Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy, as well as Cream the Rabbit and Rouge the Bat, making their first playable appearances in a Sonic platformer since Sonic Runners. Ian Flynn, who previously wrote the story for Sonic Frontiers, is a part of the game's writing team.

Previews: Trailer, Animated Intro, Launch Trailer

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Sonic Dream Team provides examples of:

• 100% Completion: The game features a total of 36 statues to unlock that are tied with the achievements from Apple's Game Center, with some being tied to collecting the Dream Orbs. There's 101 Dream orbs in total to obtain, with 12 requiring the player to collect 5 red star rings in each first act of each Zone's level (60 red rings total). 12 statues can also be obtained from collecting all the blue coins in the game (30 per first act in each Zone, which means 360 blue coins total), and 25 statues tied to Tails' Challenges. There's no reward, other than the statues providing a bit of unlockable flavor text.
  • The first post-launch update adds 2 more missions per boss, bumping the Dream Orb total to 109 Dream Orbs to collect.
  • The second post-launch update adds more missions in a new world called "Sweet Dream," which has a series of Moon Medals to collect. The second update also adds S-Rank medals, which also tie into four more unlockable statues that unlock for collecting every S-Rank medal in a world.
• Achievement System: There is an in-game achievement system that list various objectives, such as getting all 30 blue coins in a level, with each completed accomplishment rewarding the player with a statue. However, the achievements that list objectives like completing the tutorial or obtaining all the Dream Orbs for a level won't be unlocked in-game unless a player creates or signs in to their Apple Game Center account. These statues and achievements will still unlock after signing in and doing one of the levels again.
• Action-Hogging Opening: Much like Sonic CD, Mania, and Superstars before it, the game has a pre-rendered 2D animated opening movie that plays when the game is started up.
• All the Worlds Are a Stage: Much like the final climactic level of Sonic Adventure 2, the final level of Dream Team has everyone working together, switching between each character and having the player platform through segments that utilize each of their specific gameplay styles, while simultaneously playing Keep Away with Eggman so Ariem can be inserted into the Dream Core. In order, the player controls Sonic, Rouge, Knuckles, Cream, and finally Amy (skipping Tails, as he's the one working on the Dream Core at the top) in this one level. Eggman then sends the heroes back further down in order to prevent them from reaching the Dream Core, leading to one last run with Sonic as he ascends the tower and dealing the last hit by throwing Ariem into said Dream Core.
• And That's Terrible: Ariem is less than pleased after learning that someone like Eggman kidnapped a child like Cream to bypass her defenses to control a powerful artifact. More specifically, using said child as filter to get around how he isn't "pure of heart," and manipulate the device in order for him to grant his wishes.
  Ariem: Puppeteering a child?! This is a new low, even for you, Doctor.
• Attack Its Weak Point: Two of the bosses have these:
  • Dr. Crabulous has three air valves due to being an inflatable. Two valves are on its claws and one is on its rear end, once Sonic/Amy attack said valves, it’ll shrink to the size of your average pipsqueak.
  • The Factory Foreman and the Four Man have red buttons on their heads that show themselves when tired.
• Balance Buff: After the Version 1.2.0 update, the bosses were rebalanced to have different attack patterns. The first boss, Dr. Crabulous, requires six hits to be defeated instead of three.
• Batman Gambit: Because Ariem is tied to the Reverie, Eggman can't use it without her "authorization", but that doesn't mean he has to convince or force her. He builds the Guardian Hunter to attack and steal her energy away in an attempt to access her Dream Core. However, he waits until Sonic and his friends arrive to try and bring her to it in her dormant state so he can ambush them and take control. Unfortunately for him, they already found out about the plan and they work together to take Ariem to the Core and regain her full strength before Eggman can get near either of them. After that, Ariem finally banishes him from the Reverie and his vision erased by her "Dormancy Protocol".
• Battle in the Center of the Mind: The game has Sonic and his friends journey to Eggman's twisted mind and help Ariem regain enough of her power to take the Reverie from the mad doctor.
• Bittersweet Ending: Sonic and his friends foil Eggman once again and prevent his dreams of conquest from becoming a literal reality, but it comes at a price. To ensure that he can't use the Reverie again, Ariem activates a "Dormancy Protocol", locking its power, and her, away for a thousand years. However, Tails finds a way to work around this while they helped to restore her power. He reveals that, while it can't manifest dreams anymore until the protocol ends, the heroes can attach it to their own machine so they can use it to reenter the dreamscapes and interact with Ariem whenever they want.
• Bookends:
  • The game begins with Eggman kidnapping Cream and Cheese for his newest plan. They get a chance to pay him back in the real world, after they and the others defeat him in his own dreamscape.
  • The final level starts with the player controlling as Sonic, switches control between four of the other heroes, and then one last dash that has the player controlling Sonic again.
• Boss Subtitles: Each boss has its own subtitle when you encounter them.
  • Dr. Crabulous: Cognitive Crustacean
  • Factory Foreman: Menacing Managers
    • The Four Man: Managerial Mecha
  • Guardian Hunter: Nightmare Horror
• Branch-and-Bottleneck Plot Structure: How the cutscene to each of the first three boss fights begins and ends depending on the character chosen.
  • Sonic or Amy vs. Dr. Crabulous.
    • Sonic heads to face the boss, but Amy complains that he "shouldn't have all the fun". Either character mocks the boss and, after defeating it, helps Ariem bring back Tails and Cream.
  • Tails or Cream vs. the Four Man:
    • Wanting to help, Cream and Cheese rush to face the boss and stop Eggman from launching the Guardian Hunter, but there is a choice whether to let them do so or have Tails go on instead. Eggman's interaction is slightly different depending on who goes, but the chosen character is disappointed when they fail to stop the launch. However, they are cheered up afterwards by their friends, especially after helping Ariem bring back Knuckles and Rouge.
  • Knuckles or Rouge vs. the Guardian Hunter:
    • When the Guardian Hunter attacks Ariem, Rouge or Knuckles rush in to drive it away.
• Breaking Old Trends: This is the first game Rouge has appeared in that doesn't also include Shadow or Omega, her usual teammates from Team Dark.
• The Bus Came Back: As shown in the trailer, this marks Cream and Rouge's first playable appearances in a Sonic platformer since Sonic Runners back in 2015.
• A Day in the Limelight: Cream and Cheese not only appear after a long absence in a major Sonic title since Sonic Generations, but they are a key part of Sonic Dream Team's narrative.
• Denser and Wackier: In contrast to the previous 3D Sonic game, Sonic Frontiers, this game goes back to the colorful and cartoony direction of Sonic Lost World. Justified, since the worlds are intended to be dreamscapes.
• Dream Land: The various zones are referred to as "twisted dreamscapes" in the synopsis. The new world added in the second content update, "Sweet Dream," is a much more deliberate and straight example, which contains cotton candy-like clouds and moon-like imagery.
• Egopolis: The aptly-named "Ego City" is the final dreamscape most crafted in Eggman's image. The heroes figure out that Eggman wants to use the Reverie to instantly manifest this vision into building a simultaneous Eggmanland and the Eggman Empire in the real world.
• Eternal Engine: The Dream Factory is a factory that is full of an amber colored fluid called Magination, the essence of dreams. Dr. Eggman had been making his batch of corrupted Magination here, as well as the Guardian Hunter.
• Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Halfway through the story, Eggman creates a "Guardian Hunter" robot, a robot specifically made to hunt down the Reverie's guardian, Ariem. While the heroes destroy it, it manages to sap some of her power away.
• Floating Limbs: Going by her wrists (or rather lack thereof), Ariem's hands aren't connected to her body, similar to NiGHTS. Beyond that, it's unknown if any of her other limbs are also detached as she wears a turtlenecked robe that covers her neck, torso, and legs.
• Forced Sleep: The Reverie forces Eggman into a slumber after Ariem discovers his machinations. When Sonic and his friends find the doctor at his lab asleep, the Reverie then puts them to sleep in order to have them enter his dream and stop his plans of world domination. Cream and Cheese also put Eggman back to sleep during their payback after they get out of the dreamscapes.
• Gender-Equal Ensemble: The playable cast consists of three boys (Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles) and three girls (Amy, Cream, and Rouge).
• "Get Back Here!" Boss: The Guardian Hunter will keep its distance from Knuckles/Rouge and throw obstacles in the way to do so.
• Giant Enemy Crab: One of the bosses is a giant Crabmeat, called Dr. Crabulous, who looks like one of Eggman's Badniks, but has its entire body made of Balloons. If you choose Sonic, he even namedrops the trope when encountering it:
  Sonic: Seaside dream... giant enemy crab! Why am I not sur... wait, is that a moustache?
• Giant Mook: One of the bosses is a giant Crabmeat Badnik with Eggman's mustache known as Dr. Crabulous.
• Grind Boots: The game has rail-grinding mechanics, like most 3D Sonic games since Sonic Adventure 2 as well as Sonic Superstars.
• Informed Ability: Amy's statue mentions that she makes great use of her Piko Piko Hammer but she can't actually use it in this game because her moveset matches Sonic's.
• Intercom Villainy: In the Ego City dreamscape, Dr. Eggman can be heard shouting over the PA, in the same style as his broadcasts from Sonic Colors. Some of his announcements include him being insecure about his egg-shaped body, congratulating himself for winning the employee of the month award, and how he aims to keep animals safe by stuffing them in robots.
• Last Lousy Point: There are 30 blue coins spread across each first act of each level in the game, and while many of them can be picked up easily during a first run or even searching through alternate pathways, the coins are sometimes placed in rather odd areas that are very out of the way or missable as one speeds through the level. Some of the blue coins can't even be collected until you have a character that has the proper ability to get them, requiring at least a second playthrough of the first Act to explore the exclusive routes and pick up any coins that were missed (the first act of Nightmare Maze, the third zone, is when players get access to every character type available).
• Law of 100: Averted, which creates a strange situation when it comes to the rings. There are tons of rings in every level, where ending a level with more than 300 is fairly easy. However you get nothing for these so anything beyond the first ring you collect are just...there (since that first ring does keep you from dying from being hit). There are no lives and the game doesn't keep track of the rings you exit a stage with as a means of currency or even simple record keeping. Having lots of rings means absolutely nothing other than being able to appreciate being able to hold onto that many.
• Level in Boss Clothing: The final level of Ego City, Nightmare Eggman. While Eggman is attacking the heroes during their climb through his dream, there's a health bar that corresponds to a single hit for the boss. Instead of fighting Eggman directly, the heroes carry Ariem's essence to the Dream Core, navigating a level with five out of the six heroes, each one having a section that are tailored to their unique abilities. Sonic is both the first and last playable character of this level, dealing the only hit of this "fight" by throwing Ariem into the Dream Core.
• Loophole Abuse: According to Ariem, the Reverie is designed to turn dreams into reality, but she is "authorized" to only allow "pure-hearted" individuals to harness it (those with "good intentions"). Eggman is obviously far from pure... but Cream the Rabbit is as pure as a child can be, which is why he abducts her and Cheese prior to the story, using them as "filters" to trick Ariem. Luckily, the guardian sees through this deception in time and locks Eggman in his own dreamscape before he can fully manifest his dreams of world conquest.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: The Reverie is an ancient artifact described as a Reality Warper that can manifests one's dreams to the real world, but it also acts as a computer server when connected to modern machinery. While Ariem is its guardian, she acts more like an Artificial Intelligence security program, created to permit whomever she deems worthy of using the device. She even has her own set of "protocols" in place that she can trigger in case it ever falls into the wrong hands. She ends up using two against Eggman in the beginning and end of the game. Unfortunately, the second ["Dormancy"] protocol prevents anyone from using the Reverie's power for about a thousand years.
• Moveset Clone: Like Sonic Adventure 2, Dream Team gives three sets of identical controls and abilities between its six characters, with some unique aspect to separate the characters — Amy and Sonic can both use the Light Speed Dash and instantly zip to a location using a trail of rings, Cream and Tails can both fly, where passing through special yellow rings will restore their flight meter, and both Knuckles and Rouge can glide around and climb up walls the other aforementioned four can't. Each character shares the ability to do a Homing Attack and Boost.
• Mysterious Past: Ariem was created as a form of "security" for the Reverie, but it is never revealed who made either of them.
• Mythology Gag:
  • The essence of dreams being called "Magination" calls back to the setting of Sonic Shuffle, Maginaryworld, which likewise was a world of dreams.
  • Cream and Cheese getting revenge on Eggman is framed in the exact same way as Charmy attacking Eggman in Team Chaotix's last cutscene in Sonic Heroes.
  • Eggman is once again making comical PA announcements.
  • Tails notes that Eggman taking control of the Reverie will enable him to establish Eggmanland and the Eggman Empire in one fell swoop; notably, Ego City features statues almost identical to the one at Eggmanland's gate, and this isn't the first time Eggman's used an ancient reality-altering artifact to try to establish the Eggman Empire.
  • Outside the times that Sonic has said it in the games and other material, he says "Let's do it to it" at one point during the story.
• Noodle Incident: It is never explained how Cream and Cheese ended up in Eggman's clutches before the start of the story.
• One-Hit-Point Wonder: Like most Sonic games, getting hit without any rings will force the player to restart from a checkpoint. The Version 1.2.0 update introduces missions against the bosses where the player only has one ring.
• Palmtree Panic: The Scrambled Shores is (as Sonic puts it) a seaside dream with almost everything here an inflatable, the palm trees, a ship, and even the boss is a Giant Enemy Crab formed mostly of balloons.
• Play Every Day: Or rather, "play every week." Alongside the levels that can be played and rewards that are tied to accomplishing certain conditions, the game has its own set of rewards that can be obtained by playing "Tails' Challenges," which provide five randomly picked levels from the game that the player must complete in order to gain XP. If a player completes all five, they earn a bonus amount of XP. Depending on the total amount of XP earned, it will unlock a new trophy in a completely separate section from the other rewards, and the Game Center/in-game achievements have rewards tied to obtaining a certain amount of total XP from doing these challenges. These challenges refresh every week.
• Punny Name:
  • The new character's name, Ariem, is pronounced similar to the phonetic pronunciation of the acronym, "R.E.M." — "rapid eye movement" (often shortened to "REMsleep"); the state of sleep where dreaming is at its most intense (known colloquially as "deep" sleep). The fact she appears to be a sheep/ram-type creature also plays into this (since sheep are often associated with trying to fall asleep). An alternative interpretation is that Ariem's design and name may be connected to the constellation and zodiac symbol Aries, which takes the form of a ram.
  • Dr. Crabulous is a pun on "crab" and "fabulous", the fabulous aspect likely being its mustache.
  • The Factory Foreman are called such due to their occupation as security for Eggman's Dream Factory. After you beat the first three, the fourth one appears and they all become part of a larger mecha called "The Four Man."
  • A multi-levelled Stealth Pun example in Ego City; the word can refer to both a person's self-confidence and pride, especially when they exist to an exaggerated/unhealthy extent, and to the psychoanalytical concept which both balances the conscious and the subconscious and turns thoughts into actions and reality, which is perfect for a self-worshipping ideal city in the dreams of an egotist which they seek to literally make a reality.
• Purely Aesthetic Gender: As pointed out in Moveset Clone, there's no real gameplay difference within the Sonic/Amy, Tails/Cream and Knuckles/Rouge pairs, with all of it boiling down to personal preference.
• Rank Inflation: After the second content update, all missions will award a player from ranks D-S, with D being the lowest and S being the highest. S-Ranks are awarded for beating a level within a certain time limit, with the conditions appearing after beating a level for the first time.
• The Stinger: A brief scene plays after the credits, where after Tails brings the Reverie back to his lab, he fires it up again and has Cream try to interact with Ariem, after he established earlier that it is currently in its Dormancy protocol. Cream is able to reach out and talk to her, much to Ariem's delight and commends Tails on his cleverness.
• Temple of Doom: The Nightmare Maze, with its surreal stone-and-wood architecture that slowly becomes more hostile. It starts off with the atmosphere of The Lost Woods due to the ambient emphasis on the area's greenery, but it slowly evolves into a Bubblegloop Swamp as it places more emphasis on the toxic purple sludge and hazardous, thorny vines.
• Time-Limit Boss: The Version 1.2.0 update introduces missions where the bosses have to beaten within a certain time limit.
• Title Theme Drop: During the Nightmare Eggman boss fight, Eggman attacks the heroes, preventing them from reaching the Dream Core. Sonic, undeterred, starts running one final time up the nightmarish doctor's form, all while Dream Team's opening theme plays in the background while he ascends.
• Visual Pun: When Sonic and co were put to sleep by the Reverie, they fall down a portal into the dreamscapes. As Sonic puts it:
  Sonic: Ugh, I've heard of "falling asleep", but that was ridiculous!
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Eggman says this to Cream if she is chosen to face the second boss. The story began when Eggman kidnapped her and Cheese as part of a plan to access the Reverie.

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