Sonic Dream Team shines a light on our favourite anti-hero with three new Shadow levels

When the first draft for the movie Sonic dropped in 2019 and made us all wish we didn’t have eyes, I don’t think any of us thought it would launch a huge movie franchise. Alas, it did, and the third film last year finally introduced Shadow, spurring Sonic developers everywhere to shoehorn him into everything. This Shadow-stuffing still continues, with Sonic Dream Team adding three levels for the Keanu Reeves-voice anti-hero.

Heading over to the Shadow reward track and putting in some elbow grease will unlock the aforementioned three tracks. These consist of Scrambled Shores, Dream Factory, and Nightmare Maze. These will all be Acts that can only be played as Shadow, which is just as well. He was always the best. 

For wider Dream Team news, Nightmares have begun infecting the Dreamworld, causing strange nodes of corrupted Magination to burst forth. It is time for our anthropomorphic heroes to head through these twisted worlds, clean up the mess, and strike out the Nightmares’ weak points to remove them for good.

To help with this struggle, there are a few new toys to play around with. You can hit trampolines and tightrope springs to catapult yourself high in the sky and over wide chasms. The sequenced jump panels propel you even more for some cinematic stunts. Phase platforms add a bit of a challenge thanks to their irritating habit of flickering in and out of existence. You will need to master Chaos Control to pin these into place.

Finally, a number of improvements to the general gameplay. Tutorials have been given their own section in the Act Select to help you master your skills. A bug that prevented players from listening to certain tracks has been thankfully resolved, and  Perfect Boosts and Perfect Jumps have a new sound effect. A rather audio-focused bit of maintenance then.

Sonic Dream Team can be downloaded from the App Store with a valid Apple Arcade subscription.