Dream Friend

"Once you’ve completed a world, the Dream Palace opens, allowing you to add classic characters like Meta Knight, King Dedede, and more to your team."

- Official Kirby Star Allies website

Dream Friends are a special group of friends, first appearing in Kirby Star Allies.

General Information
Dream Friends are special friends (and even a few foes, like King Dedede and Marx) from past Kirby titles. They can only be recruited by using the Dream Rod in a Dream Palace; when the Dream Rod is used, a roulette will appear, and whichever Dream Friend the roulette stops on is the one Kirby will recruit. If the player is unhappy with the Dream Friend retrieved, the player can cancel adding them to the team, and the Dream Rod will respawn. Once recruited, Dream Friends act identically to normal friends recruited via Friend Hearts, albeit with unique movesets.

New Dream Friends will be added as time progresses through free updates.

The 2.0.0 update was on March 28, 2018 and added Rick & Kine & Coo, Marx, and Gooey. Playing through Guest Star ???? Star Allies Go! with these characters reveals slightly altered stage designs and new music. Murals for the Dream Friends were also added in various stages.

A new update is supposed to arrive this summer. An announcement was posted, and 30 minutes later, a vague teaser for one of the Dream Friends was posted on the Kirby_JP Twitter account. This was later revealed to be Daroach. As well as this, the same announcement style was repeated for Dark Meta Knight.

Related Quotes
"You can call on Dream Friends at the Dream Palace in Story Mode. Make your dream team!"

- Find them at the Dream Palace

"You can now call on Dream Friend King Dedede! Head to a Dream Palace!"

- Dream Friend King Dedede

"You can now call on Dream Friend Meta Knight! Head to a Dream Palace!"

- Dream Friend Meta Knight

"There are now 6 Dream Friends! Use them all as allies!"

- More Dream Friends!

Trivia

 * Bandana Waddle Dee is playable from the beginning and doesn’t need to be unlocked.
 * King Dedede and Meta Knight are unlocked by defeating their respective boss.
 * They can be befriended right after defeating them in a small time frame by throwing a Friend Heart on them.
 * Rick & Kine & Coo are playable as one character, not individually as in past games.
 * Rick transforms into Coo while floating, and Kine while swimming.
 * Unlike regular Friends, a Dream Friend will use their original color palette regardless of their player slot. However, if a duplicate of the same Dream Friend is obtained afterwards, the second instance of that Dream Friend will follow the usual yellow/blue/green color scheme depending on which player slot they are in.
 * This is different in The Ultimate Choice, where Dream Friends will only use their original color scheme if in Player 1's slot. If in slots 2-4, they will use their slot's respective color scheme, as with regular Friends.
 * While many Dream Friend attacks are wholly original, many others have their animations and/or effects reused from existing Copy Abilities, such as Fire, Stone, Bomb, and Whip.
 * Bandana Waddle Dee's moveset is directly based on Spear from previous games, and is the only character to have said Ability in the game.
 * Rick & Kine & Coo use moves largely identical to the moves they provided Kirby. If Kirby Piggybacks on them, the animations involve him in much the same way they did in Kirby's Dream Land 2.
 * The murals for Rick & Kine & Coo are located in Inside Islands in the area with the Room Guarder: Kine is located in the bottom left after entering the water, Rick is located in the left of the area with the Waddle Dee resting on a palm tree, and Coo is found in the top left after emerging from the water at the end of the room.
 * The mural for Bandana Waddle Dee is located in Sector B in the fourth room after making the first two jumps.
 * The mural for Marx is located in Extra Planet β in the last room by pulling the ceiling switches.
 * When playing as a Dream Friend that was added in from an update, the altered level design at the start of the adventure is actually a recreation of the first stage from their respective game (For example, if the player selects Gooey, they will start off in a recreation of the first stage of Grass Land from Kirby’s Dream Land 3).
 * As of update 2.0.0 onward, each Dream Friend is introduced with a small theme.
 * King Dedede is introduced with his theme.
 * Meta Knight is introduced with the ending theme of Revenge of Meta Knight.
 * Bandana Waddle Dee is introduced with the title theme of Spring Breeze.
 * Rick & Kine & Coo are introduced with Rick's theme.
 * Marx is introduced with the beginning of his boss theme.
 * Gooey is introduced with the Ripple Field map.
 * Daroach is introduced with the opening of Here Come the Squeaks!
 * Dark Meta Knight is introduced with the beginning of his boss theme.