I’ve spent the past month playing Disney Dreamlight valley on the Nintendo switch.
Disney Dreamlight valley is a cute farming and life simulation game featuring memorable Disney characters past and present.
You grow crops, cook and discover new recipes, decorate your home and village, and customize a unique avatar.
Disney Dreamlight Valley is similar to the sims or animal crossing or harvest moon or atelier or similar simulation games.
Is this game for you?
Here’s my advice as a player since launch:
Right now it is early access – those on PC are familiar with this concept but those on console do not understand that it is an unfinished game with tons of bugs and issues – some are game breaking bugs that cause you to lose progress and even have to restart completely. These issues will be fixed but it may take months.
You cannot time travel like in animal crossing. It will absolutely break your game.
Right now you have to pay to play the game, but in the future it will be free. It will also be available on mobile in the future as well as the already existing console and PC.
They have not announced yet if they will wipe and reset progress once the game is officially released. Some early access games do this. Others don’t.
There are only a limited number of characters and areas right now, more are being continually added and that will continue even once the game is live.
If you pay now you get limited edition cosmetic items for your house and avatar. These will not be available again once it goes free to play next year.
You will also miss out on several special events, like the Pixar one running right now, and probably another one every month or so. These events may return – typically for these types of games the events rerun once every year or two.
You will also miss out on in game currency that you get as a gift for paying for early access. This currency is used in the aforementioned events.
Typically in these types of free games the games are kept alive and able to continuously add new content, characters, and gameplay features thanks to people spending real life money for cosmetic items.
Additionally most of the best cosmetic items or even sometimes characters and etc are kept as this real life currency item.
Right now in the Pixar event I haven’t seen that many great wonderful fantastic items but it’s only the first event. And it’s personal taste and judgement as to what’s desirable etc.
I expect these items to not be needed to progress or have impact on gameplay but to be items that will decorate your home or avatar or companions.
This is meant to be a casual game you play a little bit each session but some people have already maxed out everything and waiting for new content. It can fit either play style but is probably best suited for short brief but frequent play sessions to keep things fresh and exciting and match pace of new content updates. Those who rush through may be bored especially right now in early access with less content.
That’s all the advice I have to share. Hope it helps you decide if you’d like to buy the game or wait for it to become free to play next year.