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Review of Disney Dreamlight Valley - A magnificent farm game intertwined with childhood and fairy tales
Instead of solely farming like other farm simulation games, Disney Dreamlight Valley brings an adventurous feel to players through RPG-style gameplay. It's so impressive that they've decided confidently to discontinue its free distribution and continue maintaining the pay-to-play format for Disney Dreamlight Valley.phimDisney Dreamlight Valley is developed by the renowned Gameloft under the license of Disney. This is a farm simulation product but utilizes characters from nearly all famous Disney cartoons. You'll encounter characters from classics like Mickey to modern ones like Moana, Mirabel Madrigal in this game. How did Gameloft manage to create a farm world with so many characters? How do players engage? Let's delve into how this game company crafts a top-quality product.
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Fairytale World Storyline
The storyline in Disney Dreamlight Valley begins similarly to other farm games. You're an office worker in the city, tired of the hustle and bustle of life, so you decide to quit your job and return to your old country life. Returning to the countryside with a small house amidst nature, you wander in the forest with your backpack and fall asleep.
In the blink of an eye, you wake up in front of a very familiar character, the wizard Merlin from Disney cartoons. The old man seems quite confused but manages to let you know the current situation. You are drawn into a fairytale world protected by magic called Dreamlight Valley that can only be reached through dreams. Both Disney cartoon heroes and villains live peacefully together until one day the leader of this valley suddenly disappears.
Then the world of Dreamlight Valley is flooded with a strange vine called 'forgetfulness.' It spreads wherever it goes, causing people to become confused. The residents are scattered all over the place while Merlin is trying to find a way to drive away the vines to restore everything. Merlin believes that you are brought to this world for a reason, and he is right when you have a strange ability to use magic to cleanse these vines. From here, you become a resident of Dreamlight Valley, step by step helping Merlin restore everything and find the lost characters.
The storyline of Disney Dreamlight Valley is meticulously and intricately built compared to some other farm games. It is not just a background story for farming life but is built as a real adventure with many connecting plots to make room for character systems and mission tasks.
Simplified Farm Gameplay
Because the story has an adventure element, it is easy to see that Disney Dreamlight Valley is not just about farming. The simulation gameplay part is condensed to make room for the game's adventure. You won't have to struggle to find upgrade materials for your tools anymore, as you will pick up a royal toolset from the beginning to use. They will be upgraded according to storyline missions rather than self-farming anymore.
Skill areas such as planting, harvesting, fishing, mining are still present but are simplified. Most are just for collecting resources for tasks or making decorations. You can still upgrade your house, craft through workbenches, cook with a kitchen... but everything is significantly simplified.
Even to restore stamina, you don't need to sleep but just perform one of 3 actions: return home, eat, or sit and rest. The purpose of simplifying this gameplay is to create space for adventure gameplay and direct the player's attention to it. On the other hand, Gameloft has cleverly simplified the farm sections so that you can feel just enough, not lacking or poor.
There is a special point that besides upgrading your own house, you can also arrange things in almost the entire village. Arranging trees or benches is common, but you can also place houses for characters in the village. On the other hand, the game's shop system will be upgraded with your money through investment function. You spend money to upgrade, and the shop will sell more types of goods to help you access more materials.
Adventure in Disney Dreamlight Valley
Reducing the farming gameplay part is a sacrifice, and the producer compensates very well with the adventure section. Somehow they deliberately create unique differences for the product through this sacrifice.
The main character exists in Dreamlight Valley with a mission to dispel the mysterious forget-me-not vines and bring the characters back to the village. To do that, besides the farm gameplay providing materials and food, the main storyline mission part plays an important role.
Firstly, achievement board-style tasks will help you accumulate Dreamlight points. This point will help unlock areas blocked by vines. New land areas will attract more discovered characters and will have more main missions to do.
You will have to do many different quest chains to help Merlin and other characters step by step restore the fairytale kingdom. The stranded characters can retreat into their own storyline scenes like Remy the mouse in Ratatouille hiding in the familiar kitchen. Some others wander out of the valley to distant lands like the evil sorcerer Jafar in Aladdin. You will be able to access all of them step by step through main quests.
In addition, the friendship system provides many different quest chains to level up with each individual character. They will help unlock more formulas, furniture, and new game functions to increase excitement for you when living in Disney Dreamlight Valley.
Is Simplicity a Weakness or a Feature?
Disney Dreamlight Valley shows a simple style sometimes so naive in content that you can't tell whether it's intentionally designed or a weakness of the game. If using a model of a sapling to represent any newly planted tree from carrots to cabbages, it's easy to see, but the attitudes of the characters are harder to distinguish.
You'll see old wizard Merlin with white hair but acting childish every time he's happy like a child. Each character has only a few actions, and it shows a quite obvious 'pointless' loop in the conversation section. But since it's based on children's cartoons, it's hard to determine if it's to fit children or the design isn't standard.
Conclusion
Overall, Disney Dreamlight Valley is a good combination of a farm game with adventure. Besides bringing the past back with beloved cartoon characters, the adventurous storyline also creates a strong attraction. The game won't be just a typical open farm like other famous products, but instead, it will be an adventure combined with simulation game with a unique appeal in its own way.
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