Familiarity makes Disney Dreamlight Valley less intimidating than Animal Crossing New Horizons

gamesradar.com:

Disney Dreamlight Valley has replaced bedtime stories in my house. My 3-year-old daughter, as you might expect, is absolutely thrilled by this – and while swapping books for video games before bed might be the stuff of nightmares for tabloid newspapers and traditionalist media commentators, playing Gameloft's Early Access life sim-meets-adventure game side-by-side with my wee pal Lily over the last week has been wonderful. There's a lot of reading in Disney Dreamlight Valley anyway, and, given the fact Lily can't actually read yet, I've taken on the role of narrator. Every time Mickey Mouse appears on-screen, I sound like I've huffed a balloon full of helium. I go slack-jawed in Goofy's presence, grouchy in Scrooge McDuck's, and adopt a posh and wisdomous, caricature English twang when stood before Merlin. Which, I must admit, is no mean feat for my rasping Scottish vocal chords.  

Between times, when I'm steering our avatar around the game's non-narrative trappings, I voice a running monologue to explain why we're gathering coins, mining rocks, crafting fruit salads, and searching for Mickey's Memories among a myriad of other social simulation activities – so that when we next chat to an in-game NPC, Lily understands why we've spent so much time faffing about beforehand. What keeps her going in these conversational lulls is knowing an interaction with Moana or Wall-E or Ariel is just around the corner, which is her cue to then laugh and scream and clap excitedly, wide-eyed and smiling from ear-to-ear. 

Admittedly, it's this same sense of familiarity with Disney Dreamlight Valley's blockbuster roster and the thought of who we might discover next, that's driving me through the more tedious, grind-driven moments otherwise