Is Dreamlight Valley The Good Disney Game We've Been Waiting For?

thegamer.com:

I have complained, many times before, about the lack of good Disney games. I grew up on the classic Disney platformers (slightly too young for the rock solid Aladdin, I instead played Hercules and Tarzan), and am a fully fledged Disney adult. I’ve seen every Walt Disney Animation picture, including the ones nobody has seen like Make Mine Music or The Three Caballeros. I want a Disney video game, but Kingdom Hearts isn’t it, MirrorVerse isn’t it, Twisted Wonderland isn’t it, and that weird new racing game isn’t it. Could Dreamlight Valley be it? The jury’s still out, but unfortunately I’m leaning towards no.

I could yet be wrong - stranger things have happened, after all. But what worries me is that Dreamlight Valley has all the right parts, but hasn’t quite assembled them correctly. It’s basically Disney Animal Crossing, which is inarguably a brilliant idea. Disney has a bursting cast of characters it could incorporate into Dreamlight Valley, and the cutesy appeal of Animal Crossing is baked in. It would still need to get the townscaping gameplay right - god knows enough titles have tried and failed to capture Animal Crossing’s magic - but it has a solid foundation.

Related: Pirates Of The Caribbean Doesn't Need Johnny Depp Anymore

Here’s the part where that foundation turns out to be sand: the game is free-to-play and supported by microtransactions. I have no inherent problem with that in a free game. Developers gotta eat after all, even at Disney. But the consensus seems to be that these microtransactions will include certain Disney characters. Some you’ll get free with the game, but others you’ll buy further down the line, making you pick your favourites before you even get to meet them, and then being stuck with