Originally planned as a free-to-play game, Disney Dreamlight Valley has various features you would expect to see in a game like that, such as divided currencies, a shop, and other microtransactions. However, during its paid early release period, it was announced that Disney Dreamlight Valley would no longer officially launch free-to-play and would instead be purchasable and feature a mainline story with free updates and paid expansions to come later.

Despite this change, Disney Dreamlight Valley still maintains several of the aspects originally designed for the free-to-play model, most notably, the various currencies that are used for different aspects of the game. While most of the updates in the game are technically free, they still require a specific in-game currency, Dreamlight, to unlock them, and it is both tedious and difficult to earn.

Disney Dreamlight Valley Doesn’t Have Enough Dreamlight

With More Ways To Spend And Fewer Ways To Earn, Dreamlight Is Running Low

When playing Disney Dreamlight Valley during the early release period, the only real uses of Dreamlight were to unlock the handful of Biomes around the valley. The process was still just as tedious, but with so few things to unlock, it wasn't too bad. Once all the biomes were unlocked, it was easy to continue accumulating Dreamlight as it was naturally earned through completing duties, and there was nothing else to truly spend it on other than perhaps a few crafting recipes that used around 100 Dreamlight or so.

Since then, however, while no new biomes have been added, several realms have, and while the original three realms were relatively cheap, each new realm since then has continued to increase in price. Starting originally at just 3,000 Dreamlight each, the latest realms now cost the equivalent of a full biome at 15,000 Dreamlight each. While this still wouldn't have been a big deal considering that realms have also become more elaborate and there were limited things to spend Dreamlight on, that's no longer the case.

Mulan's realm was the first to be added without a price increase, followed by Aladdin, which also did not receive an increase. So, it's suspected that 15,000 might be the cap for a new realm for now, but Alice in Wonderland should shed more light on whether that's true, since this has been a highly requested realm and is the most likely to see an increase.

With each update, there have been new ways to spend Dreamlight and no new ways to earn it. Some examples include the Floating Islands, which also cost 15,000 Dreamlight each, more crafting recipes, items like the slow cooker, and the new Uncrafting Machine, which is part of the Wonderland Whimsy update. With Dreamlight continuously running low now, I'm even beginning to dread updates, as I know it simply means more grinding in the weeks leading up to it if I'm not already prepared.

Star Coins Are Way Easier To Farm & Stockpile

The Easiest Currency To Earn Has The Least Amount Of Value

If you're just starting, Star Coins, the main currency of Disney Dreamlight Valley, can seem hard to come by. However, this is not the case once you've progressed enough to unlock some of the biomes and crops. Between selling off random items you don't need and spending a few hours growing a crop that provides you with an abundance of friendship progress and extra crops that you can then sell, if you have a companion with you, you can go from 1,000 Star Coins to 1,000,000 Star Coins in as little as one day.

Dreamlight, on the other hand, is primarily earned through completing duties, with common reward amounts falling between 50 and 250. Considering how little this is and how much Dreamlight everything now requires, it's nearly impossible to build up a large supply unless you spend hours grinding. However, by then, a new update may be out that will require you to spend all of it to unlock a new feature. You do have the option to craft a Dream Shard in Dreamlight Valley into Dreamlight, but it's at a low rate, and these are also relatively hard to come by and often needed for quests.

How Disney Dreamlight Valley Could Fix The Currency Problem

Add New Ways To Earn Dreamlight Or Create Conversion Options With Other Currencies

With this becoming a growing problem, there are a few ways to go about fixing it, with the simplest being new ways to earn Dreamlight or just increasing the base amounts rewarded when completing duties. Another option, especially when considering how easy it is to earn Star Coins, is to create an ATM system. Even if it's simply in the form of something like Animal Crossing: New Horizons, where you purchase a voucher with Star Coins that can then be sold for Dreamlight and vice versa.

While it may seem like this would be hard to implement, it's already somewhat being done in the expansions. Each Disney Dreamlight Valley expansion has a version of Dreamlight that accrues when completing tasks in that expansion: Mist in A Rift in Time and Storybook Magic in The Storybook Vale. Unfortunately, this only makes earning all of these variants more difficult, because unless you're completing tasks in that expansion, you will not earn that specific currency, meaning Dreamlight is only earned in the base game valley.

However, both Storybook Vale and A Rift in Time have easier ways to earn their respective currencies. A Rift in Time allows you to use Timebending to find Mist in decently large quantities, while Storybook Vale allows you to exchange Snippets, which continuously respawn. These are still time-consuming, but much more reasonable. So, perhaps the last way the Dreamlight problem could be solved in Disney Dreamlight Valley is simply an exchange rate with these expansions, where you could turn any of these three currencies into another, adding even more value to the paid expansions.