A Rift in Time Review

With huge thanks to the folks at Gameloft, we’ve been delving deep into the Dreamlight Valley once again. Today, we’re bringing you our full review for the Dreamlight expansion – A Rift in Time.

As an expansion review, we’re looking to cover the additional content within this time-bending new expansion. As such, we don’t have our usual common-sense parent’s guide, but we do urge you to check out the Family Gaming Database entry for the base game, which will tell you all you need to know.

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The Basics – What is A Rift in Time About?

A Rift in Time is the first expansion for Disney Dreamlight Valley, and spreads from late 2023 to the summer of 2024. Throughout this time, Gameloft will be releasing three expansions in the form of Acts, and we’ve been spending a fair bit of time with Act One.

Act One of A Rift in Time adds a fair amount of content for anybody who has run out of things to do in the main campaign of Dreamlight Valley. While players have been tackling The Forgetting, Jafar has been up to no good on the new-to-us Eternity Isle. Players will travel over to this new location, and discover a good number of new elements to get involved with.

Eternity Isle is split into three new biomes. You’ll touch down in Ancient’s Landing, travel the desert plains of Glittering Dunes, and find yourself among the undergrowth in the Wild Tangle. Each of these new areas comes with its own new flora and fauna for players to interact with and collect.

In addition to new objects for avid decorators, this also includes new fruits and vegetables for those who have fallen in love with Remy’s cooking challenges. A Rift in Time also brings new items to craft, and allows players to build new quest items, including the mysterious Ancient Machines, and much more.

One of the main items is the Royal hourglass, a new time-bending tool which players will use to use new magic, solve puzzles and detect treasure. You’ll use the Royal Hourglass to pull items through time in order to get ahead with challenges, and to find new mysterious items in each of the new biomes.

New Characters and Games

Act One of A Rift in Time brings us three new Villagers, in addition to the evil Jafar. In this expansion we’ll find Eve (of WALL.E fame), Rapunzel and Gaston who will lead you through the various challenges of Eternity Isle. We’re also expecting more villagers to hit within Act Two and potentially Act Three, and we’ll be able to tell you more about those closer to the time.

Scramblecoin has also hit the valley, bringing a crafty new turn-based puzzle. Players will match up against various NPC characters, using disney tokens based on your favourite characters. Scramblecoin is relatively easy to understand, but tricky to master, and adds a fair amount to do for collectors, who can make their own pieces which each have their own movement and abilities.

The Verdict – Is A Rift in Time Worth It?

Pixel Bandits Bippety Boppity Boop Level for A Rift in Time is 8 / 10.

If you’re running out of things to do in the main valley, there’s a lot to sink your teeth into within A Rift in Time. The three new characters may seem a little slim on the ground, but it’s worthwhile remembering that we’ll be getting more characters in game over the course of the next few months.

The new biomes within A Rift in Time help to build a rich and varied world, which is a fair bit bigger than we had originally anticipated. This provides a fair amount of room for exploration, as well as the new items, foodstuffs and challenges in the game.

The new quests do give players a decent amount to be getting along with. The Royal Hourglass delivers a different enough experience for us, and some nice new puzzle solutions. Scramblecoin also gives a little something new for players to try their hand at, both in terms of playing and creating new game pieces.

Altogether, the new additions to the valley and the extended story have both landed well, here. We’re excited to see what comes in the next few months, but Act One certainly delivers enough to be getting involved with for now!

As ever, to provide this review and common-sense parent’s guide, we received free copies of A Rift in Time from the folks at Gameloft.