I’ve been looking forward to this update for so long and seeing that trailer and preview image, it looks like Stitch may be here too besides just the Toy Story characters. As a note, despite this entry being finished up today (the 7th), I did play through yesterday on release! It’s actually part of why this entry is a day late– I played essentially all day, partially due to some unluckiness with a few things I’ll explain later in the entry.
Before I made my way to the Castle for the new Toy Story realm, being the Collection-minded person I am, I had to try and make the new recipes first and thankfully, they made more sense than some of the past recipes we had to figure out.
- Minnie’s Gingerbread Cookies – Ginger, Wheat
- Gingerbread House – Ginger, Eggs, Wheat, Vanilla, Sugarcane
- Hot Cocoa – Sugarcane, Cocoa, Milk
- Fruitcake – Wheat, Any 3 Fruits (I personally did Apple, Raspberry, and Gooseberry)
- Yule Log – Wheat, Cocoa, Vanilla, Cherry
- Boba Tea – Milk and Sugarcane
- Coconut Boba Tea – Milk, Sugarcane, Coconut
- Gooseberry Boba Tea – Milk, Sugarcane, Gooseberry
- Mint Boba Tea – Milk, Sugarcane, Mint
- Raspberry Boba Tea – Milk, Sugarcane, Raspberry
You’ll notice that three items aren’t there yet though: Coffee, Latte, and Mocha, all which require a new ingredient: Coffee Beans. Having finished all the new quests now, I’m also in the “This will probably be gotten through Stitch somehow” group so it’s going to probably be a while as they flat out say it’ll be at least a few days until the next part of the Stitch quest which… kind of stinks. I would say my biggest worry is missing out on a step because I didn’t realize I COULD do another step yet.
Regardless, I really love a lot of the new recipes and decorated with some immediately.
I also took the time to craft some of the new Festive items as well. Sadly, couldn’t really fit the tree in my main room though… The Yule Goat could probably be placed nicer too.
Before making my way to the Realm, I did notice I had a new quest with Merlin and thinking it could possibly be a requisite to opening the new door, I made my way there first. Alas, it was only for various enhancement potions similar to the Watering Can one we got during the last part of the Story. I mostly have mixed feelings on them as honestly, the drop rates for a lot of the other stuff just… kind of sucks. It’s one thing with the Watering which just cuts out the waiting time (which is thankfully better than most other games with farming anyway), but needing the enhancements to make drops not suck makes it feel like you constantly need them. At least it helps the Star Path go faster… I’ll also say that the Fishing Rod when enhanced looks really pretty, though unless you need tons of the Gold pool fish, it doesn’t feel especially helpful.
I also am just… not fond of more items that you just get randomly when doing a specific thing– Rich Soil was kind of annoying and now Red Algae and Onyx too… The only real positive here is that once I do FINALLY get one, they seem to start showing up more, but still was annoying farming them. My crystal collection grows though.
With that done, it was time to make my way over to the Castle and finally unlock the Toy Story Realm.
Even if I wasn’t surprised, I was a little sad it was Bonnie’s room. I have nothing against Bonnie, but having only seen Toy Story 1 and 2 (specifically because I don’t like the message at the end of 3), part of me still hoped to see Andy’s. Despite that, it was still really neat and probably one of my favorite Realm designs so far. I also loved how much we really got to do between puzzles and even going back and forth with other Realms as well through Buzz’s and Woody’s friendship storylines.
I also loved these Cacti. They were so cute with their little faces.
I know people were having trouble finding the “blueprints” you needed to take photos of, so if you were having that issue, here’s all four you need to take photos of:
With the first chunk done, it was time to move Buzz in. His house was a lot smaller than I expected it to be… and also an RV I guess, but it was kind of a relief because I’m still struggling with placing things. It’s honestly really cute though.
The dialogue when you get back to the Valley with Buzz is really great. Also great: Our uniform.
While working on Buzz’s friendship quests, I also stumbled upon a suspicious pile of wet socks on the Beach that unlocked a new quest with Donald and very much seems to be hinting at Stitch. Considering he’s already on the friendship list and the trailer, it definitely feels like this is the way to unlock him.
Since I had to get back to Bonnie’s Room anyway, I also continued the Realm quest to get Woody moved back in. I really love the Farm. Would place in my own Valley. The Origami animals were one of the first things I noticed so it was very easy to find them all.
With that, Woody moved in and I always get kind of emotional whenever there is dialogue about us being the original Ruler and all. I still have so many questions about what happened!!
Unlike Buzz’s house, Woody’s Carousel was MUCH bigger and quite in the need of some work… I thought maybe it’d work like how we had to upgrade/fix Remy’s restaurant, but instead, fixing it up was mostly through Woody’s story quest. Though… I think it could still be upgraded a bit, but it definitely looks a lot better from how it started.
I wish we got to keep one of the cute Space Aliens though…
Regardless, with Woody and Buzz moved in, it meant it was finally time to get Minnie’s and WALL-E’s level 10 Quests done. Minnie’s, thankfully, unlocked right away and while finding the leftovers of the banner was annoying (it really blends in with the Glade of Trust’s glow) and I… clearly did not place the banner well, it was still very cute.
Also in my usual fashion, I still suck at taking pictures with the photospot items… I also hate that we never get to keep them T~T At least we got the Blanket fort this time… I love blanket forts.
There’s just too many nice quest-exclusive items. I loved Ariel’s music box so much too.
It took me several hours to finally get the memory to unlock for WALL-E’s level 10 Quest to unlock. I personally got it from night thorns, but it seems any memory earning activity could lead to it. Just need to hope for good RNG. It was very cute and very short and another lovely quest only item lost, but I’m just glad to have it done.
As for non-quest related things… First, the Star Path: It features a lot of new quests this time and outside of the annoying Kingfish quest (partially due to their rarity combined with them only showing up at Night), I feel like it was a lot more relaxing which was nice. I loved the new Fireplace and of course the new Critter was the first thing I bought.
I’m nearly done with it. I would’ve finished today, but Donald asked for one of the Festive Fish yesterday so I’m one favorite gift short to finish.
Meanwhile, just… in our inventory is this frame we can rotate Memories we’ve gotten through which is nice. I set it up along with some cute Castle photos I’ve gotten. I just wish memory getting wasn’t so slow. It feels like it’s been improved to some extent as yesterday were the most memories I got in a day since the start, but it’s still so slow and getting repeats sucks.
There were also new Event Tasks under “Village” like Halloween ones were around last year. I was able to complete 3/5:
Cookie Taste Test – Eat one of each type of cookie.
A Home for the Holidays – Place 5 Holiday-themed items in your house
Do You Wanna Build a Snowman? – Place a Snowman outside (craft it if you haven’t yet). You can move one you already have out too or just… put it back and place it again.
“Even Fish are Festive!” will probably require you to catch one of each of the Festive Fish, but I don’t believe they are available yet. “Ho! Ho! Ho!” is probably tied to a mini event like Halloween. I would guess the Festive Fish will be available around that same time so just need to wait it out for now…
Considering the Halloween event started a week before Halloween, I’m expecting this event to start a week before Christmas so probably like the 18th? I guess we’ll see closer to then at least…