Disney's Dreamlight Valley has a meta, and it is pumpkins. Even more sinister, cunning players have found ways to trap and exploit the iconic citizens of Dreamlight Valley in order to increase the harvest margin of cash crops.

This kind of ruthless economic efficiency is inevitable in farm sims, but still seems a bit surprising in the context of a Disney game. Anyone who has played through "Animal Crossing" or "Stardew Valley" will know that there is an inflection point where the game ceases to be "casual" and turns into a dystopian optimization nightmare.

I confess: I have a dark past involving ancient fruit wine distilleries and turnip stocks, and I see plump profits from pumpkin trading in my future.

Early on in Dreamlight Valley, planting and harvesting carrots is the way to make money, but as players have discovered, pumpkins are the true end game. Pumpkins take a lot of time to buy and are sold at goofy stalls in the Forgotten Lands biome beyond Sunlit Plateau. Pumpkin seeds cost 275 coins, but grown pumpkins sell for 664 coins. This is a price that Scrooge himself would be proud of.

So naturally, everyone is stuffing their villages with super-profitable pumpkins. [And not just because it's spiced coffee season. I'm innocently looking for inspiration for my own village build, but it's full of gourd screenshots. I'm not mad at you: persistent crop planning is also valid building inspiration. This really is farm sim behavior at its peak. (Read for yourself about fellow PC Gamer writer Chris Livingston's 2017 pumpkin fiasco.)

A fairly detailed spreadsheet (opens in new tab) from one pumpkin advocate claims that while the total growing time (4 hours) technically makes less profit per hour than planting asparagus, the profit per minute of active care by planting and watering actually makes pumpkins superior, he argues. Pumpkin patches are also more satisfying to harvest than asparagus.

You can further maximize your cash investment by cooking three pumpkins in the kitchen to make a grilled vegetable platter, but this also requires significantly more active button pressing. It is better to sell to Goofy. Goofy doesn't seem to mind being priced out of a gourd turnover at all.

Serious grinders are pushing pumpkin meta to the max with a handy exploit. This hangout feature is the ability for the accompanying character to give you bonus items while you are mining or farming seaweed. Invite a character you designate as a farming companion, lock them in a small fenced-in square, then harvest a large crop right in front of them, then release them, and a sparkling pumpkin fountain will spring up and you can pick up the pumpkins.

The ruler exploits his subjects as a magical profit conduit.

Disney Dreamlight Valley launched in early September in early access and will be fully launched sometime in 2023. There is definitely a chance that agricultural exploitation and pumpkin's shocking profit margins will be modified in the meantime. This is especially true because the frame rate drops significantly when receiving large amounts of bonus pumpkins. For now, eat as many pumpkins as you want and welcome October. Home upgrades do not pay for themselves.