How to express emotions in Disney Dreamlight Valley

Season of Scares brings emotes to the valley

The Season of Scares update for Disney Dreamlight Valley introduced a new self-expression tool: the emote ability. Because it arrived with the update rather than being part of the game from launch, many players have never noticed it exists — the button blends in with all the other key controls, so it's easy to overlook on your first pass through the menus.

How to use emotes

The emote button sits in the bottom right corner of the screen in DDV, directly to the left of the Royal Tool wheel button, and is marked with a smiling face icon. On PC, it is bound to the Q button, but the binding varies by platform — the exact button to press is displayed on the emote button across all platforms, so you can always find the right one.

Once triggered, your character strikes a specific pose or expresses a specific emotion depending on your selection. A nice bonus: nearby villagers react in unique ways that vary based on the emote you perform, making it a fun way to pose with your favorite characters or simply stop and take in the sights.

How the emote wheel works

The emote wheel has eight slots, so you can have up to eight different emotes on standby while exploring the valley. Since there are more than eight emotes in total, you'll want to customize which ones sit on your wheel:

1. Press the emote button in the bottom right corner.
2. Select the "customize" option, located near the bottom right corner of the emote wheel that pops up. The button to activate it varies by platform but is displayed to the left of the option.
3. Choose the emote slot you want to change. You can rearrange everything, but only one slot at a time.
4. Pick your desired emote to replace it, and repeat until the wheel looks exactly how you want.

All 12 emotes currently available

As of the time of writing, there are 12 emotes in DDV:

• Scary
• Confused
• Happy
• Hello
• Sad
• Cool
• Relaxed
• Heroic
• Celebrate
• Pleased
• Waving
• Angry

This collection will likely expand in future updates, with new additions expected to be added to the list as they arrive.

What to tackle next

Once you've mastered the emote wheel, the valley still has plenty of tricky activities to work through. Consider unlocking the Astronomer's Journey Star Path, completing Olaf's Grand Exhibition Forgotten Lands room, unlocking Oogie Boogie, and creating some decoration presets.

At this stage, emotes are a small but fresh layer of expression added by Season of Scares — with only 12 available and eight wheel slots to fill, the feature is still in its early form and poised to grow with each update.