Dave the Diver In the Jungle Review: A Rich Reason to Return

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Store links: Dave the Diver: In the Jungle on Steam

A $10 return trip with sequel-sized ambition

Dave the Diver: In the Jungle launched on June 18, 2026, according to Metacritic’s public listing, and PC Gamer lists it as a $10/£8.49 DLC from developer and publisher Mintrocket. That price is the key tension around this Dave the Diver expansion: the available review record describes something far larger than a weekend-sized add-on, but also something that stretches the original game’s gentle rhythm into new territory that will not land equally for every returning player.

The expansion moves Dave to a jungle village, opens a new restaurant operation, and adds a freshwater ecosystem around Utara Lake. TheGamer reports that the setup begins with a prehistoric beast washing ashore, leading into new missions, minigames, bosses, and a deeper mystery beneath the lake bed. PC Gamer’s review says the DLC involves opening a new restaurant and frames it around familiar spearfishing and restaurant management, with added village quests and local favor systems. The Wand Report goes further on the mechanical changes, citing relationships, an isometric overworld, real-time resource gathering, and Pokemon-like turn-based battles above ground.

That makes In the Jungle a strong return hook for players who loved the original restaurant loop but drifted away after the credits. It keeps the recognizable cycle of gather, cook, serve, upgrade, and repeat, then surrounds it with a busier village structure. The question is not whether there is enough content. Across the supplied reviews, the answer is clearly yes. The sharper buyer’s-guide question is whether this denser, broader version of Dave still feels as breezy as the Blue Hole.

The jungle works best when it changes the texture of exploration

The most compelling confirmed shift is environmental. TheGamer describes Utara Lake as a freshwater ecosystem with recognizable river creatures, while The Wand Report names crocodiles, electric eels, and giant sturgeon among the threats and catches in the lake. TheGamer also says the expansion eventually takes Dave below the lake bed into a deep-sea space with prehistoric marine life. That gives In the Jungle gameplay a useful new shape: it is still about reading hazards, managing dives, collecting ingredients, and turning danger into dinner, but the creature set and terrain are different enough to make returning muscle memory feel awake again.

The new Jungle Gun, described by TheGamer, is a smart example of Mintrocket refreshing the toolset without severing the old rhythm. It combines a net, armor-piercing sniper rifle, shotgun, and basic rifle, with on-the-fly swapping and separate upgrade trees for each setting. That sounds like a direct answer to one of Dave the Diver’s recurring frictions: too many situational needs, too few clean ways to adapt mid-run. If you preferred careful capture over aggression, or if you leaned on long-range damage, the separate upgrade paths reportedly let you specialize rather than treat every dive as a generalist checklist.

The jungle also broadens the sense of place. The base game’s Blue Hole was magical because it kept changing while still being legible. Based on the reported freshwater zone, lake-bed mystery, and prehistoric creatures, In the Jungle seems designed to recreate that feeling through contrast rather than repetition. It is not trying to make the Blue Hole bigger. It gives Dave a second ecosystem with its own hazards, ingredients, and visual logic.

The restaurant loop survives, but the new social layer changes its pacing

For players returning specifically for Bancho’s restaurant loop, the biggest practical change is that the sushi bar is swapped for a grill. TheGamer says the new grill uses fresh ingredients and that the restaurant gameplay remains familiar. The Wand Report reports that villagers can be drawn to Bancho’s grill once relationship levels rise, with favor represented through a heart meter. PC Gamer’s review similarly frames the DLC as a new restaurant setup in a village where quests and local favor evoke Stardew Valley.

That social structure is the expansion’s clearest pacing lever. Instead of diving, selling, upgrading, and advancing through a mainly nautical mystery, In the Jungle gives Dave above-ground errands, requests, and relationship-building tasks. The Wand Report describes villagers asking for items such as a games console, wine, or a plectrum made from a piranha tooth, with a tool that tracks who wants what. Some items come from quests, some from the water, and some can be bought in a shop, according to that review.

The benefit is variety. The risk is softness. The Wand Report calls the cozy-game systems simplistic compared with existing life sims, while also saying they work fine within Mintrocket’s usual approach to streamlined minigames. That matters for pacing: players who found the original perfectly busy may feel the village errands push the game toward checklisting, while players who wanted a reason to linger between dives may find this exactly the connective tissue they were missing. The expansion seems at its best when the social tasks feed the restaurant and exploration loop, rather than when they ask to be valued as a full life-sim layer on their own.

There is a lot here, maybe too much for players who wanted a light DLC

The supplied reviews broadly agree that In the Jungle is substantial. PC Gamer says its reviewer had spent more than 25 hours in the DLC and was still not finished. TheGamer says the expansion is far larger than previous DLC and was surprised it was not packaged as a sequel. The Wand Report describes sweeping above-ground changes and says the overworld, resource gathering, and relationship systems make it feel closer to Dave the Diver 2 than a short DLC piece. Metacritic’s critic-summary snippets also call it content-packed and highlight a steady introduction of new mechanics.

That steady rollout is important. One ResetEra review-thread excerpt quotes a critic saying the freshwater ecosystem gives players something genuinely different to explore and that new mechanics arrive steadily enough to avoid becoming overwhelming. That aligns with what made Dave the Diver work in the first place: Mintrocket’s talent for layering odd minigames, bespoke sequences, and systems without making the player study a manual.

Still, the expansion’s generosity has a tradeoff. If your favorite part of Dave the Diver was its compact daily cadence, In the Jungle’s reported bosses, bird hunting, village favors, turn-based battles, grill management, lake dives, references, and cameos may feel crowded. If you left the base game wanting another dozen mechanical surprises, this is the rare Dave the Diver DLC that appears to justify returning now rather than waiting for a sale or a bundled edition. At $10/£8.49, based on PC Gamer’s price listing, the content-per-dollar argument is unusually strong.

Charm remains, but the story has the review record’s biggest warning sign

The tone of the critical reception is largely positive. PC Gamer’s verdict says In the Jungle is charming and surprising like the base game, with strong characters and many activities. TheGamer praises its cameos and references, citing nods ranging from Guitar Hero to Journey to the Savage Planet and Two Point Museum. Metacritic lists the expansion as generally favorable across all platforms, based on 15 critic reviews in the provided page text, with 93 percent positive critic reviews and one negative review shown in the PC critic breakdown.

The major caveat comes from The Wand Report, which argues that the DLC’s narrative is flawed and criticizes the village portrayal as stereotyped. Its review describes a chief with feathers, bamboo houses, and a sequence in which Bancho teaches the villagers to cook fish to avoid illness. That criticism is specific and serious enough to sit alongside the praise rather than be waved away as a matter of taste. The expansion may have the same abundance of jokes and surprise sketches that made Dave the Diver beloved, but according to The Wand Report, some of its framing around the jungle village carries uncomfortable baggage.

That creates a split verdict on story. If you come to Dave primarily for comic escalation, cameos, and oddball quests, the positive reviews suggest In the Jungle delivers. If you are sensitive to how games use fictionalized Indigenous or remote village imagery, The Wand Report’s concerns should factor into your decision. The safest read is that the expansion’s systems and setting refresh are stronger than its narrative framing.

Platforms, Steam Deck, and the practical buying call

Metacritic lists Dave the Diver: In the Jungle across PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and Xbox Series X, with the page showing critic coverage on PC, Switch, PS5, and Xbox Series X. TheXboxHub reviewed the expansion on Xbox Series X and scored it 4/5, calling it a worthwhile investment for someone who enjoyed the base game. PC Gamer lists Steam Deck status as Verified and says its review was conducted on an Intel i7 9700K, RTX 4070 Ti, and 16GB RAM. The supplied source material does not include detailed frame-rate measurements, console performance comparisons, or specific bug reports, so any platform ranking beyond Steam Deck verification would be unsupported here.

For returning players, the buying advice is fairly clear. Come back now if you liked the core dive-and-serve loop but want a stronger exploratory shake-up than a cameo DLC, because the reported freshwater lake, grill, Jungle Gun, village relationships, bosses, and minigames give the expansion a distinct identity. Wait if you mainly want a lean restaurant sim, dislike relationship errands, or were already tired of Dave the Diver’s habit of throwing a new mechanic at you every few minutes.

My review score lands at 8.1. Gameplay carries the expansion: the new ecosystem, flexible weapon, grill variation, and broader village loop appear to meaningfully refresh Dave’s daily rhythm. Story is the weakest category because the review record contains both broad praise for charm and a detailed critique of the DLC’s cultural framing. Performance scores well on the available evidence because PC Gamer lists Steam Deck Verified status and the supplied reviews do not surface technical problems, though the absence of hard benchmarks keeps that score cautious. For fans searching Dave the Diver DLC or Dave the Diver 2026 and wondering whether In the Jungle is worth the return trip, the answer is yes, with a clear note that its strongest arguments are mechanical rather than narrative.