Minecraft Legends is a take on the actual clock time strategy genre from the world ’s good - sell game . What does Mojang do with the literary genre ?
Minecraftis a game that ask no explanation by this head . It ’s been over ten years since its release and it ’s still the good - selling video game ever . It is really the ultimate sandpile with unlimited potential difference , still defining gambling culture over a decade later . Yet evenMinecraftdoesn’t have everything in one single game , asMinecraft : Story ModeandMinecraft : Dungeonsdemonstrate by applying different genres to the franchise . Minecraft Legendsjoins the slowly grow disturbance of otherMinecraftgames by bringing a Real Time Strategy twist to the world . While you ’d expect something like a proper Tower Defense out ofMinecraft , Real Time Strategy is certainly a music genre approximation that could work well . So what doesMinecraft Legendsdo with both the genre and the world of the franchise ? Today we incur out , as I was among those invest a computer code to try the game out early .
The cute and colorful world ofMinecraft Legends
After multiple nicely animated logos , upon openingMinecraft Legendsa beautiful cinematic cutscene plays of a Villager enjoying himself in the sunshine , only for a Zombie to sneak up behind him … to give him a bloom . Then a Nether portal opens up behind them both and Piglins come out and start attacking . Three inscrutable characters watch and call your character to help . You ’re treated to nice , calming music full of woodwinds when the chief menu appears on a background of a pleasant , grassy field .
This first impression establishes the esthetic of the biz up front , one of its strongest aspects : prettiness . Yes , I signify that . In a genre filled with more realistic looking games with often gritty assumption , Legendsstands out by make the base feeling ofMinecraftpurposefully cute . Many mobs got modest and precious , like the human Squidward Villagers or the base Piglin soldiers . The lilliputian Piglins are so cute I feel bad fighting them .
The cutscenes and story beats follow this cuteness , and it helps give the game its own magical spell . Every biome in baseMinecraftis condensed down into one Overworld map where you may research all of them in a truly beautiful biz . Riding through each biome , you get a gravid sense of what you ’re fighting for . Your theatrical role plays a sorcerous lute to summon mobs and free the denizens of the Overworld from cages like a dependable heroic fancy tale . The game feels full of life and personality … for about two minute of gameplay , before the deception wears off . The residual of the experience is mostly peculiarly paced , repetitive , and ho-hum .
Minecraft LegendsReview: Gameplay and mechanics
InMinecraft Legends , you conglomerate resources from the Overworld and habituate them to ramp up your manner to victory . On the defense side you have a small raiment of pointer tower , Edward Durell Stone walls , fix station , and climb to towers to keep bases and village well defend . The offense consists of building spawners for various mobs and leading them into conflict against the Piglins and their understructure . Alternatively , you’re able to explode them with a Redstone Launcher . Your character has a infield steel for riding around and swing , and it ’s exciting to be in the action , but you ’re not a very useful combatant and deal minimal damage compare to your allies ’ strength in number .
The game has many handiness pick decently off the chiropteran , a good move on its part . Alas , this does n’t account for how hard the controls can be at time .
The controls
This is where the game is at its washy . The ascendance , at least on PC , are at time confusing and unintuitive . The tutorial tries to excuse most of it and the how to flirt guide in the menu help oneself , but you ’re still impart digging through it when the plot does n’t put down something out clearly enough .
The two ascendency I constitute the worst to trade with were progress ramps and commanding mobs . When you build a ramp to make a bridgework or go up up pinnacle , you have to maintain down and hang back the mouse rather of click once and fall into place again to place . This ready location ramps , which already have picky essential , difficult in the middle of fight . When you ’re commanding , you have Q and E to call crime syndicate to you and then air them off in front of you , but there ’s also holding down the CTRL key for other command options . I played through the integral campaign and still ca n’t tell you exactly what that does . For such a central automobile mechanic , being forced to hold down a key in the middle of battle and drag the mouse makes it unnecessarily difficult to really organise properly in a Real Time Strategy game .
Mechanics
A lot of auto-mechanic are thrown at you at once in the tutorial and early game . You ’ll eventually figure them out , but not as quickly as the plot want you to , and you ’ll likely miss smaller auto-mechanic until you point out them afterward , like recalling your crime syndicate by agitate E at any spawner or that villages have chest with payoff for you .
There are details I like- you could command animals , a nice touch even if they ’re too faint to help . you could switch your horse cavalry for three other mount peel , a great enhancive touch modality and exciting organic discovery .
But there are some frustrations . You have a belittled radius to call mobs to you to follow you , meaning you probably have to move around and call multiple time to get everyone . They do n’t teleport if they get lose along the path , stand for in tumid assaults you ’ll most certainly mislay half of your regular army on the way there and have to call up them . You run into thorny brambles on the Overworld but ca n’t cut them with your blade for some reason . You ca n’t even build route , so if you destroy the village path while placing a building down , too sorry for you .
Screenshot by PC Invasion
Some affair are never hinted at or excuse at in enough detail . For representative , one character of cornerstone has impenetrable wall your syndicate ca n’t destroy . I assumed you would unlock something later to tear them down or ramps would upgrade . No , you had to purify the Nether and build a Redstone Launcher to destroy the wall , but the NPC did n’t even hint at this .
Miscellaneous
The music is decent , particularly when it swell up into inspirational sounds while you ’re riding through a field of flowers . However , it will get repetitive chop-chop , especially the battle music as there is only one runway for it most of the game . As bring up before , the cutscenes in the game are attractively animated and amazing to find out . understandably a flock of clip and feat move into them , and it show up . However , all the I taking place in the Nether feel visually overcrowded and hard to cypher out what ’s going on in .
Game modes
Legendshas three modes : Campaign , essentially the story mode which can be played singleplayer or with friends , Versus to battle other player in up to eight actor matches , and Lost Legends & Myths , monthly challenge scenario to earn skin rewards for completing .
Campaign
Campaign modal value is fun for the first two time of day as you get wind the game . The Piglins are an active opposition , construction and upgrading bases and attacking villages every daytime for you to react to . You upgrade your imagination gathering limits , mob spawn boundary , etc , and climb up the magnate curve .
That being enjoin , the tempo of advancement in Campaign is very funny . At the beginning everything feels easy , but it wo n’t be long before the difficultness increases beyond what you may do , storm you to spend hours lento picking apart bases or get to demolish smaller outposts until you have enough to promote . Then it is n’t too long until it becomes too well-heeled again and the end game is just a matter of patience . Keep in mind this is playing solo , and not even factoring in if you have a friend to help you . Once you have every crime syndicate case on your side , there ’s not anything young to discover past the six hour mark except for one raw addition to your arsenal . It ’s just grinding to the end and all the momentum and playfulness stops .
Versus
Versus Mode splits eight players into orangish and drab teams with the object lens to eliminate the others ’ base . You come out from the bottom and build your way into upgrades . This alleviate the previous mightiness curve issue by speeding it up . It ’s fun to play with ally on part call , strategizing together and coordinate your plan , but this can only be fun for so long . In addition , there is n’t much to Versus Mode in footing of strategy . Whichever squad build up the Redstone Launcher and blast the other home to man with it first wins , adding to the mode quickly getting old .
Lost Legends & Myths
miss Legends & Myths has the most potency of the three . It seems it will rotate a young challenge monthly for a reward . decently now it ’s a very simple defend a settlement for 20 waves of Piglins while getting more and more ascent . You ’ve seen this in other RTS games , it do work absolutely hunky-dory and is fun in this biz too . This game mode could take into account for a lot of originative twist on the game ’s set up mechanic , but we ’ll have to see what is done with it .
Story
Legends is a simple and straightforward story with no surprise . Piglins are invading a remote world , so three characters- Foresight , action mechanism , and Knowledge- call to your case for aid . Your eccentric is inside a normalMinecraftgame go about their business when a blue portal opens up and the characters excuse you ’re the only one who can save the other universe .
You are literally in - world transported from regularMinecraftto the globe of Legends , which I find hilarious as a premiss . Your character could have just been from the cosmos of the plot already , but no , you really traverse dimensions to facilitate another world in need . That ’s a sport subversion of how that storytelling machine usually goes .
The three type who serve you and the proportion they occupy in are an secret . It seems to imply their property is sort of a rift between all the world , but whether they are gods of a sort , shielder of the entire multiverse ofMinecraftwho just Are , or just some kind of entity is never totally explain . Nonetheless , they aid you through a tutorial level in their dimension , then institutionalize you out into the world in endangerment on a cavalry while giving you advice from beyond .
Screenshot by PC Invasion
You ’ll keep open Greenwich Village from the Piglins , then deliver the Creepers , Zombies , and skeletal system ’ abode as well , forge an alliance of the intact Overworld versus the Nether . It ’s a precious and mere story of unity , which is specially nice afterHogwarts Legacy . For a while the game does its line of work of making you feel good and enjoying a biz where Creepers can finally be your ally .
Pushing back against the Piglin threat
With your new admirer and hours of building , grind , and strategizing , you defeat the three unlike Hordes by destroying all their bases . The Hordes each are based around a different neighborhood of the Nether with a different aesthetic . One center on offensive , one on defense , and the spore are just the most galling to deal with .
Each Horde has a boss fight after being wiped out , follow by a final boss Piglin . Once you defeat him , it ’s over . Your three companions move on to another man in want and you remain in the new Overworld . A beautiful cutscene plays of everyone keep with pyrotechnic , the humanity coming back to life as you ’re told you instruct everyone what ’s possible united . Your character mount their horse cavalry , sour towards the undefendable portal to the Overworld with several characters peer at you , and rides into the Overworld …
Right back into the lamentable Nether hellscape of the starting sphere , after the claim card . There ’s no further ostentation , just the Overworld pull up stakes to pilot around . That ’s it . uncalled-for to say , the ending finger kind of empty once that cutscene wore off , all the beauty it established melting aside with the reality of the end . All you could do is start a new drive or move on to other way , though Piglins will finally spawn again at least .
Off we ride valiantly into battle! Screenshot by PC Invasion
The story would be better with more story and more of an ending . It passably much dies off until the destruction halfway through the campaign , tie with the lack of fresh things to introduce . All the excitation of the story is in the beginning part and dies off until not even finishing it feel too satisfying . There needs to be a intimately pace increase of beats as the campaign live on and more Piglin pushback .
Characters
Foresight , Knowledge , and Action do their line of work as templet characters just hunky-dory . They ’re competently voice move , though their echo voice lines may very well grate on some players . Their designs are interesting and somewhat memorable . There does n’t need to be much to them , but you may secernate they truly care about protecting the earth . This make them likable by my monetary standard .
The Overworld characters are the star . The Villagers , beast , Skeletons , Zombies , and Creepers are just as they should be- voiceless and conveying everything through the sound clipping you ’re used to and expressive body lyric and faces . They ’re cute , charming , and make you want to oppose to bring through them . There are several little small-scale moments , like a fox run off in a cutscene as a nod to how impossible it is to pick up them inMinecraft , that show they ’re all true to work . I especially like how the Zombies wear sunhats and the skeleton have helmets as a nod to call for tribute from the sun . The only odd particular was Zombies report as unwilling to fight back without the correct inhalation . Anyone who ’s played the base secret plan outside of peaceable mode knows that is n’t true .
The Piglins , on the other hand , are a miscellaneous bag . The tiny Piglins are charming , but the boss Piglins all kind of portmanteau together and have no personality alfresco of generic mean commandant who ache their subordinate . And while this is not a biz about character , more could be done to make them interesting and unique honcho conflict alternatively of entirely forgettable obstacles .
Screenshot by PC Invasion
A lot is missing
The more I pour over this plot after finish up it , the more I think of whatshouldbe there . Here ’s a poor leaning :
Legendsfeels like a base passing with more to sum over prison term , and to be fair , that might be exactly the case . As is , once everyone finishes the run , gets tired of the Versus Mode , and discharge the monthly challenge , there ’s no other real motivator to dally it . It needs regular updates with an inflow of fresh mental object to last recollective term .
Minecraft LegendsReview: Your mileage may vary
Should you playMinecraft caption ? It depends . If you wish your RTS games well polished and mechanically wakeless , you ’re probably not go to care it . If you do n’t have it off or run much of the musical genre and want to savor a simpleton , cuteMinecraftthemed RTS , the game is utterly fine for that purpose . This game is conk out to snap with some people and very much not with others .
Minecraft Legendshas an incredible amount of potential to become an invigorating and fun experience , but mighty now it ’s just too wanting in too many manner . This may alter with more content added to the plot , and I am invest in its future to find out . I felt a lot of positive emotions in those first two hours as I rode off on my horse to maintain this cute humankind in need of my assistance , catch beloved character rally behind me to defend back . If the game recaptures that feeling again someday , then it will become a really solid biz with nothing quite like it .
As it is correctly now , it ’s toy at your own peril . If you do n’t expect much from the gameplay and just like the style you ’ll probably enjoy yourself . But only sentence will recite if everyone goes back to regularMinecraftor this game really becomes a legend .
Screenshot by PC Invasion
Screenshot by PC Invasion
Screenshot by PC Invasion
Every Mob that can fight with you in the game. Screenshot by PC Invasion
