Minecraft Review

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"If you're not the kind of person who can make their own fun, a lot of Minecraft's appeal is going to be lost on you"

The whiff of "emperors new clothes" is overwhelming. Why not just come out and say "Minecraft is great, but you have to have 'imagination' to see how great it is".

Ok, I get that the reviewer likes the game, but is it not possible to give that opinion without being so passively/aggressively insulting to those that might not like it? There's just no need to imply that there is something wrong with the player if they think it sucks.

 

[masticina]

Do I have to say more? It is like Lego.. but then digital..

Now excuse me while I am going to complete my lovely camp on this small island. A small fire to sit around, a fishing pole, an oven to cook the fish. oh and a bed all I need

 

[Slycne]

"If you're not the kind of person who can make their own fun, a lot of Minecraft's appeal is going to be lost on you"

The whiff of "emperors new clothes" is overwhelming. Why not just come out and say "Minecraft is great, but you have to have 'imagination' to see how great it is".

Ok, I get that the reviewer likes the game, but is it not possible to give that opinion without being so passively/aggressively insulting to those that might not like it? There's just no need to imply that there is something wrong with the player if they think it sucks.

And this whiffs of projection. Did I ever say that preferring a more tightly structured game is somehow wrong or less fulfilling? It's akin to comparing playing with Legos or reading a book. Neither one is a more correct way to spend your time, just simply different. Unless you're my twelve year old self that would listen to books on tape while playing with Legos, clearly the king of pastimes.

I certainly didn't mean to imply any condescension.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

I can't get into it at the moment.

Can't seem to find a seed that I want to spend a lot of time on.

 

[GrandmaFunk]

There is one big problem with Minecraft that isn't mentioned at all in the review:
Minecraft is schizophrenic.

The game doesn't know what it wants to be. An open world survival game? A construction game? An RPG? There is no clear vision for the game.

Oddly enough, I think this is actually the main reason why Minecraft became so damn popular!

it can be any or all of those things..players can pretty much pick and chose how they want to play and what game elements they want to interact with.

some days i'll just work on a new building project, some days i'll just explore the world, some days i'll go cave-diving..or maybe i'll just build a farm.

or build a rollercoaster

 

[Balobo]

Skipped ahead to see the score. Decided that reading the rest of the review is probably unnecessary, as I'm not really in the mood for a laugh. If you're going to make a joke review, at least be a little less subtle. Go and give Bastion a bad review to shake it up a bit.

 

[Marik Bentusi]

Wow. The first twenty seconds of the video has already ruined anything they would hope to say to me, and that's not even past the introduction.

They're usually doing joke reviews and they try to keep this style in this one, but they can't help but make some serious remarks here and there because they're genuinely disappointed by the final release's incompleteness.
If you can distinguish the satire and sarcasm from the grain of truth in Yahtzee's review, you should also be able to do that here.

I don't agree with all the points you're making in the actual post, but thank you for posting this video I was thinking about as well. We can all enjoy a game no matter how good or bad other people make it out to be, but a reviewer should go two steps beyond that and judge a game based on analysis. Just saying why you think it's good or bad is just stating one's opinion or a comment.

Sad to see a bulk of the escapist community can't see where the serious parts of the videos are and which are just satire. Then again it is kinda hard considering the other videos of the series are pretty much just joke reviews. A person that already has made up their mind probably won't be convinced by it and will tune out quickly, no matter how many valid were made.
A review can never be objective, but it can become more objective and less subjective by explaining each point made and by not hiding any part of the analysis, being as honest as possible. Otherwise it's useless for a reader with an open mindset.

So yeah, just throwing out there my support for you since I think you could need such a message in your inbox.

 

[Balobo]

Good to see a proper review, though the inherent difficulty of reviewing Minecraft is that everyone already owns it. Still, one of the best games I've played in ages.

The difficulty of reviewing Minecraft is because it's a pos and massive Notch fanboys will attack you if you speak the truth, so you must shower an unpolished, shallow and incomplete product with glowing praise.

 

[Balobo]

I'm sorry, but you're out of your mind if you think it deserves that score. I mean, if you like it, fine, but if we're being objective here, Minecraft is terrible in just about every category you could name, and is far surpassed by similar titles such as Terraria, as someone already mentioned.

You want a good review? Here:


Notice that this guy basically lists nothing but FACTS about the game. No opinions here, minus the occasional comment, such as his views on the music.

Again, if you like it, that's your opinion and such and I'm about not to tell you that you CAN'T like it, and indeed there are a few aspects of it I like myself. But don't give it a great score and tell me that it isn't an objectively awful game.

Might want to look up objectively. It doesn't mean what you think it does.

The only real similarity between Terraria and MineCraft is resource gathering. Past that, MC is a construction tool, and Terraria is an attempt at MetroidVania.

Why are we reviewing a construction tool as a game then? Either it's a shitty game or it's a decent construction tool.

 

[Tiamat666]

There is one big problem with Minecraft that isn't mentioned at all in the review:
Minecraft is schizophrenic.

The game doesn't know what it wants to be. An open world survival game? A construction game? An RPG? There is no clear vision for the game.

Oddly enough, I think this is actually the main reason why Minecraft became so damn popular!

it can be any or all of those things..players can pretty much pick and chose how they want to play and what game elements they want to interact with.

some days i'll just work on a new building project, some days i'll just explore the world, some days i'll go cave-diving..or maybe i'll just build a farm.

or build a rollercoaster

I don't think so. Minecraft started gaining traction when it was still a fairly simple "explore, mine and build stuff" game. These core concepts and the fact that there was nothing else like it was what made Minecraft interesting and special. The "messy" stuff like enchantments, dragon, and pointless NPCs, were only added relatively recently. And nobody likes to play Minecraft for these new features that don't add much and rather divert focus from the original spirit of the game.

 

[-|-]

And this whiffs of projection. Did I ever say that preferring a more tightly structured game is somehow wrong or less fulfilling? It's akin to comparing playing with Legos or reading a book. Neither one is a more correct way to spend your time, just simply different. Unless you're my twelve year old self that would listen to books on tape while playing with Legos, clearly the king of pastimes.

Ok, but I still think that "the kind of people who can make their own fun" is a loaded statement containing implicit value judgements, intentional or otherwise. You won't find many people that will admit to "not being the kind of person to make their own fun" as it will be generally considered a negative personality trait.

I certainly didn't mean to imply any condescension.

I can accept that. I apologize for being snarky - I've just had an annoying debate with an advertizing 'creative' about what constitutes so-called "creativity" (which isn't really any excuse, but it's the best I've got).

Btw, I don't have an opinion on minecraft; I've never played and I'm probably never going to because I don't do PC gaming (please don't flame me). I only read this review to see what all the fuss has been about.

 

[Veylon]

The real problem with rating Minecraft is that there's precious little to compare it. It can be argued that it isn't even a game, but a toy. There's also the issue that (as the video shows) much of what makes Minecraft so popular isn't even from Notch, but from modders. And, besides which, it's tough to review because it's a moving target that changes over time.

I'll grant that it doesn't know it wants to be, but it's players know what they want out of it and it's open enough to allow them to ignore the parts they don't care for.

Personally, even as a fan I felt the reviewer was too forgiving. Minecraft suffers from serious technical glitches and hiccups that would doom most games to oblivion, including the ever-annoying CTD on F11 bug. And, if you had to research a wiki to learn how to play, say, Skyrim or Battlefield, the developers would be raged at for their incompetence. Minecraft is fun, but it's extremely lacking in polish and optimization.

 

[Lev The Red]

"if you're able to lose yourself in finding your own fun, there isn't a better game than Minecraft." except Terraria.

while admittedly the only thing keeping me from buying Terraria is it's not compatible with osx (raise flameshields), i have played Terraria on a friend's PC and i think Minecraft is better.

but thats's just, like, my opinion, man.

 

[Legiondude]

You want a good review? Here:


Notice that this guy basically lists nothing but FACTS about the game. No opinions here, minus the occasional comment, such as his views on the music.

I watched and kept getting the vibe that he was out to accentuate the negative even if he had legitimate complaints

Also, can't reeeeeeaally garner respect for his review if he resorts to using fart noises for every criticism.

 

[MaxwellEdison]

And yes, even redstone, because Terraria has that as well. Unlike Minecraft's, it can actually be hidden...

I've never played the other game, so I don't really care about the discussion. Just letting you know almost all the redstone on my map is hidden in Minecraft.

 

[CardinalPiggles]

Vanilla MineCraft doesn't deserve 4 and a half stars I don't think, it's community does.

 

[ResonanceSD]

I prefer Yahtzee's description of Minecraft "creativity toy" rather than "game".

Also best one-liner to summarise this game from the article "This utter and complete freedom is both Minecraft's biggest strength and also one of its weaknesses. If you're not the kind of person who can make their own fun, a lot of Minecraft's appeal is going to be lost on you. "

I go through stints of Minecraft, a single 4 hour session is enough to satisfy me for months =D


EDIT: I'm pretty sure vanilla minecraft isn't a 4.5 star game (Lower than Dragon Age 2 on this website, for those playing at home)

However, modded minecraft easily attains 4.5 in my books, with some of the better mods (HD textures, memory modifiers, etc) taking it up to 5 =D

 

[subtlefuge]

You want a good review? Here:


Notice that this guy basically lists nothing but FACTS about the game. No opinions here, minus the occasional comment, such as his views on the music.

I watched and kept getting the vibe that he was out to accentuate the negative even if he had legitimate complaints

Also, can't reeeeeeaally garner respect for his review if he resorts to using fart noises for every criticism.

Also, every other review that they do is satirical. For example, they gave Sonic Generations a 4 out of 10 for having colors that aren't brown in it and not being able to play as Shadow (jokes that must have seemed funnier in their heads).

However, I get the impression that the shtick for the Minecraft review was that it was mostly non-satirical. Still, you have to agree that delivery is significantly less than what was promised.

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

Good to see a proper review, though the inherent difficulty of reviewing Minecraft is that everyone already owns it. Still, one of the best games I've played in ages.

The difficulty of reviewing Minecraft is because it's a pos and massive Notch fanboys will attack you if you speak the truth, so you must shower an unpolished, shallow and incomplete product with glowing praise.

You know it's ironic how I think the same when it comes to Skyrim now you mention it.