I do not like survival games in general and do not particularly like minecraft. I have two major issues with this genre. 1 theres just so much BS baked into these games, i really bristle against what i would describe as “eat your vegetables game design.” Game mechanics that force you to do tons and tons of boring shit to eventually arrive at a pay off. Grinding levels in a multiplayer game, levelling up in an mmo and gathering resources in an open world rpg, the survival genre combines all of these things together to create a creamy vegetable smoothie of pain without any of the pay off to make it worth it and thats the second major issue i have, for me the pay off just never felt worth it. These games rarely have compelling stories, they rarely have fleshed out endgames and they typically fail to create a feeling of satisfaction. You just feel like your on a hamster wheel the entire time and when you do make some big breakthrough like acquiring diamond equipment, your still gonna have to go back to the same boring activities you were taking part in previously. Survival games typically struggle to deliver a smooth feeling of progression. And thats really why i cant have a fun time in games such as minecraft.
Bonus note: My friends convinced me to get try minecraft again on ps4. I spent an hour staring at a “Locating server screen” until i gave up and went to bed, all the more reason for me to dislike this game.

It's hard to write 1 review for a game that has changed so much since launch. While this game is definitely relatively the same at it's core and still deserves roughly most of the praise it gets, it's not quite the same as it was 6-7 years ago.

To generalize this game and not get into specific eras, it's proof that sometimes the simplest of ideas go the furthest. I think it's still a somewhat interesting survival game, but the main thing about Minecraft is the freedom. It's amazing how non-linear and personalised this game can feel, you can really play it how you want and create whatever you want (the latter has been said a million times I know). It's really just a very fancy toolbox that let's you manufacture how you play it, so it's also very flexible as a multiplayer game.

Now, to get into how it's changed and how it has began to fail itself. The game is still the same deal, but I think the entire survival aspect has been watered down, a more suitable name for the mode now would be "conquest". The game advertises night as a dangerous time, but beds allow you to just skip the "most dangerous time of day" with 2 or 3 clicks. There's really not much survival about it aside from a few things it's made easier. Combat and enemy AI is very easy to get through now, hunger and health can be covered with stackable food, other than that there's not too many dangers. I think the developers have also took away from some of the simplicity with an oversaturation of features. Obviously games are updated, and I'm not against that, but none of the features really add or fix the problems of the game such as the survival aspect or progression. There has been zero changes to the equipment tiers or mainline progression since the games earliest days aside from enchanting. The atmosphere of the game also isn't quite the same, with the game having a much different colour pallet and array of creatures.

At it's core, Minecraft is still a great game and deserves to have survived as long as it has, but something really needs to be done about the games difficulty/survival aspect, and as for the rest you just need to take it with a grain of salt that the game has just evolved over time. Still, despite all that, a game that definitely does deserve the pedestal it stands upon.

The game has lost basically all of it's intuitive design it had in it's alpha and beta days. Mobs and the night are no longer a threat at all, you can just be a killing machine and run around at night freely and the game is now just some mediocre adventure game that isn't able to decide whether there is some point to it or not. Whereas old Minecraft's point used to be self fulfilling (build and claim as much land as you can so you can avoid monsters at all costs), that has left the game long ago as the player no longer even needs shelter at all and building a house is pretty much done only for the sake of building a house, and so is expanding your territory

The classic adventure game that gives the player absolute freedom to do whatever he/she wishes. Like the name suggests, you mine and craft stuff in this game; with every block in this game being a destructible element, the game gives the player the freedom to terraform and build structures to the player's creativity and imagination. The game also includes a decent roster of enemy mobs and encounters, which may prove a challenge to players who aren't too careful. There is a story to this game, but it's rather vague and requires a quick google to actually point the player to the right direction. It is the pinnacle of open-world sandbox games if you prioritize gameplay over graphics, and I have yet to see a game that can rival Minecraft.

Writing: N/A
Gameplay: 4/5
Art Design & Visuals: 3/5
Voices & Sounds: 4/5
Atmosphere & Immersion: 4/5

How the hell to rate Minecraft?
It's like rating Tetris - its just a video game staple now.

One of my favorite games to return to when I want to just chill out, mine some wood, build a house. I never got deep with the logic stuff or the community.

Also - the alpha soundtrack is one of my favorite game soundtracks of all time.