Minecraft Legends Review

"Crafting Strategy"

Campaign

April 19, 2023 at 7:40pm
By Jason Stettner

The latest spin-off for Minecraft has arrived in the form of a real time strategy game. A genre that while different from the core of Minecraft, actually does work here in an interesting way. What you’re doing is essentially commanding groups of troops you’ve created or perhaps found in order to fend off an invading Piglin army that has made its way to the overworld.

It’s a daunting task where you need to go about this sprawling landmass taking out the large bases the Piglins have made while also protecting various fortresses that the villagers have created. This concept produces a neat back and forth sort of concept for combat.

You’re quite free in your tasks, but you will have to sit through what’s a rather slow opening forty minutes of more narrative driven combat with guidance. It opens up greatly past that point, but I can see that portion being rougher for the adult audience.

Throughout your ventures you’ll be given really high quality cinematics that depict what’s going on and get some slight direction towards additional monstrosities that have arisen in the world. The length of this campaign effort is actually fairly long, and it can be redone in an almost unlimited fashion since the world is unique when you go at it.

This aspect is also expanded upon with fresh side stories that are to be added over time. The first is basically a tower defense sort of setup where you defend against waves, I’m curious to see where this addition heads though for now it’s very limited and hard to get a true idea out of it.

Multiplayer

For me, the multiplayer of Minecraft Legends is one of the stronger elements of play. Teams of up to four players will face off against each other in matches that could be swift or take well over an hour to get completed. You’ll be building a base, attacking Piglin defenses and attacking the opposing team’s base all at the same time.

It requires communication, teamwork and strategy which when it’s working properly actually is such a grand time. It’s a shame that the game lacks any sort of proper team based matchmaking, you can’t create groups and the matchmaking system itself is very poor. You end up on random teams from friends, get matchmade into games that are a total loss and it’s complete chaos where no one seems to know what they’re doing or care to stay in a match.

That’s also if you’re lucky, sometimes you just get put into empty lobbies where they never start, it’s weird. The pooled resources plus destruction of each other’s items is maddening. I really did quite lose it trying public matchmaking as players lacked any fundamental understanding of what they’re doing. I did of course have to remind myself that it’s likely the younger audience playing in most scenarios, but it doesn’t come across as well structured for serious play which is where RTS games can really truly shine.

I do believe that you could have some really incredible battles within the online multiplayer if they were to create a setting for this mode to flourish. It just seems a bit chaotic which is such a shame as it really is such a blast to play when you’ve got players really into what’s going on. The conflict, the strategies and the poking at each other’s bases while Piglins roam or cause problems between is ever so delightful.

Gameplay

The world of Minecraft Legends is rather beautiful. It comes across as distinctly Minecraft in the aesthetic style but also strangely looks like Trove as well which is neat. On the Xbox Series X you’re getting a 4k resolution at 60fps and it seemed to smoothly offer that across my experiences with small or large armies no matter the biome.

That’s right, the various locations of Minecraft are presented here from weird swamps to high chilly peaks. It’s really neat to adjust your strategy according to the environment. There are also a good chunk of unique mobs (creatures) to control or attack. The Piglins are varied, as are your many ways to take them out with the options present.

There’s also a good selection of buildings and upgrades to your abilities that are available as well. Some buildings offer certain usages such as towers to defend. Others are upgrades where you can have more units as once, or gather new types of material.

It’s complex in concept, but simple enough that anyone should be able to pick it up, and that’s important for a game based on this property. Controlling units is also incredibly easy to understand and you get many movement options as you dance about on your mount. The mount can be swapped out as well I may add, some unique mounts you come across offer great advantages.

The Conclusion

Minecraft Legends offers simple, yet decently complex enough real time strategy combat where players are free to build and attack within a dynamic world. It feels like a bit of a primer for Age of Empires which is quite charming to think of.

The campaign is lengthy, offering varied combative scenarios for you to work on. The cinematics are gorgeous, the enemies are distinct and there’s a wealth of replayability if you really get into it. I’m curious to see where the extra adventures are taken, but there’s not enough there to get a real feel for that mode.

I loved the PVP multiplayer when things were properly setup, but it’s also wildly chaotic when trying to just matchmake which turns me away from it. I could see that multiplayer being ever so tactical and exciting, but it’s too frustrating due to how they’ve structured it.

This is a quality take on the real time strategy genre of games, and it works within the realms of Minecraft. I liked this, spending many hours working out strategies and battling along. I think they could take the campaign concept further perhaps, but what we have now is generally great. I feel there’s untapped potential with this as well.

It’ll be interesting to see the long term support as this does seem fully connected to core Minecraft when looking at the integration of the Minecoins and the store for cosmetics. That aside, it does run well and looks lovely. The dynamic days and unique biomes all bring the charm of the regular core game, but in this distinct setting. It just really quite works and I hope we see this grow further over time.

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Minecraft Legends Review on Xbox Series X
Review Code Provided by Microsoft

Rating Overall: 8.0