Minecraft Legends: The Final Preview

Foreign When I think of Minecraft I think of creativity peace and adventure Minecraft Legends opening campaign scene made me feel as though my past accomplishments and care for the franchise were being rewarded by trusting me with a new and important challenge save the Overworld from the greed of the piglens Minecraft

Legends is the fourth Minecraft spin-off game and after getting an hour with its campaign and about an hour with its PVP multiplayer it’s already building to be my favorite of the bunch Foreign Minecraft Legends is an action strategy game which yes is different from a real-time strategy though only in a few critical ways instead of taking a top-down omnipotent view of the world your character leads mobs into battle with a sword in hand Dennis Reese executive producer at Mo Yang told IGN

That one of the reasons the studio didn’t want to make a traditional RTS is because of the challenges they present when putting them on Console the action strategy interpretation cuts out some of the impersonal aspects of real-time strategy and makes events and threats more focused instead of commanding waves

Of soldiers or creatures from above you’re using music to direct a mix of mobs to attack piglet Towers or defend an otherwise defenseless Village first you’ll start with two kinds of golems and then as the campaign progresses you’ll find allies in the iconic creeper and other formerly Hostile Mobs

Directions to the mobs are rather simple move here follow but become more complex steadily over time command one set of units following to move or focus on a Target I played exclusively on an Xbox controller it did take me a fair bit of time to get used to all the commands and

I can’t say it came away from my hour with the campaign having fully mastered the I think the campaign still does a good job of peppering in new layers of lessons during the early tutorial missions I really only felt the lack of Mastery because of the multiplayer

Session that came later but more on that in a moment it’s difficult to say whether the on the ground perspective is more helpful than a wider view after only an hour of the campaign but it did make my personal affection for units stronger that being said it’s a little

Disappointing I can’t cheer on my units or do more with our friendship other than sending them off into battle and Reviving them again and again at their spawn structures other than that as the commander I could only use my sword to attack piglet enemies as it doesn’t do

Damage to structures then when it comes to mining or resource collecting or building defensive structures The Helpful fairy-like creatures called The Alley handle that it’s an interesting distribution of tasks and I’m curious to see how it changes and expands as the campaign continues we didn’t prepare the

Creatures of our world for this day but we believe you can that’s why we called upon you if there is any hope you the tutorial Mission early on was short and straightforward but served as a great introduction to the hosts each gave me a boon to assist in my quest to

Defeat the piglet Invaders and defend the Overworld I like them they serve as just enough context for the story and as fun and encouraging guides but also give me enough space to still feel like the story is my own something I look for in Minecraft the tutorial was genuinely

Essential and expanded well into that first hour of play building on beginner mechanics as the piggling threat increases getting upgrades in Minecraft Legends isn’t done through earning experience that translates to new levels but in true Minecraft fashion instead requires using resources to build towards something new in this case

Building Improvement structures that can be made with a large collection of resources and a special stone called prismarine that’s earned by defeating the piglens Improvement structures unlock more units new buildable defenses and a slew of other upgrades like the ability to mine for diamond or other ore one benefit of Minecraft legends playing

By its own unique action strategy rules is its campaign’s patience with battle Reese said that if I wanted to say spend more time running around the procedurally generated map to floor I could do so without the village actually being in Peril the Peril kindly Waits the hosts gently provide reminders of

The next critical task but they won’t stop you from indulging in curiosity I could easily see myself getting lost and seeking out new mounts or finding other Secrets Reese confirmed there are no secret areas but enticing things like floating treasure chests in the sky that yes are intended to be there and are

Their own sort of challenge to collect I appreciate that Minecraft Legends preserves Minecraft’s exploration and Discovery an hour wasn’t nearly enough to make much of a dent into the full scale of the piglet threat or my forces abilities to combat it Reese said that Minecraft Legends campaign can take

Anywhere from 18 to 25 hours to complete depending on how each player approaches the game I look forward to exploring and unlocking everything in it I can when Minecraft Legends is out April 18th it’s a rare chance to befriend creepers and other creatures I’ve admired but had no

Choice but to slay or run away from previously work the Minecraft Legends mechanics come to full force in multiplayer in each match two teams of four start from nothing and are challenged to destroy the opposing team’s base while protecting their own this means starting by only being able

To gather the basic resources of wood and stone and hopefully if your team is coordinated gather prismarine and build enough Improvement structures to unlock building the most complex buildings and tools like the devastating Redstone launcher the multiplayer map mimics the campaigns and having specific biomes where certain resources are guaranteed

To be found and I like it it’s procedurally generated for a new challenge each map the average length of a multiplayer match is said to be about 20 to 30 minutes but my team managed to push ours to almost 40. we defeated the opposing team’s Redstone launchers several times over but ultimately our

Uncoordinated roles and lack of a developer in our ranks spelled our downfall Minecraft Legends is a game that requires strategy in multiplayer but unfortunately it has limited tools for it in the build that I played Reese said that there’s no dedicated in-game chat for safety reasons which I respect

But there’s also no way to really call out specific actions or declare player roles either one reason my team survived so long was because one of my teammates planted his flag at the base and stayed there almost the entire game to work on improvements building alongside me until

I ran off to gather Resources with a third player our fourth may as well have been AFK which led to our defeat when trying to fend off a coordinated enemy attack roles like a dedicated Builder or resource gatherer are crucial to success Minecraft Legends has a ping system but

As it didn’t seem to go much further than me picking a spot on the map or an item in a menu I wasn’t able to convey my strategies without taking off my headset and speaking directly to the people sitting near me with the time investment in mind I’m not certain I’d

Want to play Minecraft Legends online without having at least a friend or two by my side still I did only get to try one especially long match with three others as unfamiliar with Minecraft Legends mechanics as myself so I’m hesitant to entirely write off the solo queue for multiplayer just quite yet Any Minecraft fan knows Mo Yang is usually around for updates post launch and Minecraft Legends is no exception Reese said that there will be special challenges called Lost Legends which serve almost as separate minigames successfully completing one could earn you a skin one lost Legends example

Reese gave me that I didn’t play was called portal pile a base defense challenge against waves and waves of piglens that’ll be available at launch Reese said they also want to work with creators to potentially have them make their own lost Legends challenges called myths there will also be a Legends

Marketplace to get skins for player characters and mounts Ries didn’t mention if there’d be any campaign DLC though behold I always want always wanted to say that we present to you gifts even though my long multiplayer match was nowhere near the length of the ones Reese said they had when they were

Initially tuning multiplayer the investment in time and potential challenges with Team coordination has me skeptical about my chance at success I’m not at all skeptical about my interest in the campaign though it seems like just the right amount of challenge while still being a pleasant reflection of some of my favorite elements of

Minecraft sure it’s weird to not stop and collect every resource myself but with the help of the Allies the Charming hosts and the potential of finally getting closer to the creepers without them exploding I can say I’m excited to learn we’ll have plenty more coverage of Minecraft Legends when it launches April

18th and for everything Gaming Minecraft or otherwise you’re already in the right place IGN [Applause] thank you