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Sum-Up

In-depth analysis further down.


🟩 Pros
🟥 Cons



• Combat feels clean, responsive and engaging with its pacing. Ability effects, hit weight and so forth emphasize battles in the right way.
• Solid visual style that perfectly incarnates the spirit of the original Minecraft - not without many “poetic licenses” made to add more flair and variety.
• Great variety of enemies and bosses, each with distinct movesets, abilities and ways to defeat them.
• Excellent variety of weapon / armor traits and unique artifacts to mix-and-match for endless combinations…


• …Even so, the complete lack of classes, skill trees and attributes of any kind feels like a major flaw to an ARPG-style progression; a blunder no amount of gear can overcome.
• Presence of annoying mechanics such as excessive backtracking, repetitive puzzles and boring platforming, that worsen the core experience instead of adding variety.
• Most levels are overly-long (40-50+ min) for ARPG standards, without checkpoints or teleport beacons; losing all 3 party lives means redoing everything from scratch.
• Terrible handling of progression, where all your gear will always become outdated, so you can’t focus on a playstyle you like and are forced to keep switching random stuff.





🟨 Bugs & Issues
🔧 Specs



• Cloud saves aren’t automatic (manual upload required) and aren’t synced with Steam Cloud.
• Occasional bugs related to co-op player position when KO’d, which might make revives impossible.
• Complete absence of quick scrap function to discard unwanted loot; each must be done manually.


• i5 11400H
• 16GB RAM DDR4
• 512 GB SSD
• RTX 3060 6GB
• 1080p





Content & Replay Value:
It took me around 33 hours, alongside my partner, to complete MCD all the way to Apocalypse+ difficulties, taking extra time to find secret levels and side-areas when possible, and finish all DLCs - for the base game only, 15-20 hours. Given the absence of classes / builds and the linearity of levels, I don’t see a reason to replay after finishing.


Is it worth buying?
Only on 50% sale or better, and only if you have someone to play it with in co-op, solo would be boring, not to mention frustrating at times. The content amount isn’t worth full price due to its only sufficient quality and no replay value. Forget the DLCs, they’re not worth it.


Verdict: Decent
Rating Chart Here
An ARPG targeted to fans of the titular open-world sandbox; it does some things competently and is carried hard by its namesake - yet, dubious design choices and annoying mechanics drag it down considerably.


https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3104195694

In-Depth

Writing & Worldbuilding
On the story side, MCD has very minimal narrative; other than a run-of-the-mill villain corrupted by fiddling with powers beyond comprehension, and a brief cutscene at the start of each level, there won’t be any further elaboration on lore, characters or events - that’s alright for an ARPG.
The world is built using the original Minecraft as a baseline; many “out of canon” additions have however been made for the sake of variety or gameplay. For instance, Endermen can be hit by arrows and also can walk on water, to name one. These new additions are always made with good criteria and feel well-integrated, rarely out of place. There’s an excellent level of detail in the environment, however interactivity with it is at a bare minimum; you’d expect more of it for a Minecraft-inspired title.
Exploration & Secrets
The world is divided into self-contained dungeons you can repeat as many times as you want, through four distinct difficulties that become unlocked as you beat the final boss on the previous ones, and get a higher power level from equipment. Each stage is, barring some exceptions, fully explorable without one-way drops, and has many side-areas or, occasionally, hidden sub-dungeons for reaping extra rewards or even unlocking secret levels.
Exploration is an integral part of progression, given that enemies very rarely drop any gear, unless they’re bosses; most of the loot is gained either from end-stage rewards or chests found in the levels themselves. The attentive explorer will have massive amounts of loot to scrap for money, use, or gift to a teammate - only one item can be traded between each mission, having you complete another one before trading is enabled again - a pointless decision.
There are also puzzles and platforming sections in most levels; some of them are fine, while others prove unclear, frustrating or downright badly designed - they don’t feel like a meaningful addition at any point, and if anything, they’re a waste of time… especially when you’re running some level on repeat to get a specific drop, only to get your time wasted by the same gimmick. Should you want to backtrack because you forgot something, there won’t be teleports or checkpoints: it’s the long haul, with characters having dismal running speed.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3096535077
Combat System & Bosses
Combat plays out in a classic ARPG fashion, having Souls in place of Mana, which are gained from slain enemies, a HP bar, and a revive mechanic (in co-op) for fallen companions. About that: if you don’t revive your teammates within 30 seconds, the “night” will start hurting and eventually kill you, while a party wipe will detract one life from the total, and have you repeat the entire dungeon should you run out of them.
Enemies are varied in shapes and sizes, often with their own attack patterns and abilities unique to specific biomes and levels. They’re varied enough to not get stale and can become very challenging, especially on higher difficulties where Enchanted foe variants (elites) come by the truckload. The available dodge-roll has a long cooldown and no i-frames unless specific items are equipped, so you won’t actually be able to dodge as frequently as needed to avoid all the various AoE and projectiles.
You won’t have a definite build at any point, because MCD doesn’t have classes, skill points, trees and attributes: all of this was completely scrapped for a simplistic, casual gear-based progression system, meaning your equipment, armor and weapons will dictate what your skills and synergies are. This is fine for novices but will downright suck for players that want more depth.
On paper, this would mean more variety, but in reality, given that you’ll always need better gear, everything you have will eventually become outdated without any permanent progression outside of equipment. This translates into having to ditch combinations that are enjoyable and work well, simply because the gear enabling them is too outdated. The Blacksmith in your base allows you to scale gear to your current power level, but only after completing three levels, which is a grindy chore.
Bosses are interesting enough, multi-phased, and have their own quirks to learn and exploit. Their difficulty is however inconsistent, with some of them clearly being more challenging than others, regardless of how far you find them in the campaign.
Character Progression & Equipment
Other than acquired gear, you’ll be given one enchant point when you level up, usable to unlock enchantments on gear, which trigger passive abilities with three power levels. These traits can make gear pieces significantly more powerful, but are random and can only be changed at a specific trader using Gold, a currency obtainable only in specific level types.