In order to survive, they’ll need to brave an army of insects while being sure not to starve or dehydrate. Much of the game takes place within the confines of a single backyard, with new areas becoming available as the main story progresses. Naturally, these new areas contain stronger, more dangerous insects like spiders and bees, ensuring that the difficulty level increases together with the player’s sk
The world is currently in a tough place with most everybody being told to stay indoors and keep away from others in an attempt to combat the rapid spread of COVID-19. With many beginning to feel the the negative emotional affects of social distancing, it may be a good opportunity to turn to video games to participate in a new or beloved video game ripe with social interaction. As such, we’ve compiled a short list of titles that could help gamers come together during this temporary new world. Note that the intention of the article is not to make light of the pandemic, but instead provide a resource for those feeling the effects of Social Distancing to find a community to embrace.
From the same people that brought us Game of Thrones and Tales From the Borderlands comes their newest decision based game, Minecraft Updates: Story Mode. Telltale Games is notorious for their rigorous storytelling and memorable characters and this time is no different. You play as Jesse, regardless of which gender you choose at the beginning, who is on a mission to create the greatest build at EnderCon, (Enderman Convention if you didn’t catch on). The winner gets to meet the great Gabriel of the Order of the Stone, a group of people who slayed the Ender Dragon years ago but have disbanded since. Of course, the episode would be nothing without some kind of story of revenge that spirals the characters into an adventure that they would have never seen themselves in. Someone sets out to create a Wither, a huge monster that sets out to consume everything, leaving you and your friends to seek out the Order of the Stone. You are accompanied by your friends Olivia, confidant and trusty, Axel, large and loyal, and Reuben, a pig. Telltale hit the nail on the head this time with a different, family-friendly take on one of their main installments. No prior knowledge of the original building game is needed, but it would help if you had some basic terminology.
The episode doesn’t stop there, because once you’ve returned from either of those two paths, you head off as a group with whichever other character you picked up in the first episode (Lukas for me) to find the last member of the Order of the Stone, Soren the Architect. This path also follows a relatively fast-paced action sequence, but falls a little short with its sub-par cliffhanger. It’s only episode two, but the weird events surrounding the Order of the Stone and exactly what they’re going to do to stop this crazy Wither Storm seems as though it will never be resolved.
Each path differs in gameplay as Magnus’s path is a lot more action-oriented with the introduction of Boom Town and ‘griefers.’ Of course, we all know ‘griefers’ from the original game as annoying players who would blow stuff up. Because of this, QTEs (Quick Time Events) are utilized that were so popular in the previous episode to dodge TNT. Ellegaard’s path isn’t as action oriented and focuses more on puzzles and the character focus from the very first episode. There is a lot more dialogue in this path and a lot of it makes up the funnier aspects of this episode. This episode capitalizes on the voice actors that Telltale has gotten together like Corey Feldman (Magnus), who played Mouth in The Goonies, and Grey Griffin (Ellegaard), famous for playing Daphne Blake in the Scooby-Doo cartoon movies that bring the characters to life.
At this point I thank them for the interview and ask if they can send me some of the screenshots they showed me so I can put them in the write up which based on the above screenshot they obviously agreed to. I have played Minecraft, and while I can appreciate what it does and see why it has the popularity it has, I was never able to get into it. Dragon Quest Builders, on the other hand, was much more enjoyable, at least in my opinion. Perhaps it is because I am a long time Dragon Quest fan and enjoy the story component but regardless of the reason I did enjoy the time I spent with the demo. From the limited exposure I did get it seems like this really is an adventure/RPG that uses the building block mechanic and not a simple Minecraft clone dressed up like Dragon Quest. As a result of my time playing the demo and this discussion, I am looking forward to getting my hands on the final version and testing out my bonfire prison idea. Dragon Quest games have always had the same game designer, character designer, and composer, who are respectively Yuji Horii, Akira Toriyama, and Koichi Sugiyaman. These three have worked on the franchise for its thirty year existence and are all on board with Dragon Quest Builders.