Story Mode has been out for a bit now, and has been well received by players! With a solid stable of celebrity voice-actors, and the strong storytelling background of Telltale Games, it holds its own with a fairly clever story, and interesting gameplay elements.
Minecraft: Story Mode is an episodic interactive comedy-drama point-and-click graphic adventure video game similar to Telltale's other games, released as a number of episodes. The player collects items, solves puzzles, and talks to non-player characters though conversation trees to learn about the story and determine what to do next. Like other Telltale Games, decisions that the player makes will impact events in the current and later episodes.
Unlike Telltale's previous games that tend to carry more mature or emotional overtones including the death of major characters, Minecraft: Story Mode is aimed as a family-friendly title, so the decisions will still be pivotal and emotional but will not involve mature imagery or themes. Elements of crafting and building, central to Minecraft, are included in the gameplay, following a similar approach. The game features combat and other action sequences, carried out through both quick time events similar to Telltale's other episodic games, and more arcade-like controls, such as steering around debris on a road.
Have you had a chance to play it yet? If so, what do you think?
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Posted Oct 19, 2015Yeah, it's pretty great IMO. I played it 3 times so far and am impressed with the dialogue routing system. The writing is excellent, given the audience appeal limitation. The plot is original, even if a little tropey. The graphics are OK. And the player choices are abundent.
Don't go bashing the gameplay in the comments below because:
-the game is story driven
-the little movement/combat control is meant to keep the player engaged in the story and feel...important to the plot
-the game doesn't even need ANY gameplay aside from its story. Again, story driven. But it chooses to do so, don't assume it's gameplay based
-it's supposed to be more of an interactive story than a game
So, given that this is 95% story/dialogue based I will critique how good it is in that. The world building is excellent. The characters are sorta fleshed out, but they could use backstories to suppport their personalities. But it's still chapter 1, so I won't judge that. What I didn't like was some of the dialogue choices didn't really match what the characters were to say. Especially during the scene in the cave where almost none of them do. What I did like was "insertcharacter will remember that" hinting at future chapters going off of these choices as well as choosing names/designs fir various things.
Overall, I give it an 8.5 out of 10 becuase
Story = 9/10
Gameplay = N/A (Story-driven)
Graphics = 7/10 (But they probably wouldn't make sense in any other style)
Replay Value = 8/10 (although I'd prefer to cherrypick scenarios)
And story had a slight curve in the calculation, because, for the 4th time, story deiven people.
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Posted Oct 20, 2015Also, if anyone's interested, I'm recreating it as a Minecraft map: http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/mapping-and-modding/maps/wip-maps/2543936-minecraft-story-mode-recreation
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Posted Oct 19, 2015The pirates are coming...
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Posted Oct 19, 2015The Wither Storm is awesome. Since I haven't played the game, that's all I have to say.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015Never played, at least not yet. I'm just really glad to hear that it is actually good, I was getting tired of the hate. Last thing I wanted was people getting cocky because they think they were right.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015They had no choice but to use the characters with the blocky mouths. They can't do Slamacow mouths, because to be honest, those really smooth mouths don't resemble Minecraft at all. But hey, let's be thankful they had arm bends and an actual mouth.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015Even so, look around the minecraft animations a bit longer. There are bit type mouths in some and they lipsync better than this
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Posted Oct 19, 2015Meh, the game seems to contain more quick-time events and timed dialogue choices more than actual exploration and interaction. The combat gets boring really quick, because all you have to do is wait for the right time to press a button. It also crashed my computer once because of how resource intensive it was.
Overall, the experience of the game wasn't that great for me.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015It's alright, but it's definitely a step down from the usual Telltale formula. There was a lot less walking around, figuring stuff out, and really heavily important choices that really effected the game at all. It just kind of felt like I was watching an episode of a TV show, it didn't feel like I was playing the same way that the Wolf Among Us, The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones do. It was also way shorter than I expected. I was expecting the usual 2-3 hours an episode of a telltale game gives me, but I got just under and hour and a half with this episode.....it was kind of dissapointing.
On the upside though, I did enjoy the characters, the story, the quirky kind of minecraft humour; it was well thought out and was actually interesting. I do still think that the game was dumbed down from the usual telltale outline for the younger audiences and do think that that did damage it in my views a tad, but it was enjoyable for what it was. I'm just happy I have Life is Strange to keep me satiated point-and-click wise while I wait for the next episode to come out.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015I think the choices will make a lasting impact in later episodes. It's not fair to judge based on 1/5 of the game where you are just beginning to develop a character for your character. Also, we already got the Magnus/Ellegard route. So that should be interesting. Yeah, Telltale has seen better days. But if you never played a Telltale game before (like most of the audience this was partially intended for) it makes a good standalone title. Keep in mind keeping a younger intended audience brings many limitations. So it makes sense that all those tragic deaths and realism were not present.
When I played the game it took me more like 2 hours. Maybe more. That's because I thoroughly explored the environment (in the few scenarios where I actually could). Also, I found it to have some good replay value.
Well, I hope the next 4 episodes are greater than or equal to this one. Then maybe it will prove its worth to more of its players. Even if epsiode 1 might have sealed the deal in the wrong way for a small portion of IOS/Android users.
I agree the quarky humor was good. Also, there are a few easter eggs if you are careful enough to spot them. Such as Mojang employees. Or waiting too long on chapter 1s final choice between the 2 heroes to search for makes Axel say "Goggles." and Olivia responds "What?" and then Axel: "I don't know. I just ran out of things to say."
I am still hearing the gampely sucks in comments below. Let's drop that point for now. I like how you compared it to books/movies because that's what we should be doing.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015I haven't played it yet, but it sounds awesome. Watching the trailer has really gotten me excited, but still, trailers make everyone excited. Anyways, while reading Mojang's post on their website, I thought of something (No nasty remarks like: Well, there's a first time for everything!). I was thinking, after all this MCSM (Minecraft Story Mode) business gets registered and everyone gets a copy, maybe they will add in a MCSM skin pack for Xbox 360/One?
That is definitely, to me, a type of thing the guys over at the studios like adding in. And maybe they'll make it free? I'm kinda hoping for that because of me always having to wear the stupid Tuxedo Steve skin. I mean, who pays for something they've already paid for? (PAYCEPTION
!)
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Posted Oct 19, 2015Or.. you could get PC version and have no problem of limited skins (not to mention a paywall) ;P
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Posted Oct 19, 2015My parents aren't like that, dude.
Why would they let me get a game I already have on my iPad, and Xbox 360!
I can't imagine myself saying: 'But it's an awesome new PvP update and I have to beat up people and go on multiplayer servers to show off.'
Can you?
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Posted Oct 19, 2015You could explain that the PC version has free content such as mods, maps, skins, and resource packs. Plus other stuff like an infinite map.
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Posted Oct 20, 2015I could, If they would know what a map, mod, resource pack, and skin even was.
Do you know any free way to get Minecraft, without pirating?
I'm fairly sure they might guess my Mac password and delete Minecraft even if I get it that way, but maybe I can hide it in my Applications folder..
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Posted Oct 20, 2015They can't if you don't have a desktop launcher. Minecraft PC is uninstalled in an unusual fashion as it is. So if you simply go to %appdata-> Roaming-> Minecraft (windows, not sure how Mac is) and launch it from there all the time they won't be able to find it.
Also, just explain to them that pocket/console edition is a dumbed down version of the PC edition with very few features/limited multiplayer/and very little user generated content which made Minecraft famous in the first place.
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Posted Oct 22, 2015I run on a Macbook Pro, bro!
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Posted Oct 25, 2015no! Don't hide it there if you manage to get it! Launch the game once, and from then on hide it in ~/Library/Application Support/minecraft and keep the DMG hidden in documents.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015Look, I'm a sucker for story driven games if they're well done. Truly, I am. Portal 2, Valiant Hearts and Spelunky? Loved it! But what do those games have in common? They balance gameplay and storyline well and what makes a storyline good? The storyline affects the audience emotionally whether it makes the audience laugh, cry, jump for joy, hold their breath, etc. And that has a name: It hooks the audience. Something I find lacking in TellTale games. I don't mind if it's "point and click" if the story is well done. I don't mind if the story's crappy if the gameplay is good and fun. I'm not against Minecraft having a storyline at all. I think it's a canvas for literary creativity and have seen some beautiful and well done stories come out of it. So why do I dislike Story Mode? The gameplay is a snore and the story is bad. Not only that, but for a professional company that can afford Pixar animators if they wanted to, the look and graphics of the game is horrible.
I think the reason why the story is bad is because it's constrained to a certain demographic (kids) and therefore can only go so far. Kids do not bide well with emotionally intense stories. And that's okay! But I think that considering the age range of the Minecraft community is so huge, they should make a story aimed at kids and a story aimed at adults. Because it's kinda weird adults are criticizing a game that's not aimed at them as long as the game doesn't have negative effects on the child's growth. And I would like to see what TellTale can come up with for an adult story. Or, then again, maybe I don't.
I don't know. That's my best explanation.
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Posted Oct 19, 2015I too love P2, but on the note of the review I agree on most aspects of it. As for graphics I don't really like them but you gotta think that it was a hard decision on how they would be presented, not every would be happy about it. The story wasn't bad IMO, a bit odd, but not bad. The gameplay sucked imo, would have been much better a movie or book.