So i haven't played minecraft in about 2 months now. And they released the final version version about a month ago, so you'd think OH BOY THE GAME'S FINALLY DONE WOOHOOO NOW EVERYTHING WORKS but you'd be wrong.
When i first heard about Minecraft I wasn't too keen on it. A block building game? crafting? Sounds like a cheap RPG with the combat ripped out of it. Then my creativity kicked in when i realized you could build entire worlds out of the blocks, or at least, a nice castle of your own design if you don't have the time for entire worlds, and that was pretty cool. It reminded me of Stronghold: Crusader, an excellent strategy game where you build castles and manage farms to feed your troops so you can defend your castle.
So me and a few of my friends played minecraft and went around creating towns and villages and exploring and building and every new update the past year or so has introduced bugs into the game, but also something new you could use as a resource. New monsters to defend your castle against, or new farm animals to mate wi.. er... breed... and cook and eat... yea... and crops to grow, and sure it wasn't perfect and the updates kept any mods (there's a huge mod community built around minecraft) from working correctly, but it was still in development, so you dealt with it and assumed those would eventually get corrected.
So about two months ago, notch (minecraft creator and main programmer) decided to release a final version. Now he'd been making millions off of this game, enough to start his own company and hire other programmers, but instead of focusing on minecraft, easily their biggest selling (and at that point, only) game, notch and his mojang programmers decided to spread out. So the last few months of minecraft's development were, notch working on something else, and jens being left to fix bugs. And there's pretty much been no new content added for months now.
In the meantime, notch has stopped working on minecraft altogether, and moved on to other games. jens, the only programmer at mojang (notch's company) currently working on minecraft, is more focused on his own other projects than doing anything for minecraft at all. So basically minecraft is currently abandoned and adrift in limbo.
This wouldn't be so bad if the game were actually finished. There's bugs that jens is supposedly working on, but they don't really interfere with the game that much, and what's left is a block building game with a few monsters that pop out at night. There's different biomes with different vegetation, but the same animals (your average selection of farm animals) pop up in every biome, and basically at this point the game is a farming simulation with zombies, since you have to grow some kind of food to keep yourself alive now. But all of that at least works correctly for the most part. So if you want a farming simulation with zombies, you're all set.
They tried adding villages. They really did. but the villages end up so few and far between that it's a miracle if you find any, and the villagers they added to them aren't done yet. They just wander around and get lost in the wilderness if you let them out of their homes. They had plans to make the villagers interactive, and they were going to hire an AI specialist to help program them, but that never happened.
So at this point, once you've built yourself a castle, or farm, or immense, world-spanning tower if that's what you felt like building, then you're done. There's not enough gameplay to hold anyone's interest past this point. And I'm not just talking about me, either, everyone i played minecraft with has the same problem. Building is fun, but once you're done with that, the game becomes lifeless and boring. Final grade for the released version of minecraft is INCOMPLETE, and i've never given that score to another game before. Minecraft started with such promise, and ended with such disappointment.
On the future games front, I am betting skyrim is going to outsell everything else this christmas. I already have the game, still playing it. It's earned its metascore of 95. There was a TON of work put into this game. Every rock, tree and snowdrift was artfully crafted, every monster and dragon looks great, and now that i have fixed the nagging sound issues, I can hear all kinds of things going on in the game. A lot of gaming companies forget about sound when they make games, not really sure why, I mean, i understand visual cues are the most important for actual gameplay but sound is invaluable for immersion in a game. Have you ever watched a movie with the sound off? Why would you, right? But some gaming companies are giving you the same experience when they produce games without much in the way of sound, and that's just pointless. In any case, i think skyrim is easily one of the best games of the last 5 years. Would be even better with multiplayer options, but everything is so heavily scripted and since there's no random events, that cuts down on replayability and totally cuts out multiplayer options. However, I can already see the end of skyrim coming, since there's very little replayability with the lack of random events (every new playthrough has the same quests, in other words) I will eventually grow tired of it and skyrim will be over.
So what's new on the gaming front? Well, Star Wars: The Old Republic is coming out in 5 days. It's an MMO, and my history with MMO's is horrible. They are all made the same and they all end up playing the same... much like skyrim, I can see the end of them as soon as I start playing. Same quests over and over. But i may get it anyway, in case it surprises me. The trouble may be Origin, EA's (electronic Arts) answer to steam, a gaming service that offers games for sale. Steam, which I currently use, offers just about every game for sale that's on the market, past or present. Origin has a PC library of precisely 154 titles, about 100 of which are sims games and their expansions. So you may find your options for gaming purchases limited. Currently SWTOR is not available on steam. It would seem to me if you want your game to sell, you make it available to the most amount of people, but what the hell do I know, right? Right.
Other than that, there's literally nothing new out this Xmas. Next year, Diablo 3 is due, along with a bunch of other games. Sure, all those games were due this year, too, but they got pushed back til next year. So hopefully we'll see them by next xmas. Will they get pushed back again? Maybe! I still find it funny that Diablo 3 has been up for pre-order all year. It may not be out til 2015, maybe 2020 at this rate!
With any luck, I'll have a job by then.
in the meantime, I am listening to xmas music, playing skyrim and watching a charlie brown xmas. if I ever get a dog, I am naming him snoopy. Or her. I don't care. I may name one of my kids Snoopy.
Oh and my current favorite xmas song is (I think) titled "can't wait for xmas" by mindy aber? Not sure how you spell her name. It's got a snappy little beat to it and it pretty much just sets the mood for the holidays... not the one I currently HAVE, since it's like a week before xmas and I haven't got any lights or my tree up yet (not my fault, I swear), but the one I WANT, because she sings about having everything all set up and just waiting for it to come while enjoying the moment with some wine, which just sounds bloody awesome to me. I'd LOVE to have a xmas where we WEREN'T just finishing the decorations on the 24th, you know? Oh well. Maybe next year! Still haven't heard it on the radio yet this season, so I may have to go on the internet and listen to it at least once before the end of the year.
Happy holidays everyone! Hope you are enjoying skyrim, brando!
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