Minecraft: Dungeons came out on the 26th of May and was received very positively. Many gaming personalities started playing it on twitch and youtube and reviewers reacted positively. The game was a ARPG "Diablo style" game, which while many said has greatly simplified the genre, still enjoyed its mechanics and gameplay.
However, Minecraft: Dungeons has come and gone, and 5 months later virtually no internet persona still plays the game. The player base has clearly dwindled, and considering its great initial reception, it is curious as to what caused this.
On release, the game received some criticism that it was short on content. There weren’t many levels, and instead, you could replay the levels at a higher difficulty. While this is not a bad idea per say, it is just not enough in this case. Even shortly after the game’s release, I finished all of the levels and it got quite stale quickly to play through the same levels over and over.
In addition, there was a distinct lack of synergy between the gear you could obtain and equip. Creating a more complex combination, a "set" so to say, was just not possible, which meant that the moment you found a new weapon with slightly better DPS, the best thing to do was to equip it, without worrying about any enchantments or need to plan for a certain "build". This meant that users did not have a specific item or build to focus around, the character was ever-changing and never truly a planned entity. This works for many games of course, but not so much for Minecraft: Dungeons.
In relation to the above, while leveling you would receive "Enchantment points" to upgrade your gear further which seemed like a great way to commit to a piece of gear and preserve your points, until you realize that salvaging the item, refunds all points invested into it, ready to use them on the next item you found.
Despite the waning player base and popularity, it seems Mojang and Microsoft are not giving up on the game just yet, with updates being released and new content being announced during the Minecraft Live event.
Howling Peaks, will be released in December with new gear, missions and mobs. The update will also add new obstacles to the terrain, such as cool new animals like mountain goats and the force of wind, which can push players around or off the edges of the map.
During the same event Mojang informed us of upcoming cross-platform multiplayer for PC, PlayStation, Xbox, and Switch which will be added into the game during November.
In conclusion, while Minecraft: Dungeons was quite the fun on release and really does have lots of potential, especially playing with your friends. The Achilles heal of the title is not quality, but rather its lack of content, which is what ultimately made it lose steam. Considering the upcoming updates as well as the yet to be announced future content, I will definitely give it another spin, and hopefully, the online community will too.
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