Minecraft

Standing in the sunrise on a high place and looking over everything I have built and knowing that it continues much longer than it is possible to see is like a gaming experience beyond every builder/strategy game I have ever played. Or that feeling when you are digging around and suddenly drops down into hole and there is complete darkness and then hear the presence of a spider and zombie. So many similar moments in this game that are something beyond you usual gaming experience. Overall one of the games that makes most use of the dynamics between light and dark, like those moments when you encounter a lava lake in the night and the warmth of that glow. Fucking beautiful game.

Over 12 years, I've played 5,000+ hours, 100s of minigames, started 100s of new worlds, made at least 250 friends, made a couple dozen servers, worked on several mods, created at least a dozen resource packs, and I could honestly go on.
I'm not sure what else to say besides you have to play it. I'd recommend it to literally any human being.
I guess I'll write a real review eventually :p it deserves a thorough one

Minecraft is real life........................ 2
Even 10 years after its initial popularity boom, Minecraft remains an unmatched experience. Anybody with a desire to exercise their creativity will find a place for themselves in this game's auto-generated worlds. No matter how old I am when I come back to it, there's something new that I want to do. Because of this, it's difficult for me not to love a game like this, despite its general association with children (wait until you see my #14 favorite game pick). I generally don't feel the need to sing the praises for highly acclaimed games either, though at this point, I shouldn't hide that I've spent a lot of my teenage years messing with this.

The fundamental concept of 'randomly generated content' is one that doesn't work well with many gameplay styles. The appeal of 'infinite content' is attractive, though there's a limit to how 'infinite' it really is before the patterns and gameplay repetition start taking form. A well designed game will incorperate the 'randomness' as a surprise, making it an essential part of the gameplay experience. A badly thought out randomly generated game will use this RNG as a substitute for actual content, resulting in boring gameplay. Minecraft is, of course, one of the games that pulls this off well. Almost all of the game's content is already built into the world's generation.

The basic Minecraft starter gameplay revolves around learning to survive. You aren't given any sort of goal. You are spit out into the middle of nowhere, and you just need to not die. I can't imagine anybody playing it today who wouldn't understand the 'punch trees' concept, though when I first played the game, you would need to have a guide open in the background if you wanted to know how to make things. Once you get your tools, you will end up noticing the 'hunger meter', which means you have to find a source of food, which is typically whatever animals spawn around you. And of course, every time I play this and night rolls around, I realize I've waited too long to make some kind of shelter. Or more importantly, a BED.

Once you get to the 'build a house' stage of Minecraft, the possibilities open up to what's going to become the rest of your gameplay experience. When I was a younger teen, I would build houses into the sides of hills or mountains, which is actually a lot more creative than what I do nowadays. Usually I lay down a basic set of walls and a roof and call it a day. Though, when I'm feeling more creative, I try building my house up into a multi-leveled nightmare, where each floor makes less sense than the one before it. The last time I played this, I tried making an entire mansion (which may have been influenced by my recently played games). Generally, you have to make your own goals in this game, though the 'ender dragon' exists to fill the void for the people who need to have a credits roll for the experience to be deemed worthwhile.

I've never tried to beat the ender dragon, for the record, just because I've never been interested in all the wacky extra hidden content buried in these random seeds. Because Minecraft lets you tackle the game however you want, you can make it as simple or complicated as you like. What you can't do, however, is engage in entertaining combat. The game tries to make things work with the use of swords, shields, and a bow, but most of the enemies in this game just run straight at you and attack you. This includes creepers, which quickly blow up everything around you. There are more interesting concepts than that, like the enderman who only attacks you under certain circumstances. Though, you will generally only come across the wacko special enemies if you search for them.

Everything you use in the game can be upgraded as far as you're willing to work for it. If all you want is something reliable, you can go digging around for diamonds. Though, for more dedicated players, diamond simply isn't enough. The next steps change the game from digging for diamonds into farming experience points to gain enchantments. Or even searching through the game's hell world for netherite. There are a dozen different ways to do these things, meaning you can play merchant and trade with villagers for your goods if you wanted. You can grow your own food at your house. Hell, with all the methods discovered by players of the game, you can make machines that will give you whatever you're looking for as long as you have the patience to build it. All of these resources are intended to fuel whatever projects it is you're working towards.

So when I say Minecraft is real life 2, it's not exactly too far off. You need to have some goal or project in mind in order to enjoy it, otherwise you're going to bumble around and then die.
This is also why I, and so many others, got bored of No Man's Sky quickly after its launch. It had all the randomization, but no actual projects or goals to work towards other than the dumb 'center of the universe' goal
For some, living peacefully is enough, though living peacefully in Minecraft takes a bit of effort in itself! Mainly because there's so many damn enemies spawning at night. It's one of my problems with this game, that I can't reliably have a dark room in my own house, lest it spawn multiple creepers that end up blowing up everything as soon as I open the door. If that wasn't enough, the game launches pillagers and other bullshit at you as well. I'm sure there's an easy babby mode that eases this problem, though it'd be nicer if I didn't have to worry about enemies spawning IN my house. That's why I made it in the first place! Also, the hunger meter is annoying. Obviously since this is a survival game, it's necessary, but I also feel like that drains too quickly. Again, maybe I need to play on 'easy mode'.

Somebody who knows more about this game's mechanics could go on for an eternity about everything this game has to offer. I don't know that much, but thankfully, the player doesn't need to know much in order to enjoy the game. It's always a good time for me.

Perhaps one of the finest games in the sandbox genre which pioneered a whole exploration of voxel based games in the 21st century. Truly the pinnacle of engaging the user's creativity and creating a generation of blocky architects. A soundtrack that does nothing but grow on you over time and is perhaps one of the most instantly recognizable OSTs in the video game rabbit role. The modded side to this game is something to behold, so even after thousands of hours upon hours of enjoying the vanilla experience, there's always a mod, or modpack, for people who need just a little bit more from the base experience. Quite possibly the greatest sandbox of our time.