The failure of Minecraft Legends
Marcos Jimgar
Introduction
As many of you already know, Minecraft Legends was a highly anticipated game a few years ago, generating a lot of hype for being a strategy game. However, unfortunately, after its release, we realized that, to a certain extent, it was a visually beautiful game but with mediocre combat and gameplay.
In this article, we will go through all the problems that led to the failure of Minecraft Legends. Let's get started!
Main Launch Mistakes
Even before its release, Minecraft Legends had certain issues, such as its unnecessary launch price of $40 or €40, making it the most expensive game in the Minecraft franchise compared to Minecraft ($30) and Minecraft Dungeons ($20). This already raised alarms, but the real problem lay in its gameplay, lack of replayability, and difficulty.
Another major issue was its post-launch support, as it took too long to release new content. This is a brief summary, but now I prefer to go point by point without summarizing.
Gameplay
For a beginner, the game’s controls felt normal, but as players continued playing, they began to notice several frustrating issues. One of the biggest problems was troop control, which was a challenge to manage, as units would often get stuck while moving across the map. Additionally, the game lacked real strategic depth—by simply taking five mobs of each type and building some bridges, players could defeat most bosses and clear dungeons with ease.
This led to a repetitive and boring gameplay loop. A possible solution would have been to create more competent enemies that forced players to develop real strategies, preventing them from mindlessly rushing through the game.
Marketplace
This was a very poor way to start monetizing the game. Personally, I agree with DLCs that add skins and extra content for a few dollars, but the Marketplace was in the game from day one, and free skins simply did not exist. In Minecraft Dungeons, these kinds of microtransactions didn’t even exist, making it clear how desperate they were to make money at all costs.
A better approach would have been allowing players to unlock cool skins for free while keeping some as paid options. However, this wasn’t the case—you had to pay no matter what.
Another major issue was the introduction of paid levels—community-created maps that required payment to play. This was absurd, as they weren’t particularly impressive, yet players were forced to pay for them.
Lack of Replayability
Once the game was completed, there was no clear reason to keep playing. The campaign was the main focus, and after finishing it, the only options were to replay it or play with friends. However, the campaign had no replay value—it was the same map with the same bases to attack every time. Combined with the repetitive and unchallenging gameplay loop, this made players quickly lose interest.
It’s worth mentioning that months later, a team-based multiplayer mode was added, but by then, the game was already dead, making it impossible for it to revive.
Final Conclusion
Although Minecraft Legends was a game I played for about 15 hours and enjoyed, its incredible decline from 3 million active players to just around 30-25 daily players makes it a failure for Mojang and Blackbird Interactive (the main studio behind it).
With nothing more to add, thank you for reading the article. See you later!