Quick Look: Minecraft: Story Mode

These 2 words don't sound like they should be used together.

WHY DOES THIS EXIST

To put it simply.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MS3E7o_RQaI

I'm at least interested in seeing what this is.

I have no interest in Minecraft but I will watch this Quick Look.

As someone who dislikes Minecraft, but likes TellTale, I'm interested.

Why do games these days keep starting with some line about "how you play changes the story". We get it, it's a video game.

Best case scenario I guess is that they make The Lego Movie, where they take a construction toy and add a mythology and characters to it that in no way existed before, and make it be all cute and about the joy of creation?

*bursts into the room* plaaaaay borderland taaaallllesssss

Haha, I'm almost positive this is just like The Wolf Among Us Quick Look where they intentionally just choose the silent option to see what it does, and it's invariably dumb because the main character just stonewalls people. I swear they did the same thing.

This starts out with a real banger of calling redstone, "red dust." So that's great.

Press X to bludgeon pig to death with stone block.

Is that Billy West doing the introduction?

Brian Posehn was in Brutal Legend

I'm open to the idea of this - if anything it's kind of exciting as the game was a completely blank slate narrative - but I've gotten tired of Telltale games, fell away mid-season from both Borderlands and Game of Thrones, and I fear Life is Strange has made it even harder to go back.

This actually looks pretty entertaining. Admittedly I was never really into Minecraft, but everything looks pretty solid. Even though I'm not getting 100% of the references, it seems like a fun game.

@hargrimm said:

Because Minecraft is a machine that prints money. I'm surprised there haven't been more spinoffs.

Couple of notes for our GBeast editors, from a casual minecraft fan. (I haven't played much but I absorbed information from youtube people).

• This looks WAAAAAAAAAAAAY better than Minecraft. There are shader mods that apply alot of the colour correction and lighting effects that make it look similar but Telltale didn't just take the vanilla look.
• Animations are more natural here and have many more points of articulation (plus they can bend). I would have preferred more simple animations, actually.
• Wither skulls are used to summon a wither, which is a giant black flying monster. Austin was thinking of a Ghast (white), which is an intimidating enemy, but a mere baby by comparison.
• Minecraft basically is mods. It continues to have life because of the crazy things that can be added, even on server side. Whole other games have been recreated inside minecraft. MS paint is in minecraft, and can be played with servers full of people. The vanilla game is a platform at this point.

I really appreciate the GBeast style of quick looks (you didn't just spend 30 minutes shitting on it) and hope you keep it up!

From IMDb Billy West does Narrator / Sigge / Fanboy (voice)

Why the hell do they all have smug faces in this game?

This is what you want to take issue with? Perhaps you're just having a bad day.

Sooooooooo.... where is the Beast cast??

Both Brian Posehn and Mission Hill are underrated.

Patton Oswalt and Brian Posehn have both been in games.

When is Minecraft: ARAM Mode coming out?

I've been a pretty big mark for Telltale's brand of storytelling (excepting WD Season 2 which was a shitshow for a multitude of reasons), but after playing the first episode of this...MAAAAN, this is bad. None of the humor really lands, the characters are extremely boring, and the plot is paint-by-numbers. Considering that these games live and die by their writing, that's a big problem. At least Tales From the Borderlands is as good as everyone says it is; I initially skipped it because I hate the Borderlands world, but Tales is legitimately great. Y'all should play that instead. This doesn't seem worth it.

@bisonhero:Yep; for as much as the games initially emphasize that 'silence is a valid option', it really isn't. The games are not written with an idea of a mostly silent protagonist, and playing the same 'gruff, stoic badass' archetype in every game gets boring. (Wolf Among Us is maybe the only game where you could get away with 'silent', but that's not really true to Bigby as a character; he talks all the time in the comics, and the game was written with that in mind.)

This has no reason to exist, wont be much good, but will make money hand over fist.

Why do games these days keep starting with some line about "how you play changes the story". We get it, it's a video game

CRPGs would scare the bejesus out of people who light up at those words.

Isn't Patton Oswalt a shitbag? I've lost track of who the comedian piss babies who get upset if you dare criticize them are :(

Oh boy...

EDIT: OK, I'm looking at the character selection menu. Are these all from Dreamworks movies?

Waiting for the Altis Life mod

(Also, is this game simply a money grab)

EDIT: (This is a really weird product)

...This does not look good.

Vinny's insistence on stretching these games by intentionally doing silly things stresses me out for some odd reason. Just pick an option Vinny!!!

Looks interesting. Once a few more episodes are out I might pick it up. Wasn't expecting the big open exploration of Minecraft like some folks, this looks like a decent Telltale game in a universe that I already love.

What a nightmare

Oof...

It looks nice, and the concept is interesting, but I checked out on the QL halfway through. I was hoping the writing would be wittier given the VA cast (and Telltale's history with comedy), but it all just comes off as dull.

@meauntienora: Dude I kinda forgot about Mission Hill tell I heard Austin bring it up...thought my head was gonna explode, I'm gonna go find those episodes somewhere now

Also, given how good of a job TTG did with a Borderlands game, I give them the benefit of the doubt on crazy licensing choices.

@bannerthief said:

My issue is that they always kinda treat the silence as noncommittal or your guy just being weird. It would be nice if in certain moments, silence was actually a choice where you're rewarded with a "Yeah, silence was the right choice", but they seemingly always punish you for it or your character gets a weird look from everybody present.

Like, in Walking Dead Season 1, when things go real bad for Kenny and his life is ruined, was one of the only moments where I just said nothing, as a sort of "Man, there is nothing I could possible say right now that would be appropriate for how bad things just went", but then the game/Kenny just treated me like I was wussing out and not committing to a reaction and they gave me a hard time over it.

A wither skull is worth way more than a diamond, Petra got swindled.

walking dead season 1 was good but holy shit did telltale drop the ball on everything after. i really dont understand why they are so critically acclaimed, every script they've ever made feels ripped out from some awful after school kid/young adults show

That training montage and the title card scenes are pretty great.

This looks fine but I cannot think of a Telltale adventure game less suited for me.

I'm starting to feel too old.

Next they'll make a pewdiepie game.

With this comment, I feel like the Walking Dead Season One was the only Telltale game you played. Wolf Among Us was great.

Also, I had this playing while I was preparing dinner and when GBeast said "Here's Minecraft, a Telltale game" I laughed in the kitchen and said to myself, "those Beast-boys are such kidders!"

Then it turned out they were right.

Huh.

Alright, that jump off the bridge just convinced me to buy this game when it's finished.

It bothers me that they don't recognize Brian Posehn.