Block Story (3.5/5 stars, guidance suggested, FREE today only as Amazon’s Free App of the Day) is an app that’s been described as a combination of Minecraft and Skyrim. Considering how popular those games are, this seems like a winning idea. From Amazon:
————————————-
Block Story is a game somewhat similar to Infiniminer (the game that inspired Minecraft) with an RPG spin.
Features:
* Infinite world even up and down
* 25 Quests, that give you objectives and hours of fun
* Leveling up, and skill points to improve your character
* Beautiful terrain generation with Hell, biomes, floating islands, forgotten sky, underground world and coral reefs.
* Torches you can make and carry to light your way through caves
* Equipment you can wear like “My Precious” (a powerful ring), and flippers (to swim faster)
* Crafting
* Many weapons, like swords, magic, shields, guns, bow and arrow
* 87 realistic mobs, from lizards to dragons, from clownfish to giant sharks.
* Beautiful graphics, with colored lights, epic night sky, and bumped terrain
* 4 control modes, 1 joystick, 2 joystick, accelerometer and d-pad.
* Vehicles like cars and boats for your long trips (more coming).
* Frequent updates
* Optimized for Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD
***** THIS IS THE FULL VERSION ****
***** IT CAN SAVE THE [GAME] WORLD UNLIKE THE LITE VERSION *****
Here is a video showing you how to craft: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fZwK9PT5SY
“I think for pure playability, Block Story might have the edge over Minecraft”
“On its own Block Story is a brilliantly executed game, but I think that it will only ever live in the shadow of the game it resembles, which is a shame, but the truth.” – Androidtapps.com
—————————————-
This video should give you a pretty good idea of what the game is like.
While it’s true that reviews have been mixed, since Block Story is free today you’ve certainly got nothing to lose in giving it a try, especially if you’re already a fan of Minecraft or Skyrim. Some of the negative reviews seem to be based on user error, or incorrect assumptions about the game (e.g., it’s similar to Minecraft, but gameplay is not the same as Minecraft). Amazon reviewer David Newman bought the game at its full, regular price, and his review is glowing:
Best $5 I’ve Spent On A Game. I never thought I’d be excited by a game like this, but for the price I was tempted to try it. I’ve been very happy with the purchase, and the authors are constantly updating the product.
To start with, the game has a role playing element. There are quests to do. Levels to gain. Experience to earn. With each level earned you can allocate points to different attributes. These attributes are things like traveling faster, flying faster, more mana, more health, more melee damage, better ranged damage, etc.
One can explore the computer generated realms of the game. There is the surface world, with floating islands in the sky, subterranean caves, fantastic cliffs and land bridges, glaciers, lakes, oceans. A variety of climates as well. Deserts, forests, jungles, swamps, meadows, boreal forests, snow covered mountains, and iced over oceans. Beneath the ocean’s surface there’s kelp forests, coral reefs, and underwater caverns.
The computer generated realms also includes Moria, a sub-surface world populated by goblins, quest givers, new kinds of stone and artifacts to dig up. Even deeper down is Hell, a vast realm of danger, exotic ores and monsters, and quest givers. There is also a ancient sky realm, for those that dare to fly or build a structure high enough. In the sky realm one finds more unusual ores to mine, as well as unusual plants and stone. One can even mine the clouds of the sky realm. One can create and save multiple worlds, and move between these worlds exploring, collecting materials…Each generated world is vast, you’ll probably never see the edges of the world, unless you start moving and keep so for decades (real time, not game time).
Filling all these realms are common and not so common animals and monsters. The game already has some 85 different kind of mobs. Some friendly, some as sources of food or hide, and many that are hostile. These are all rendered as polygon, textured models, and not as animated blocks. This includes the quest givers as well. No animated blocks that vaguely like the intended entity.
The game includes crafting, and the list of what can be crafted is constantly growing with each update. General categories include crafted building materials, weapons, vehicles, furniture, game aids (like teleporters), health & mana potions, etc.
There is an active web site and forum devoted to the game where one can find advice, tips, crafting recipes, construction contests, and idea submissions for the game creators.
Block Story – get it today, while it’s FREE!