Minecraft: Builders & Biomes Junior
- Andy Page
- 6 minutes ago
- 3 min read
Before playing Ulrich Blum's Minecraft: Builders & Biomes Junior I had never entered the world of Minecraft. Yes, I’d seen YouTube videos of people playing it (courtesy of my eldest) and was familiar with Steve & his lava chicken (apparently it’s ‘tasty as hell’) – and so wasn’t sure what to expect from my travels in the Overworld. What I discovered is that, beyond its seemingly innocent veneer, this game is as cunning as a Piglin and as anxiety inducing as a Creeper (okay, I know a little about Minecraft, but that’s it, I swear… maybe).
As you may have surmised, Minecraft: Builders & Biomes Junior is the younger sibling to Minecraft: Builders & Biomes, having also been published by Ravensburger, and although it shares similar DNA with its elder sister, Junior does have some key differences. Where the original is a competitive game of mining stones to build structures to get points, and doing away with mobs to get points, this version is a 2-4 player co-operative mining enterprise to populate your shared 3 x 3 grid with animal shelters while also trying to work as a team to stave off the mobs that want to follow you back to your farm and reduce your chances of completing your goal. No killing here – it is aimed at a younger demographic – but there are still things to make you sweat: the aforementioned mobs and also the lava that surrounds your stack of precious stones.
Rather than a ‘resource mountain’ of 64 cubes, this edition has 27 cubes that are formed into a 3 x 3 x 3 larger cube by once again ‘pouring’ into a cardboard mould. Don’t let the lesser number of cubes fool you into thinking this makes for easier mining tho'. In order to acquire the cubes you might need you don’t simply pick them from the stack, you have to physically 'mine' them using a foam pickaxe (designed to look exactly like it’s come straight from the pixellated videogame). If the cube(s) you want fall(s) onto the grass that surrounds the stack, happy days, but if any cubes fall into the lava that surrounds the grass you lose them and your turn is over. This way of mining elevates the game to quite a technical test of your dexterity, and where more cubes are needed it can become a real challenge trying to ensure your precious resources don’t end up being burnt to a crisp. Help is on hand tho', in the form of a foam shovel which can be used by any other player to help stop cubes falling into the lava, provided you have the tokens to ask for this help: ‘iron shovel’ tokens are single use and can be earned through the game; ‘diamond shovel’ tokens can be given to younger/less able players at the start of the game and allow the shovel to be used by any other player every time the player with the diamond shovel has the pickaxe).
Why go to the risk of mining these cubes when the chances of loss seem pretty high? Because it’s the only way you’ll be able to build animal shelters (or keep away mobs) on your farm board. Beside the shared, double-sided farm board there is a 5 x 5 grid of tiles, all initially laid grass side up, with the reverse showing either an animal that inhabits a forest, desert or tundra biome, or a mob. On your turn you select a tile, flip it over and, whether it’s an animal or mob, try to ‘mine’ the correct block(s) to either build a shelter (brown for forest, beige for desert, grey for tundra) or ward off a mob (black for a torch) – green ‘emerald’ cubes are wild and (usually) needed to ensure victory. In addition to being a tricky dexterity game, there’s an element of memory & recall, as once a mob has been warded off it flips back to its grass side. You can place the torch card on it to mark where it is but when another mob has been flipped and then successfully held at bay, the torch moves places...
On top of being a surprisingly tricksy dexterity and memory game, there’s a good amount of scaling, with five different levels of difficulty to choose from and options within them to make the game easier or harder depending on who’s playing. It may be Junior in name, but this is certainly not a dumbed-down version of the original: it’s quite possibly one of the best, genuinely co-operative games I’ve ever played!
(Review by Andy Page)
