Minecraft Dungeons 2 review: It's dangerous to go online

Minecraft Dungeons 2 is an enjoyable dungeon-crawling romp, especially with friends. And by that, I mean local friends, not online ones.

I remember when Mojang and Double Eleven first came together with the idea of taking Minecraft and putting it in a dungeon crawler setting. The first Minecraft Dungeons showed a lot of promise, nailing down the fundamentals of hack-and-slash adventures and combining it with some new twists. The outcome was decent, if a little overly simple. Minecraft Dungeons 2 doesn't do too much to deviate from its overly simplistic gameplay loop, but it does dive deeper into its source material while refining some of the first game's mechanics into something a little more complex.

Unlike the first game, I mainly played Minecraft Dungeons 2 on an online server. That quickly proved to be a mistake, because while local offline play is a fun way to experience this adventure with friends and loved ones, the online component proved majorly frustrating for a variety of reasons.

License to Ill

While the first Minecraft Dungeons followed an Illager run amok, Minecraft Dungeons 2's story shows that nearly the entire Illager crop is rotten to the core. A new dimension known as the Sift has made contact with the Minecraft Overworld, seeking to make contact and forge bonds and friendships. Unfortunately for the Sift's denizens, they made first contact with the Illagers, led by the Illager High Council, who wasted no time trying to seize the Sift's power for themselves. The Illager High Council has begun using the Sift's portal technology to warp across the Overworld, threatening to take control of everything.

I'll confess that I don't remember a lot about how Minecraft Dungeons told its story, but the storytelling in Minecraft Dungeons 2 feels almost minimalistic. There are a few cutscenes, but there's almost no voiceover, outside of a few narrations. The cutscenes are gorgeous to look at, showing the power of Unreal Engine 5, which is why it's too bad there are so few of them. Instead, the game opts for a more text-based presentation. On the one hand, it comes across as dated, but the manner in which quests unfold and are told through the perspective of the narrator almost makes this feel like a Dungeons & Dragons campaign. The format started growing on me by the end.

All of this is to set up a player's hero embarking on this journey against the Illagers. Off the bat, the game asks if players are going to play online or offline. Both allow for drop-in, drop-out play, though the former allows for online players to dive in via party codes or matchmaking. What bothered me almost immediately is that once a player selects their character for on or offline play, they cannot change their mind. IF you're playing with friends in an online setting and decide later that you want to play at home with your spouse, kids, or local friends without connecting online, you have to start an entirely new character. Of course, that's just the beginning of the game's online woes, but I'll get to those in a moment.

Like the previous Dungeons, players get a melee weapon, a ranged weapon, and three artifact slots to help complement their play style. Magic is, once again, represented by Souls, while healing is tied to a potion that uses a cooldown timer. Like before, players are as strong as the gear they equip, which can be enhanced further through Enchantment Points. In the last game, I despaired over the idea of grinding for gear and going through the endgame with inferior gear that left me vulnerable to the sudden difficulty curve.

That's not an issue with Dungeons 2 anymore, as shopkeepers will allow players to level up their gear for some in-game currency. If you have a Level 15 helmet with the perks you want, you can keep paying to level that helmet up throughout the game. It also provides some incentive to keep leveling up, as gear can only be improved as far as the player's max level. Plus, a lot of the randomness has been taken out of the shops, as shopkeepers can likewise be leveled up to offer items and services of increasing rarities. All of this feels like a substantial improvement over the original, even if there's still the issue that there's no crafting in this Minecraft game.

Four bars for four players

Minecraft Dungeons 2 does a lot to improve upon the foundation set by the first game. Combat feels satisfying with weaponry that allows for build experimentation. The world feels bigger with more secrets to explore. There are side quests all over the place. The story is still short, but now there's an endgame that feels engaging and challenging. Even the simple addition of a jump button feels so satisfying and allows for greater depth in exploration and battles. If you're playing with your spouse or your kids at home offline, it's a lot of fun.

Sadly, I spent the bulk of my review playing online, where my temper slowly rose like a Creeper about to explode. There were several instances where the online servers were unstable, often disconnecting me from the game, even when I was playing solo. This would normally be a mild inconvenience at most, but the disconnects were frequently happening deep into some dungeon runs. If a player dies during a dungeon run, they'll respawn back in the village hub with a helpful warp spot available to take them back to their most recent checkpoint within the dungeon. When a disconnect happens, the player returns to the hub, has to journey all the way back to the dungeon, and run through the whole thing over again from the beginning. This happened multiple times.

On top of that, the online experience was frequently buggy. Rubber-banding happened often, which would have been annoying enough if it just involved watching my character leap back to where they were a few seconds ago. That happened quite a bit, but these online hiccups were a thousand times worse during a boss battle. Even when I was battling the final boss, I saw a big attack about to come my way, so I dodge rolled to safety. Or at least I thought I did, because the server rubber-banded me back to where I was, at which point I was obliterated in one hit.

I had buggy online experiences throughout my time with Minecraft Dungeons 2. I'll spare everyone the worst story, because it's a pretty lengthy tale, but the entire remainder of the campaign nearly became unplayable for me at one point because of an issue with a disconnect and a hard crash. Playing Minecraft Dungeons 2 with loved ones at home is a wonderful experience, but trying to play it online is the pits. And, again, this isn't a problem that can be solved by transferring that character offline. In order to play the story's final few hours offline, I would have had to start a new character from scratch.

Dungeon crawl before you dungeon run

In many ways, Minecraft Dungeons 2 is a substantial improvement over its predecessor. A handful of quality-of-life changes go a long way toward making this a better dungeon crawling experience. From what I saw, Mojang and Double Eleven took many of the criticisms of the first game to heart, because a lot of the last game's shortcomings were addressed. Their efforts show. This feels like a better dungeon crawler. It feels like the ideas put into place in the first game were able to flourish more. Most importantly, this felt more fun with more to explore even after the story ended.

Minecraft Dungeons 2's biggest weaknesses now lie in an unstable online component, which is a major problem for a game like this. I want to be able to join my friends online without worrying about constant rubber-banding or random disconnects. Or if I've had enough of dealing with these problems, I'd like to at least take my character off the online grid entirely without having to start over. I had been enjoying myself with this game a lot, but the online issues did a lot to sour me by the end to the point that I was just ready to wrap the whole thing up.

Minecraft Dungeons 2 is a great game night idea, but just make sure your party's all gathered under one roof first.

This review is based on an Xbox key provided by the publisher. Minecraft Dungeons 2 will be available on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch 1 & 2 on Tuesday, September 29 for $29.99 USD. The game is rated E10+.

Sign up for our monthly roundup of exclusive content, top stories, and updates from Shacknews - once a month, no spam.

Shacknews staff does not use generative artificial intelligence (AI) in their content. Shacknews strictly prohibits the use of its content for AI training or to generate text, including text in the style or format used for this publication. Shacknews reserves all rights to this work.

Review for
Minecraft Dungeons 2
7
Pros

• Beautiful visual style, about as good as Minecraft can look
• Gear system is noticeably improved
• Easy to jump in and out with friends
• Satisfying endgame component

Cons

• Can't use the same character online and offline
• Online instability is infuriating
• Still no crafting component in this Minecraft game