Minecraft
Platforms: Android, Mac, Nintendo 2DS/3DS, Nintendo Wii U, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, Xbox 360, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Action, Creative, Fighting, Open World, Platform and Shooting
Released: November 2017, updated in 2019. Added to this library 4 months ago, last updated 10 weeks ago.
Overview
Although Minecraft – where players place blocks to build structures, sculpt the landscape and create adventures – is the best-selling game of all time, some of the best aspects of it are little known. Along with the exploration, building and survival-play, children can use complex ‘Red Stone’ circuitry to automate their creations and make interactive spaces.
The game is constantly evolving, with updates adding new blocks, enemies, capabilities, characters and interactions. Upcoming extensions of the Minecraft experience include Minecraft Dungeons, which offers an action-adventure challenge for up to four players on any standard gaming platform.
The stand-alone Minecraft: Story Mode (PEGI 12) games also offer character and choice-driven adventures. Minecraft Earth enables players to build structures that look like they are in the real world with a new AR (augmented reality) app. There’s also an array of online ‘server games’ where children can compete against others online in different battles. This is a great way for children to experiment with ambitious building projects, as well as learn the principles of programming to make their creations come alive.
This game is good if you want to learn something playing a properly great game, play games with building like LEGO, dip your toe into online games, hide and seek, make video games, nourish youthful ambition, connect and challenge friends, play with people on different systems, survive the night, play games with learning projects or control and order things.
Commitment
Players: You can play with 4 players in the same room and up to 16 players online. You can have 20 people in a Minecraft server to build together. The multiplayer games have up to 16 players competing with each other. You can compete in these games in split-screen mode to accommodate more players on one system.
Cross-Play: You can play against people on different systems: Xbox One, Switch, PC and Moblie. But not with PlayStation. If you purchase a map without Xbox account it is available on the other systems when you log-in.
Costs
Minecraft has a marketplace where you purchase additional content, skins, resource packs, and more.
You will need PlayStation Plus to play online with PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4 or PlayStation Vita. You will need Xbox Live Gold to play online with Xbox 360 or Xbox One.
This game is free with Xbox Game Pass.
Ratings
The app includes in-app purchases.
This game has been rated ESRB EVERYONE.
Users Interact: The game enables players to interact and communicate with each other, so may expose players to language usually associated with older rated games.
Accessibility
System settings: Android has accessibility settings including ways to navigate and interact, although not all games support this. The Wii U has some limited settings, such as disabling rumble and selecting mono audio. PlayStation 4 has a range of accessibility settings. Some are system only, some work in games (invert colours and button mapping). Xbox One has a wide range of system features including some that can be used on all games, like the excellent co-pilot mode. iOS has a very extensive suite of accessibility settings including ways to navigate with voice and comprehensive screen reading, though most of the features don't work with games... read more.
Similar Games
The following games address a similar topic or offer a similar way to play. They are good options to play after Minecraft, and also offer a range of alternatives for different age ratings.
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Costs: Purchase cost.
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Genres: Action, Adventure, Creative, Open World and Simulation
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Costs: Purchase cost.
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Farm Together
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Genres: Open World, Simulation and Strategy
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Costs: Purchase cost. Season pass and in-game purchases.
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Castaway Paradise
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Lego (Series)
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Genres: Action, Adventure, Fighting and Open World
Duration: Between 10 hours and 15 hours to complete.
Players: You can play with 2 players in the same room, but you can’t play it online.
Costs: Purchase cost. Season pass and in-game purchases.
The combination of Lego, a popular film franchise and a video game is a rich recipe for gaming fun. The series of Lego games has developed since the first release on Nintendo DS. Not only do these games offer a chance to explore, destroy and fight in a...
Eco
Genres: Creative, Open World, Simulation and Strategy
Duration: Between 20 hours and 50 hours to complete.
Players: This is a single player game. You can play with up to 100 players online.
Costs: Purchase cost.
Eco extends the resource-collecting and building of Minecraft by introducing environmental implications to your actions. Using resources like trees will erode the soil; mining might pollute the river; and each animal depends on another.
Lego Worlds
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One
Genres: Action, Adventure, Creative, Open World and Simulation
Duration: Between 10 hours and 15 hours to complete.
Players: This is a single player game.
Costs: Purchase cost. In-game purchases.
Lego Worlds takes virtual building back to the classic bricks with familiar figures, buildings and challenges from other Lego video games in an open world where your imagination can go wild in a bottomless bucket of bricks.
Astroneer
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Genres: Action, Adventure, Open World, Simulation and Strategy
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Players: This is a single player game.
Costs: Purchase cost. In-game purchases.
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Riverbond
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One
Genres: Action, Adventure and Fighting
Players: You can play with 4 players in the same room and up to 4 players online.
Costs: Purchase cost.
Riverbond is a frantic adventure in a blocky world. With four people on one system you take on an adventure to defeat evil and free the charming citizens. It's a brawling game with the emphasis on fun and over the top cartoon combat.
Roblox
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Action, Adventure, Creative, Fighting, Platform, Puzzle, Rhythm, Role-Playing and Strategy
Duration: Between 5 minutes and half an hour to play a round.
Players: This is a single player game. You can play with up to 100 players online.
Costs: Free-to-start. Season pass and in-game purchases.
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Portal Knights
Platforms: Android, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Action, Adventure, Creative, Fighting, Narrative, Open World, Role-Playing and Simulation
Duration: Between 27 hours and 29 hours to complete.
Players: You can play with 4 players in the same room and up to 4 players online.
Costs: Purchase cost. In-game purchases.
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Duration: Between 20 hours and 25 hours to complete.
Players: You can play this with 8 players online.
Costs: Purchase cost.
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Dreams
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Genres: Creative
Duration: Between 3 hours and 4 hours to complete.
Players: You can play with 4 players in the same room, but you can’t play it online.
Costs: Purchase cost.
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Terraria
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Duration: Between 50 hours and 80 hours to complete.
Players: You can play with 4 players in the same room and up to 8 players online.
Costs: Purchase cost.
Terraria looks like a 2D, lesser, version of Minecraft. However, this is a game every bit as complex and creative as the better-known block building game. To the world-crafting and survival it adds hundreds of items to collect, characters to defeat and...
The Long Dark
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Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Open World, Role-Playing and Simulation
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Players: This is a single player game.
Costs: Purchase cost.
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Rust
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Genres: Action, Creative, Fighting, Open World, Shooting and Strategy
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Players: You can play this with 250 players online.
Costs: Purchase cost.
Rust (also, Rust: Console Edition) is an online survival game set the wilderness. You explore, gather and craft materials to manage hunger, thirst, health and protection. The preparation is to ward off the threat of bears, wolves and (more commonly)...
Minecraft is in These Lists
In addition to the similar games listed above, which have been linked to this game specifically in the database, you may find games with a similar theme to Minecraft in the following lists:
Nourish Youthful Ambition In 7-12 Year-Olds
Expand LEGO Style Play
Video Game Projects with Checkpoint Kids Magazine
Checkpoint Kids is a magazine about video games for kids by kids. In each issue you’ll find activities, challenges and tasks to complete to help you and your kids understand the importance of gaming.
Checkpoint Kids has teamed up with schools across the country to help them identify gaming as a tool for literacy, creativity and social connection. Working with these schools the magazine is in a unique position provide informative supported by teachers teaching core subjects.
To access Checkpoint Kids activities download the magazine on any mobile device, tablet or access it through your browser, create a free log-in for PocketMags:
Educational Games That Are Also Good Games
Some of these games are aimed at younger players to play on their own, but others (as indicated by their PEGI ratings) are better for teenagers or played together in a family. Find some games that pique your interest, read through the details and decide how your child might benefit from playing them.
Free With Xbox Game Pass
You cannot play games you install when your Xbox Game Pass expires, although you do keep any games you have purchased at a discount with your membership. You will need to purchase any in-game extra content in addition to the subscription, although some games include this content for free.
- Xbox Game Pass £7.99/month
- Xbox Game Pass Ultimate including Xbox Live Gold for online play £10.99/month
- Xbox Game Pass PC £7.99/month
Wield Absolute Control
If games offer an escape from chaos, these games are particularly good at granting a sense of satisfying agency and power as they do that. Whether it’s ordering the perfect stock room in Wilmot’s Warehouse, organising your island in Animal Crossing, perfectly controlling the flow of traffic in Mini Motorways or even build civilisation just the way you want it in Civilization the sense of satisfaction and calm from the achievement is second to none.
Play With People On Different Systems
These games are a good way to extend the list of friends and family that you can play with. It also makes it less critical which system you have in your home, even if your friends have a different one.
Play And Connect
Players enjoy making new connections in these games, as well as connecting with wider family and friends. Listen to the chatter while children play these games, and you hear as much talk about homework, television, YouTube or what's happening in the world as who to shoot in the head next.
First Steps Into Online Video Games
The games in this list offer small steps to go from local play to online play. Some games, like Roblox are designed for young players with lots of special safety settings. Other games, like Sky, are designed to lead players into co-operating with each other with in-game purchases you give away, and interactions that start limited and expand as you gain experience. Then there are co-operative games like Ibb and Obb where you work together and communicate with gestures on the screen.
You can use Family Settings and Parental Controls on your system to limit how your child interacts with other players online. As well as finding the right games to get them started, it's also important that you play with them and keep game screens in shared family spaces so you can see what they are doing.
Hide and Seek
Hide In A Crowd: There are games like Spy Party, Thief Town, Hidden in Plain Sight and Buissons, that let you play as a range of characters and then challenge another player to find you amongst a computer-controlled crowd, from what way you move and interact. The Fruit game in Game and Wario on Wii U has the same mechanics, with one person trying to steal fruit without the other players working out who they are. Wii Party offers hiding in its Spot the Sneak mode where one player has a secret advantage in the mini-games that the other players have to spot. Another great example is Wii U Party, Lost and Found Square mode. One player stands in a crowd of identical people and uses the Wii U gamepad to look around and describe their location to other players, who use the TV to explore and find them. At the end, you see a map of where the players had run.
Prop Hunt: There are games with "Prop Hunt" modes where you can change into the items in the world to hide. Fortnite has a great Prop Hunt mode, as does Minecraft. Then there are games like Witch It designed around this idea of transforming into normal items and hiding in a game world.
Separate Screens: There games like Mario Chase and Luigi's Ghosthouse in Nintendoland, or Pac-Man Vs where one person has their own screen while the others team up to hunt for them use the main TV screen. Or games you play online where everyone has their own screen and try to hide from a particular character like in Secret Neighbor. Screencheat is a twist on this, where you share the same screen and try to shoot each other, but your characters are invisible.
Hidden Objects: Or there are hidden object games where the computer hides things that you have to find, like Hidden Folks and Hidden Through Time. There's a hidden object mode in Mario Odyssey where you hunt online player's hidden balloons. A twist on this is Here Kitty where one person hides a phone that then makes cat noises until the seeker has found it.
Open World Hiding: You can use pretty much any open-world game to make your own hiding fun. You can hide in Minecraft (having turned nameplates off), sneak around on public transport in or simply count to 10 while visitors hide in Animal Crossing New Horizons.
Make Your Own Video Games
You can unleash your creativity with these games that enable you to make your own games. Start with something familiar and try making your own levels in Mario Maker or get to grips with building in Minecraft. Build your confidence and creativity and soon you’ll be creating more complicated games in Dreams or LittleBigPlanet.We put this list together with the help of the brilliant National Videogame Museum, (NVM). The World's First Fully-Playable Cultural Centre Dedicated to Games. If you want more information about making your own videogames, the NVM has free resources to get you started.
Survive The Night
Whether this is as simple as closing the door to keep the zombies out in Minecraft or as complex as crafting food, clothing and medicine to cope with the freezing blackness of The Long Dark these games are exhilarating as they pose a strategic puzzle with personal consequences.
Many of these games offer an open world in which to survive, which opens up more ways of preparing for and then making it through the night time. This, of course, leads to another day where you need to spend time and resources wisely while exploring your surroundings.
Thanks for using our resource. We are editorially independant, written by parents for parents, but welcome sponsorship, partnership and suggestions. It is supported by the Get Smart About PLAY campaign from AskAboutGames.com. For more advice and guidance on video games, also check out my Taming Gaming book.Tweet
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