At this point I’m inclined to believe that Blue Ocean‘s publishing schedule is completely off the rails. It’s really a jumble of some magazines being delayed while others fill the initial release slot. It’s getting ridiculous to the point where even the employees at my newsagent’s get confused which old issues to keep around for a few more days and which ones to replace with the new editions. Can’t really blame them as I myself got confused this time, but alas, here we are with the June issue of the LEGO Minecraft magazine.
My reservations about the comics likely will never fully go away, but it looks like they are more and more getting a handle on how to make this world of perpendicular edges and people with cubic heads visually interesting. This one has some nice panels and a good density with relatively many characters and environmental details, so it doesn’t feel all too shabby. My only complaint would be that there’s a bit too much green and blue, which makes it look cold and gloomy.
The posters are okay and in fact now that I think about it I should probably have done the cool thing and shown you the backside which depicts the battle at the underwater temple, including the two puffer fish. The wanted poster for the golem ultimately feels a bit redundant and like a low effort, as they didn’t even fancy it up with some statistics or adding some “bad photocopy” filter.
Other than that there’s a “witch hunt” board game worth mentioning that’s also on a two-spread and looks like it could be fun for a while. It doesn’t add much to the “chase game” formula and pretty much copies all the tropes, but appears balanced enough to be fair and not frustrate kids too much. It could keep the little ones busy and add at least an hour of distraction on top of the other simple puzzles scattered throughout the mag.
The extra is the Iron Golem from the poster. He’s certainly not the most attractive guy, but I guess it’s okay. As usual I have no idea about his relevance in the game. The build is reasonably complex, but at the same time also simple. The printed 2 x 3 tile is another nice piece for the collection and incidentally so is the modified tile with the minifigure head stump. In researching it I was surprised to find out how rarely it has even be used despite being around so long. Seems a bit odd, as I could imagine quite a few scenarios where it could be used to add some interest to a setting or allow for some unusual construction.
Overall this issue is just fine. Not outstanding, but just fine. Minecraft still doesn’t quite jibe with me, but at least what you get here is enjoyable and provides a few minutes of fun.
Mylenium's Brick Corner 