The Quest for the Diamond Sword: An Unofficial Gamer’s Adventure, Book one – Book Review
Minecraft, the game that is widely known by young and old, due to its simple yet addictive gameplay has been getting a lot of attention on the ‘merchandise’ market as well. Not only t-shirts, figures and play sets have been surfacing everywhere around the globe, but also a decent portion of story driven novels. Whilst this may sound like a fairly peculiar thing to do, seeing the lore of the Minecraft world does not go as deep as many other known games, it might actually be a great way of adding another dimension to the world of Minecraft. The Quest for the Diamond Sword is the first adventure that writer Winter Morgan came up for Steve, the square-ish main character of the Minecraft games.
Note: As our site is based in Belgium, we were given the Dutch version of the book. This means that the writing style might differ a tad at times from the original style. The book is also available in English and probably certain other languages as well.
Steve loves his laid back life as a hoarding farmer, that settled next to a friendly NPC village. Even though Steven is a ‘player’ in the world of Minecraft, he still isn’t one of the adventuring type. Relaxing at his farm, harvesting stuff, hoarding up items that might come in handy one day, that’s pretty much Steve’s cup of tea. It might not be an exaggeration to say that Steve is one of those few that actually cares for the NPC’s and even started to bond with them. Elliot the blacksmith is his friend, that supplies him with many emeralds, Avery loves to talk about adventures in her library and many of the other villagers have become close to Steve as well.
It’s clear that Steve is a caring person and that he wants to protect the villagers at all costs. He made sure the village is properly lighted to keep the monsters, that come out at night, at bay and he even created an iron golem to make sure the village is even more protected. Sadly, it seems his protective matters may not have been enough to keep his computer controller friends safe. When Steve is relaxing after a day of hard work, he hears screams resonating from the village. At first he hesitates but after a short while he mans up and decided to head towards to the town to save his friends. Sadly it seems that the lights have been destroyed by an explosive ‘creeper’ and that the iron golem has been destroyed by an evil player, who are appropriately called ‘griefers’. Due to this the village is crawling with zombies and his best friend Elliot has been turned into one. Steve tries to defend his friends, but he cannot stop this infestation of evil monsters on his own. He decides to run away and find a solution to save his friends.
Overall the as the story progresses it becomes clear that Steve has to temporarily forget his laidback life and go on his own adventure. He has to go through all the dangerous areas the world of Minecraft has to offer but not only monsters await him. During his journey he will also come across other players, who might be evil as well. Diamonds are hard to come by and that means many players are out for them. Whilst danger and ‘death’ might not be the biggest problem for a ‘player’, the fact that he will respawn at his farm will force him to start over and over again if he isn’t careful.
The story proves to be very simple, yet catching, which proves to be more than enough to create fitting setting for the adventure Steve is about to embark upon. It’s clear however that the story directs itself towards a younger audience, due to the more simplistic writing style as well as the overall basic plot progress. The Quest for the Diamond Sword is filled with very short, powerful but simple action sequences, which will surely keep the attention of a younger readership. That being said, some of the action sequences will become quite predictable, as the main character(s) often opt for the same course of actions, over and over again.
Whilst Winter Morgan (pseudo) did an effort to present a young audience with a fun story, there are a few inconsistencies. At certain times the material of the weapons used by Steve change from one to another and other times when he is without a weapon he magically wields the bow he has lost earlier in the story. Small inconsistencies, that are certainly noticeable by a slightly older audience, who will surely explore the books of Winter Morgan as well.
Becoming completely emerged in the story is also something that will probably leave a more adult audience with mixed feelings. Many game inspired novels don’t really make a distinction between the player and the NPC’s of the universe that revolves around the game. The distinction between actual players and NPC’s make the adventure feel a bit less epic than it could have become. The bonding with the characters might feel a bit more real, but you are slightly drawn back to the real world, instead of the digital square world created by Mojang Studios.
With its 127 pages and fairly big font, the book is only roughly two hours worth of reading. Even though this might sound short, a young child will take longer and with the plot the book is running, the length is actually quite perfect. The story features a lot of action and thanks to the shorter length the plot doesn’t get dragged out too much.
Conclusion
Even with certain negative touches in the review, The Quest for the Diamond Sword proves to be a very entertaining book for young and, in certain cases, old. The adventure itself is portrayed in a fun and entertaining fashion with loads of action. Even though some portions become quite entertaining, the story will revolve around camaraderie as much as the search for diamonds. Certainly a fun read through, if you have a few moments to spare.
The Quest for the Diamond Sword: An Unofficial Gamer's Adventure, Book one - Book Review,
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[…] though the story itself proves to be less catchy than The Quest for the Diamond Sword, some items have been improved. There are no more inconsistencies about changing materials or […]
[…] though the story itself proves to be less catchy than The Quest for the Diamond Sword, some items have been improved. There are no more inconsistencies about changing materials or […]