Minecraft Dungeons has announced its winter event, Chills and Thrills, which is live in-game now. Minecraft Dungeons is a bizarre spinoff of the single bestselling game of all time. Mojang has taken the iconic sandbox crafting game and turned it into a roguelike dungeon crawler. The end result sold well, but got only moderate reviews from critics, who found it entertaining but somewhat soulless, and lacking in personality.
Mojang can’t be blamed for trying to capitalize on the brand, though. Minecraft is one of the most instantly recognizable video games in the world, and against all odds, it just keeps going, eleven years after it was first released. Fans of the crafting game had a good year in 2020, primarily thanks to the inclusion of protagonist Steve in Nintendo’s famous brawler Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Steve was certainly an unexpected inclusion, and one that made a lot of fans of both games very happy. The surprise that followed his reveal even crashed Twitter.
And Minecraft Dungeons keeps kicking for any Minecraft fans who want to branch out. Earlier today the Minecraft website announced the arrival of the Chills and Thrills event in Minecraft Dungeons. The event is live now and will run until December 30th and it offers players six new trials to take on, complete with modifiers like changing numbers of chests, altered artifact cooldowns, and, most frightening of all, invisible mobs. The event will also offer three unique collectible items for players to use when decking out their characters: the Arctic Fox Armor, the Frost Slayer blade, and the Shivering Bow.
The winter months are always an exciting time for fans of live service games, as the titles each take their own approach to going festive. Minecraft Dungeons fans are joined in their winter festivities by Overwatch players, who get to dive into this year’s iteration of the Winter Wonderland event. Fans of that game can unlock some delightfully festive skins like Penguin May and Gingerbread Ana, and take part in a brand new 4v4 Freezethaw elimination mode. And these are just two examples of games celebrating the season.
Minecraft Dungeons might have underwhelmed critics upon release, but that didn’t stop it from selling well. It even outsold Animal Crossing on Switch, at least when it released. And it’s good to see that Mojang is still improving the game. Hopefully fans who have stuck with the bizarre, blocky roguelike are enjoying their winter wonderland in Minecraft Dungeons.