Minecraft PC IP: play.cubecraft.net

witcher

Novice Member
Feb 23, 2021
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Hello CubeCrafters, and welcome to my review.


Thanks to the surprising "Is this already being discussed?" feature—which is actually of great utility—I was able to learn that there are few to absolutely zero server reviews of the server, which only motivated me more to make one. Though I only joined the server recently, I am familiar with it. Not that I can remember what the server was like anyway, although there are some vague memories floating around in my head it doesn't really matter. One final thing I should mention before digging straight into it is that I am a Java player, I haven't seen the server on bedrock so this is a Java review.


First Impression
My first impressions were very surprising since it was so calm and peaceful, almost like a valley where only the chirping of the birds can be heard along with the waterfall crashing into the river. A bit too much? Well, no regrets there. Anyway, comparing it to H (I am not too sure if naming other servers is allowed so I won't take my chances) this is absolutely incredible to me. The lobbies there are far too chaotic, even if you turn off all the players it's still a mess, but on CubeCraft it's nearly the opposite. I believe saying that CubeCraft is like a calm and peaceful road and "H" is a highly accessed highway, would be a very accurate analogy. Obviously it's a matter of preference in this case, mine is Cube's way of making lobbies. I truly prefer a calm road instead of a highway, just like I prefer a calm and peaceful lobby rather than a chaotic one.

Hotbar
Let's go to your hotbar for a moment, you have five items in there. Your profile, shop, loot, updates and lobbies. Remembering it now? Alright, let's start with the profile then, there are your achievements, challenges and settings. The first two are what interest me most, they keep every mini-game server running smoothly and give you motivation to continue playing. I'm unaware how popular these challenges and achievements are among the community though, but they gave me a motivation boost once I couldn't figure out what to do next. CubeCraft handled this very well, they have various daily challenges to complete, both to keep you busy and to introduce you to the less popular game-modes. This alone would've been enough to satisfy my expectations of a profile, but CubeCraft went further. They added general achievements, which isn't a special concept on its own, but makes your profile look a lot better and complete as a whole.
The updates book is actually very new to me in both its use to the community and it's rarity. I'll be brief about it, it's an incredibly useful tool to keep track of the updates and keep the community informed in a very simple way. And for some reason this is the first time I've ever seen any item like it. I might've just missed it but if I'm not mistaken none of the other major servers have an item like this, which now that I think about it is strange and really shows how much thought goes into this server, quite the eye for detail.

Relic Hunting
This small mini-game in the lobby was the first thing I actually played when I joined. I found it quite easily behind the spawn but didn't really understand what it was until I clicked on it. Fast forward twenty minutes later and I had four relics in my checklist. You can probably tell I enjoy that lobby game, but I actually fell in love with the idea behind it. The reason for that clearly goes beyond the game itself, obviously a small treasure hunt to keep the lobby less boring is a fine addition to the community but it's actually very clever, because it's an amazing way to make good use of the entire lobby. Such a small mini-game is making sure the builders didn't put hours of their valuable time into their builds and actually making use of it all, which is why I love it so much. It's a massive lobby and it would be a shame to let it go to waste by only using such a small area to join games and open Cubelets, and that's all thanks to Relic Hunting.

There are seventy-two relics than can be found and another forty-five holiday relics in total for five different holidays, thus nine relics for each holiday. These numbers sound very decent to me actually, it's a very good balance between too many and too few relics. As far as I can tell, seventy-two relics is enough to keep the mini-game fun and not very easy to beat, though it's also not too much to scare people off by making them believe this is impossible to accomplish. This makes you want to work for the relics, farming a few points and experience while you do it. Sure, the payout isn't that great but it doesn't have to be because the mini-game is not about that. You'd most likely play this when you're really bored or waiting for your friends to come back, so the payout is the least of your worries. That's actually another example of why this small mini-game is so well made. You can grind this game for hours and hours until you've gotten all relics, or you can play it passively while waiting for your friend to get back from dinner and you'll have the same amount of fun playing it.

Critique
I must say, the lobby is not flawless. The sound of cubelets opening is loud and annoying and cannot be turned off as far as I can tell. The fishing mini-game is fun for a good couple of minutes but gets boring very rapidly after that, it's probably supposed to be a last resort in case you dislike Relic Hunting but it could still use improvements. Also, the fact that you can only play the lobby mini-games by going all the way back to the spawn area is mildly annoying. Not so much for Relic Hunt as for Lobby Fishing I must say, however when you enjoy both the mini-games it should definitely be possible to switch between them with an easier method.

Other than that, there aren't that many negative points to the lobby on its own. Perhaps the "Sentinel is always watching" is mildly creepy but I pay it no mind.

The lobby gets an 8.6 out of 10 rating.


Parkour is one of my favorite Minecraft mini-games and actually the first real mini-game I tried on the server when I joined. Before I explain why parkour is so much fun on here, I'd like to mention that it's a very good way to be introduced to the server's achievements and points system. If you're new to the server and start with playing parkour, you'll unlock an achievement for the first map you complete if I recall correctly. This immediately clarifies what achievements are and what you could expect from them. Then you have the points, and as simple as they may seem it's still very good to know what they are exactly, where you can use them and how you can earn them. This demonstrates itself perfectly when you earn coins by getting medals.

The beautiful thing about parkour is that it's all yours, you own your run and nothing can interfere except for your PC's performance and the server's connection, which has actually been nothing but excellent so far. Thanks to the very clear and easy categories you can start wherever you like to begin your parkour career. And that's the beauty of CubeCraft's parkour, you don't have complete the easy mode first. You can start at whatever difficulty you like, as you should, though not every server I've played parkour on has this feature. That may sound absurd to anyone who played parkour on here, but it's the truth. And that's yet another reason why I love CubeCraft's parkour.

The last thing that amazes me about this parkour—probably even more than the rest—is the fact that each map teaches you something different. Perhaps this sounds a bit too exaggerated, but this has been a genuine experience of mine. A few good examples of this are the Beach map, which introduces you to complicated ladder jumps, and circuit that teaches you the complicity of corner jumps. The hardcore parkour fans reading this will hopefully know what I'm talking about.

Only one thing mildly annoyed me, and that is the automatic generated messages that appear in your chat. There is nothing wrong with the messages themselves, however these messages can become very distracting whilst playing parkour.

Parkour gets a 9 out of 10 rating

Duels
Duels isn't a game-mode I enjoy playing that much, but I'll admit it's decent just like FFA. Unfortunately, only Iron ranked members and above are able to select kits, which I think should be available for everyone. After playing a few games of Duels I found out I am quite terrible at 1.9+ combat, but fortunately that didn't impact my experience at all. Instead, this game-mode is an amazing way to train yourself to finally win a game of SkyWars if you've never won one before, or Egg Wars for that matter. If the kits were free to select for everyone, this would make an excellent training mode, unfortunately you cannot have this privilege without paying 9 pounds for an Iron rank.

Free For All
I am not a big fan of FFA, it has nothing to do with CubeCraft though, just FFA in general. However, I must say it's actually very decent on CubeCraft. I would definitely not play it often due to my general disliking of FFA, but truth be told I'd go there for the daily challenges whenever I could. There's not as much toxicity there as I'm used to on PvP servers, which is actually astonishing.
The game-play itself is also slightly different than other FFA's, the kits are more balanced and although there's always one standing out, it still holds up very well. Out of the six kits, I would play with three or four, which is more balanced than any other FFA server that I've ever played on.

Assassination
This was totally new for me, and although the description may have made this game-mode seem like Assassin's Creed in 240p, the game-mode was surprisingly fun. That may be confusing, when I just mentioned I dislike FFA, but it's actually very easy to understand. Unlike FFA, in Assassination you start with the same gear and weapons, which is already a huge difference that I enjoy. Then there's more to the game-mode itself, FFA is about getting the most kills and rewards you with points and experience, just like Assassination. What makes this game-mode so different though, is that you actually have to loot chests while watching your back, find money and kill your opponents in order to get better armor. Assassination is just a more developed version of FFA. Also, I am aware that there's a shop in FFA, it's just so underdeveloped compared to Assassination that it's not worth mentioning in my opinion. And lastly there's a safe zone, the shop. In FFA it is to kill or be killed but in Assassination you can take a break, eat your food—which is another fine addition to this game-mode—and go to the shop to upgrade your gear and heal up from that full diamond bully who has been targeting you for no apparent reason. This is what makes Assassination work, the combination fighting, resting and looting. There may be a few flaws, like fighting near the shop and going in it to heal again (though you could just go to an area farther away from the shop if this becomes troublesome). This game-mode has seems to be well balanced, unique and very fun to play, hence why I give it all the credit I believe it deserves.

PvP get's a 7.1 out of 10 rating, which would've been way higher if it weren't for duels unfortunately.

First Impressions
SkyBlock is probably the most well-known game-mode within the entire Minecraft community, leaving any server that tries to recreate it with a lot pressure to make it unique. That's why I was so interested in CubeCraft's version of the well-known game-mode, and frankly, it did not disappoint. You immediately spawn on your island, which is already something I sincerely appreciated. For some reason, none of the previous SkyBlock server's I've played on had this feature, and although it may be small it shows CubeCraft's eye for detail once again.

The Shop
The SkyBlock shop is incredibly easy to use even for people who aren't familiar with the popular game-mode. Take the quests for example, they are unique, which shouldn't be surprising at this point. They're easy to understand and complete, and get harder through your time on SkyBlock. What did surprise me however were the ore generators, I have never seen anything quite like it. When one of the quests' description was to buy an ore generator, I genuinely had to read it three times to make sure I hadn't misread it. Once I came to understand how the generator work and why it was in the shop, I actually fancied it a lot. It's a very clever design for a generator and saves an incredible amount of space, most certainly in the long run. The last thing that stood out to me was the selling menu within the shop. It was surprisingly simple but more efficient than I've seen before. It only shows your inventory, however the reason it's so special, to me at least, is because most servers just put the buy and sell feature in one menu, and that forces you to search for each item you wish to sell. This is an incredibly efficient feature, one that I might appreciate above all else, ironically.

Critique
SkyBlock is almost flawless, especially since I expected it to lag way more than it did, though there was a minor complication. What I've experienced might be a bug, you may treat it as such, that genuinely bugged me (pun intended) during my time on SkyBlock. This wasn't my first time on a SkyBlock server, so I had already made wooden tools quicker than the quest to craft wooden tools appeared. Evidently, if you don't complete a previous quest, the next quest will not check if you've already accomplished it. This is what I've had with my wooden tools and for my crafting table quest. It might be a known bug though, never the less I did have some minor difficulties with it. The bug was did not have a huge impact on my game-play, but it was mildly annoying.

SkyBlock gets an 8/10 rating

First Impressions
I have never heard of Minerware before, but looking at the banner and the NPC I figured it'd be a mining mini-game. But as you all know it's not even close to that. Instead, Minerware seemed like a mini arcade to me, which is actually a pretty accurate description now that I think about it. `The mini-games themselves seemed fun and not too difficult to understand, and lastly, I felt as if I were in an actual arcade.

The mini-games
Minerware offers a ton of fun mini-games, most of which I have enjoyed. They're very fun, addictive and random, these three elements are what makes you want to keep playing them. It's like you're being sucked into a cartoon of some sorts, a totally different and colorful world where nothing but joy exists. Perhaps that's too extreme, but again, no regrets.

Critique
There aren't too many things that I could comment on, other than the snowball fight mini-game. It doesn't give you a second to orientate yourself, look at what team you're on and to make a move before you're shot. This could definitely use improvement.

Minerware gets an 8.8 out of 10 rating

Pricing
After taking a good look at the pricing of the ranks I immediately noticed they are expensive compared to H (again, we all know what this means). That doesn't necessarily matter though but it does stand out. 9 pounds isn't a lot of money for the first rank, and it already seems to have a lot of good features. Lapiz however, is really not worth it. There are barely any improvements and it comes at twice the price, and that just isn't worth it as far as I'm concerned. Gold is very different, it immediately feels as if you're taking a lot of steps for a total of 30 pounds and actually has sweet features attached to it. Diamond and above is in my personal "A bit too expensive" area, at least for now. When you're new to the server and you enjoy playing it and have an income, a gold rank would be a solid choice. If the gold rank is too much, go for iron and skip Lapiz, it just isn't worth it. Emerald seems to have sweet extra perks to it, just like Diamond does. However, Obsidian doesn't seem to be that different from Emerald, but still has more differences between ranks than iron and lapiz.

Did you buy a rank?
Yes, I just purchased the gold rank as you may have guessed. It seems to me that gold is the absolute sweet spot, and that alone was convincing enough to order it. Also, it's a lifetime rank and as normal as that may sound there are actually servers that work with monthly ranks. And although I am aware that CubeCraft Plus exists, that's not the point. It's very good to see lifetime ranks, it makes me confident in the continuance of this server.

The ranks get a 7.5 out of 10 rating

What about the rest?
Games such as Lucky Islands, Tower Defence, Featured games, Among Slimes etc. will be reviewed as I explore the server. I have already put a lot of effort into making this thread hence why I will post it early on. After I've explored the other games more thoroughly I will add them to the thread and notify any readers here who are interested.

CubeCraft then gets a rating of 8.2 out of 10
 
Last edited:

Maaarijn

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Mar 12, 2017
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Really nice thread! Original idea and interesting to read your opinions on the gamemodes.
I hope you enjoy the other awesome games Cubecraft has to offer!

Duels
Unfortunately, this has been nothing but a bad experience for me. The kits are random, which is a huge downside, I couldn't possibly be the only one who enjoys choosing kits over getting random ones. Perhaps this is still possible when you duel somebody privately, I haven't tried that in all honesty. Though even if that's possible, it should still be available for duels with randoms, hence why I dislike this game-mode more than any other.
You can select a specific kit by right clicking the normal or overpowered kit selection. Not sure if you need a rank for this tho.
 

Technosword

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Apr 21, 2020
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Glad we got such a high review. This was very detailed and I enjoyed the read! For duels you can select a kit but it’s an iron rank perk. Keep up the good work :)
 
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witcher

Novice Member
Feb 23, 2021
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You can select a specific kit by right clicking the normal or overpowered kit selection. Not sure if you need a rank for this tho.
Thank you for your response.

I'll be honest and admit that as soon as I thought you were unable to select a kit I didn't spend another second in Duels. Though in my defense, this wasn't exactly difficult to overlook. I will change my rating of both PvP and the entire server review, since that is the average of all reviews.
 
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witcher

Novice Member
Feb 23, 2021
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Glad we got such a high review. This was very detailed and I enjoyed the read! For duels you can select a kit but it’s an iron rank perk. Keep up the good work :)
I'm glad you like it, I did spend a very long time to make it. I noticed you can select kits with your right mouse button, though I didn't know this was an iron+ perk until now. Thank you for the additional information.
 

witcher

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Feb 23, 2021
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The review has been edited in Duels advantage, unfortunately I overlooked an essential feature.
 
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TheSweetSuitMan

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May 31, 2017
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Also, the fact that you can only play the lobby mini-games by going all the way back to the spawn area is mildly annoying.
Small tip, you can leave the server and join back to start back at the main lobby with the game modes. Also, switching to another lobby using the beacon in your Hotbar works great if you are in a party.
It seems to me that gold is the absolute sweet spot, and that alone was convincing enough to order
Agree. Although gold doesn't have skywars chest voting for example, which is quite a big deal for a lot of players. Lapis always seemed like an odd rank to me, it is basically iron with some very minor upgrades. Diamond/emerald are the best value if you want pretty much all features, the latter if you want to be able to fly in the lobbies. Obsidian is not really worth it and got buffed in the past as it has always been regarded as the 'rich with no brain' rank (at least by me and some friends). Tip: during certain seasonal events cubecraft has a massive sale during which you can get a rank for about 40% off. If you ever want a diamond or maybe even emerald upgrade, you can probably get it for about 20-30 euro during the sale.

Anyway, great review, I liked reading your thoughts on cube.
 

witcher

Novice Member
Feb 23, 2021
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Small tip, you can leave the server and join back to start back at the main lobby with the game modes. Also, switching to another lobby using the beacon in your Hotbar works great if you are in a party.
Thank you for your response.

I am aware of this and took it into account when rating the lobby and writing this bit. I believe there should still be an easier way to activate lobby fishing and Relic Hunting. Though these may be a good short term solutions, there should be a more user-friendly way to switch between these lobby games. It'll become annoying to keep switching between lobbies or rejoining the server, especially when you're in a party and just want to play a game whilst waiting for your friends to get themselves ready.

Agree. Although gold doesn't have skywars chest voting for example, which is quite a big deal for a lot of players. Lapis always seemed like an odd rank to me, it is basically iron with some very minor upgrades. Diamond/emerald are the best value if you want pretty much all features, the latter if you want to be able to fly in the lobbies. Obsidian is not really worth it and got buffed in the past as it has always been regarded as the 'rich with no brain' rank (at least by me and some friends). Tip: during certain seasonal events cubecraft has a massive sale during which you can get a rank for about 40% off. If you ever want a diamond or maybe even emerald upgrade, you can probably get it for about 20-30 euro during the sale.
Gold may not have SkyWars chest votes, but that's 20 pounds away, 66.66% of the price of gold itself. True, gold doesn't have all the best features but still offers a lot for its price, which cannot be said about Lapiz (obviously).

Diamond and above are indeed the 'premium' ranks, that I could already tell. Diamond seems to be a good balanced rank if you already have a lot of experience on the server, it'd be foolish to spend 50 pounds without familiarizing yourself with the server for at least a couple of months. Hence why I said gold is a perfectly balanced rank, it's not too expensive yet gives you a premium feeling.

As for the seasonal sales, I've figured that out myself quite fast. I do love that CubeCraft offers discounts based on seasons, just like Steam does. Who knows, I might upgrade during the Eastern sale which I believe is the next one to come.
 
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witcher

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Feb 23, 2021
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I’ll bump this thread to see if anyone has something else to add. I’d also like to thank everyone who replied for the effort they put in to correct me and share their opinions so far.
 
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