I dont think construction needs a point to be interesting. The feeling that you have actually constructed something that is genuinely yours and is a product of your mind (and not the devs) is a rewarding one. It also depends on what type of construction the game gives you (I dont think Cataclysm's crafting is comparable to minecraft blockplacing).
Most crafting systems dont allow for actual construction (you diddn't "make" that sword, you only fulfilled the requirements to aquire the sword). You are generally given no flexability and instead need to simply get the preset requirements for the preset result. It is not your sword, you did not make it.
Something like minecraft allows you to "build" stuff that can be the product of your mind, allowing players to build stuff that other people have not or in some cases the developer(s) did not even think possible. It is your construction, no one else has built something like it before.
To each his own, of course. But thats my take.
Plus what is the point in slicing enemies 
I agree. To some extent, construction for the sake of construction is fun. I haven't built any "megaprojects", but I
have invested time and effort to make my primary base complex and visually appealing, and also dotted my explored map with simple buildings like watch towers and cottages. Partly because they were good as navigational references and partly because they simply looked cool. I played with LEGOs when I was a kid, and Minecraft tickled that usually dormant part of me, whether my constructions would help me kill baddies or not, like few games ever do.
Sometimes you never know what you'll end up building. I remember once seeing the movie Legionnaire, starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, and felt inspired to get on Minecraft, travel to the nearest sizeable desert and erect a sandstone fort, French Foreign Legion style. Had the tricolour flag and all. In hindsight, you could say I was possessed by a strange mood.
But ultimately exploration's my goal, and experimentation with the game's mechanics. Similar to my goals in Dwarf Fortress, beyond creating a functional stronghold, in that case.
SCIENCE! is as important in Minecraft as it is in DF, and usually there's not much of a "point" to it. It's all about creating some sort of contraption whose major virtue is that it works.
As a sidenote, given my main objective is exploring, I find it disappointing there isn't more variance in pre-generated structures that the player can find. There's a couple of mods that add more, but the structures they add are decidedly sub-par. I mean, I don't want to find a flying pirate ship, or eleventibillion temples/castles that
all resort to the same sand collapse trick to potentially kill the player.
Anyway, this thread is about Starbound. Terraria IN SPACE and across multiple worlds with randomly generated characteristics sounds way better than Minecraft 2D, which is basically what Terraria is. I mildly dislike the slight funky anime (as in crazy teenager-aimed show) tone they've given the game. But maybe it's just the concept art, and at any rate it's a minor thing I can live with.
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Topic: Starbound - We have lift off. (Read 994996 times)