Minecraft Dungeons vs Minecraft Dungeons II: Which One Should You Buy?

If you have never played either, the first Minecraft Dungeons is the better-value buy this week: its Ultimate Edition, with all six expansions, costs $19.99 on Steam until 8 October, less than the $29.99 sequel. Minecraft Dungeons II is the pick if you want a connected open world, deeper gear and a game Mojang is still updating, and it was on Game Pass from day one, as our launch news covers.

This comparison is built on Mojang's official pages, the two Steam listings and their review summaries, OpenCritic and Metacritic, all checked on 5 October 2026 at about 11:00 UTC. AFK Journal has not played either game: where we describe how they feel, we cite the critics and players who did. It answers the most-discussed question on r/MinecraftDungeons last week, a 2 October thread with 285 upvotes and 113 comments.

How do the two games compare at a glance?

What does each one cost right now?

The Steam Autumn Sale has turned the price comparison upside down. Every version of the first game is 50% off until 8 October, while Minecraft Dungeons II is at full price. These are US Steam prices; other stores and regions differ.

Outside the sale the gap narrows rather than flips back completely: the full first game is $39.99 against $29.99 for the sequel's base game. The Deluxe Edition is harder to judge. According to Mojang's FAQ, its two DLC arrive "when released", and neither has a date or a description yet, so $20 extra currently buys cosmetics plus content nobody has seen. If you are shopping the sale anyway, our list of the best-reviewed games under $10 uses the same Steam data.

What actually changed in Minecraft Dungeons II?

The structure. The 2020 game splits its campaign into separate levels, mixing handcrafted and procedurally generated areas that you pick from a map. Dungeons II puts everything in one connected world. Xbox Wire's preview describes side quests, Rifts and Dungeons spread across the map, Boss Totems that restart a boss fight for another shot at its loot, and Minecart Stations and Teleport Statues for fast travel, in both the Overworld and the Sift.

Gear runs deeper, as our Minecraft Dungeons II gear and enchanting guide explains slot by slot. Mojang's announcement lists weapons, armour, artifacts and talismans among the gear you build a hero from, and Xbox Wire adds Enchantment Books, which give equipment new abilities, and Echo Shards, which upgrade merchants, blacksmiths and gear. Not everyone found it generous: GameSpot says Enchantment Books were too scarce to experiment with during the campaign.

Smaller changes add up. You can jump now, which IGN welcomed even in a 6/10 review, and the game runs on Unreal Engine 5, according to Xbox Wire. What did not change: neither game has character classes. Any hero can use any weapon or armour, which IGN counts against the sequel because co-op partners end up playing the same way.

What does the first game still do better?

Sheer volume. Between July 2020 and July 2021 Mojang released six expansions, from Jungle Awakens to Echoing Void, which ends the story in the End, then three free Seasonal Adventures built around the Tower, a roguelike mode that later went multiplayer, according to the official game page. That is finished, though. In 2023, when the game passed 25 million players, Mojang confirmed that update 1.17 was its last and that no new features or content are planned, although the Tower's layout keeps rotating.

Returning players also miss specific systems. When we read the sequel's negative Steam reviews for our Minecraft Dungeons II review, comparisons with the first game came up in more than a third of them: fans want back the mission-select structure that made favourite levels easy to replay, and the enchantment points that gave finer control over a build. Mouse players also disliked click-to-move with no WASD option.

On PC, the first game is the more finished product. Steam lists full controller support for it and only partial support for the sequel, and Dungeons II launched broken on Steam Deck until Mojang's 1 October update made it playable there. Mojang says full Deck verification needs more work.

Do you need to play the first game before Dungeons II?

No. Mojang's FAQ answers that question directly: you do not need to play the first game, but returning players "may spot a few familiar references". Dungeons II has its own story about a new threat to the Overworld, so starting with the sequel loses you nothing essential.

How do critics and Steam players rate them?

Critics prefer the sequel by a little; players prefer the original by a lot. On OpenCritic, 73% of critics recommend Dungeons II, against 48% for the 2020 game. On Steam the order reverses: 90% positive for the first game, 63% for the second.

That gap is not a fair fight. The original's rating was built over five years on Steam, with every expansion already out, while the sequel's comes from its first week, bugs included. It is moving the right way: when we checked on 2 October, Dungeons II stood at 61% of 6,165 reviews; three days and about 2,000 reviews later it is at 63%. It also still has nearly three times as many people playing on Steam as the original, even with the first game half price.

Which one is better for co-op?

Both support four players locally or online, and Steam lists cross-platform multiplayer for both. Dungeons II adds a mixed mode in which two or more players on one console or PC join others online. Its weak spot is stability: disconnects, rubber-banding in online boss fights and quests that stall are recurring complaints in reviews, and Steam reviewers note that heroes made for online play cannot be used offline, and vice versa. For a couch session on one screen, either game works; for a group spread across platforms, the sequel's options are wider but rougher.

Community opinion leans towards the original for now. In the r/MinecraftDungeons thread, the top reply (304 upvotes) argued that the first game currently has more content and is more fun. Replies pushed back that the sequel will keep getting content while the first will not, and others noted that only two DLC are confirmed so far.

So which one should you buy?

• New to both and on a budget: the first game's Ultimate Edition at $19.99 before 8 October. It is complete, cheaper than the sequel and better rated by players.
• Game Pass subscribers: play Dungeons II there first. If it clicks, the original is a cheap add-on for the cape.
• You have finished the first game and its DLC: Dungeons II is the only new Dungeons content there will be. If you play mostly online, consider waiting for Mojang's first bug-fix patch.
• You want a long endgame: the first game, for now. Its six expansions and the Tower are finished content, while IGN describes the sequel's endgame as built around a single activity, Soul Storms.

For the full critics-versus-players breakdown, read our evidence-based review of Dungeons II. Everything else we publish on the game, including patch coverage as Mojang updates it, lives on our Minecraft Dungeons II hub.