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Black & White pc Game Reviews
Black & White
Critic Score
Metascore: 90 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
7.3 out of 10
based on 34 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 36 votes
Read user comments
Rate this game

Peter Molyneux's highly anticipated "god game," a blend of the genres including strategy, sim, RPG, and puzzle, features the player as a new god in the lands of Eden who must reign with the help of uniquely evolving animals in either a benign or evil fashion.

PUBLISHER: Electronic Arts
DEVELOPER: Lionhead Studios
GENRE(S): Real-Time Strategy
PLAYERS: 1
ESRB RATING: T (Teen)
RELEASE DATE: March 27, 2001

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100
Game Revolution
It's the sort of game that comes around once every few years and totally changes the gaming landscape.
Read Full Review
100
GamePro
Black & White miraculously pulls you in and doesn't let go until you've sacrificed many hours.
Read Full Review
100
Total Video Games
If you’d like to keep your friends and job stay clear away from this game, if however you want to get sucked into a game that rarely let’s you leave, then you need to get this game, simple.
100
Yahoo! Games
A stunning achievement.
Read Full Review
100
Daily Radar
One of the most compelling, beautiful and impressive pieces of code we have played in a long, long time. It is also insanely addictive.
100
Games Radar UK (Pre-2006)
Believe the hype. The new Best Game Ever just rode into town, and it's going to be sticking around for a long time.
Read Full Review
100
GMR Magazine
Highly conceptual "god-game" that has you ruling over mortals with a little help from a giant cow-monster. [Feb 2003, p.94]
99
Gamer's Pulse
Over the past 12 months, I have played some of the best games ever made and playing Black & White is just pure icing on the cake.
Read Full Review
97
IGN
A truly miraculous "game." I call it a "game" because it's more of an experience.
Read Full Review
95
PC Gameworld
With excellent online play, top-notch graphics, and a musical score that you'll find yourself just listening to, Black and White is a quality game all around.
Read Full Review
95
TotalGames.net
To play this is to love it - there is so much to do, so much to learn and so much enjoyment to be had from this that I cannot see anyone failing to like it.
Read Full Review
95
Happy Puppy
Quite simply the most ingenious, addictive and meticulously-crafted and executed computer game of the year thus far.
Read Full Review
95
PC Gamer
One of the most innovative, creative, original, and awe-inspiring PC games ever. [June 2001, p.52]
95
Da Gameboyz
Plain and simple, Black and White is the most engrossing game I've seen in a while.
94
Gamezilla!
It has an innovative style, quality design and some elements that have never before been seen in gaming, like the alignment system. It's easily one of the most entertaining games I've played in a long time.
Read Full Review
93
GameSpot
The scope of Black & White is so far in excess of a typical game design that it seems surprising that the finished product turned out so polished and so playable.
Read Full Review
91
GameSpy
One of the most unique -- and enjoyable -- strategy games we've seen this year.
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90
GameZone
An incredible game that features great AI, music, graphics and story.
Read Full Review
90
All Game Guide
Mixing elements of empire building, resource management, life simulation, survival and brawling with complex strategies and tactics in a gorgeous fantasy setting seems too good to be true.
Read Full Review
90
ActionTrip
The musical score is monumental in a sense and it reminds me of that theme song in "Gladiator" - the one which plays during that scene when Maximus is walking through a crop field near his home.
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90
Spank!
It's not the all-encompassing experience of godly power that was suggested. You have to play it in a fairly rigid and organised fashion.
90
Armchair Empire
Black & White is one of the games you will remember 10 years from now as a turning curve for PC gaming. Thank you Peter Molyneux and Lionhead Studios, this game has certainly been something fresh and new.
Read Full Review
90
Cincinnati Enquirer
A heavenly refreshing virtual toy in which to lose oneself for hours on end.
Read Full Review
90
Electric Playground
I strangely feel a very strong maternal instinct towards my monkey (don't tell my children). I find myself telling him out loud what a good boy he is while rubbing his belly or explaining why I have to spank him.
Read Full Review
88
Gamers' Temple
Ground-breaking and very fascinating, but the game is hurt by an overemphasis on micromanagement. Improved village management and some poor level design kept this game from rating higher.
Read Full Review
85
Voodoo Extreme
After about 15-25 hours (Depending on the gamer) the game just seems to lose it’s fun factor. Sadly, many games released nowadays don’t even have 15 hours gameplay in them, let alone 15 hours of damn fun gameplay; Black and White does indeed have this.
Read Full Review
85
Playboy
While the game is far from perfect -- some may bristle at the constant micromanagement and the often ambiguous objectives you are required to meet -- it is very approachable and addictive, an almost ideal virtual playground in which you can play god.
Read Full Review
80
Maxim Online
Though the plodding pace and cutesy atmosphere border on blasphemy, the game’s open-ended design lets you indulge your most megalomaniacal fantasies with ease.
Read Full Review
80
GamerWeb PC
Think of this as a cake-baking contest, and Lionhead showed up with a cake mix still in the box. The final quality depends on how you mix it, bake it, and frost it.
Read Full Review
80
Adrenaline Vault
Parts are a bit problematic, such as the combat, challenges, and village management, but most of what you experience is endlessly fascinating.
Read Full Review
78
FiringSquad
It has a great concept, great innovations, but they should have spent more time refining the gameplay to be more rewarding. City building, fighting, and creature training are all too shallow.
Read Full Review
75
GamePower
I stand in awe of the vastness of its scope and the inventiveness of its design. However, it takes forever to learn, and one can't help getting frustrated along the way.
60
Computer Games Magazine
It's a brilliant toy but also a jumbled mishmash of original ideas and mundane gameplay that fails to deliver a cohesive single- or multiplayer experience.
Read Full Review
58
Gaming Age
Once I made it past that initial stage of astonishment, I made an unfortunate discovery: the single-player game, as designed, just isn't much fun in the long term.
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now! The average user rating for this game is 7.3 (out of 10) based on 36 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Tom W. gave it an8:
Imaginative and fun. Lionhead takes god games another step forward.

Toe K. gave it a1:
Very subpar game. not very fun. controls suck.

Karl N. gave it a6:
I didn't get far enough into the game to critique the game mechanics. It's the philosophy behind this game that bothers me. I find this game annoying because it assumes that people are whiny, helpless creatures that only know how to do three things: grovel for help, run in terror, or bow in terror/reverence. Surely people could have a more sophisticated response to God. Surely there could be something more than just fear driving human actions. This disappoints me because the game was ambitious and I would like to see more attempts at these kinds of games.

Heikki M. gave it a2:
Horrible repetitive shallow garbage through and through. If you look past the graphics, a child could program a better game than this in BASIC in one hour. You can test the trustworthiness of a review site by checking what they had to say about B&W: the ones that praised it played it for a few moments, tops.

Mike N. gave it a5:
Unplayable. B&W has a promising game concept, controling a big fury silly godlike cute creature that can evolve as the game progresses. And the game had extremely nice graphics for the time when it was released, and the presentation of the game and tutorial is top notch and it has an innovative control system, so as a game developer I fully appreciate the game and it is a nice work of art. But as a gamer there simply isn't any game to play, micro managment of the minions is killing the game and training the AI is close to impossible. However the game serves as a great tool of sorting out magazines that do real game reviews and those the just look at the cover, play the game for 15 minutes and then write a review. Don't ever buy one of the magazines that rated this game above 70. I haven't tried out B&W2 yet, but hopefully gameplay is included in the sequel which might make it a great game.

Jerry gave it a 9:
This game wuz pretty amazing in the beginning but it became boring and the graphics culd have been a bit better......

Jon K. gave it a 6:
How did this score so highly? No, no, no!! I await Black & White 2 eagerly, but sadly the original was fatally flawed. It takes what is essentially a sandbox environment where you look after your creature and your worshippers, and restricts it with a rigid structure that's repetitive, dull, frustrating and badly paced. Plus, it's near impossible to play again because of the very lengthy tutorial you're forced to sit through...

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