Minecraft has finally gone gold, and with that the ever approaching release of version 1.0 rushes ever closer. Notch and the crew at Mojang recently released Release Candidate 2, and asked the gaming community to start reviewing the final build of the game and I am doing just that. But I want to try and take a step back, and try to imagine myself as someone who has never even heard of Minecraft let alone play it. I am trying to imagine myself as someone who is not going to hop onto the Minecraft wiki to figure out how to play the game after dying during their first night from a creeper’s suicidal explosion or a skeleton’s arrow; someone who has not been following the fascinating history of the game and its makers. Now I assume that the average gamer out there expects the game to teach them how to play using some kind of in game tutorial. Even if it is as rudimentary as a few texts boxes, they are still going to expect to be taught how to play. Sadly to say, this is not the case with Minecraft, and it is something I feel needs to be addressed.
Now before I go on, let me explain something. I realize Minecraft and its community is a sort of anomaly in the world of gaming. The types of gamers playing Minecraft (especially those like myself who have been playing the game for well over a year now) are the kinds of gamers who are going to jump on the net, and learn all the ins and outs of a game; we have a drive to figure out how it works. On the other hand, the gamer who is content with their Zelda, Final Fantasy, and Madden is not going to be content with a game that does nothing but the bare minimum (the achievement tab) to explain its mechanics. It is this glaring omission (a problem most of us ignored under the impression of the game was still being alpha and beta tested) that will limit the game from reaching an even wider audience than it already has. Also, with Minecraft coming to the Xbox 360 in the near future, this is a problem that has to be dealt with sooner rather than later. There is still a huge dichotomy between the types of gamers who are solely playing console gamers and the rest of us, and I think the people who download this over XBLA are going to demand more than online wikis.
Terraria fixed this problem with the inclusion of an NPC that you could talk to near your spawn point. This character would teach you the basics of the game, and help you situate yourself in the world of Terraria. With towns now spawning in the many worlds of Minecraft, and with the Adventure Mode getting the most attention, I think Notch and crew should just spawn you in a town. Have the NPCs talk to you, and have them teach you how to play. As of right now, this information vacuum is something that needs to be addressed in Minecraft. Mojang cannot rely on the community any longer to explain their game for them; they need to do it from within Minecraft. This massive barrier to entry is going to prevent people from feeling the thrill of getting lost underground only to find that diamond deposit; they will never be able to experience the terror of exploring the nether, always afraid of losing their items in that fiery waste; and they will never be able to battle the ender dragon, and get the dragon’s egg.
I think Minecraft is a fantastic game. Getting together with friends and exploring the endless world has been one of the highlights of my gaming life, yet the games lack of even a rudimentary tutorial is something that Notch and the team at Mojang have to address. While I had a fantastic time figuring the game out (and still do every time an update is released) I feel the average person who thinks Modern Warfare is the epitome of gaming will not feel the same way. Until this is solved, it is almost impossible to review this game. Even with the release of 1.0 only days away, Minecraft still feels very much like a game without direction, and I think myself and too many of us are giving them a free pass. But I’m not worried; the team at Mojang are talented guys, and I know they are going to continue improving Minecraft and continue change the face of what video games are and can be. It would just be a shame if this lack of information prevented people from experiencing one of gaming’s most rewarding experiences.
Showing posts with label Minecraft. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Minecraft. Show all posts
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
My Minecraft World
I am done with this map. Maybe it is because I have not played much Minecraft lately, or maybe I simply need a change of scenery. It’s not like I don’t like what I have made, oh far from it, but I think I am ready to start something brand new. So in honour of my first venture into the random world of Minecraft, here is a download for my map. It’s simply called world2, not because I was trying to be creative or anything, but because I started it well before we had the ability to name the maps.
Have fun exploring all I have done and I apologize for the random clutter in the inventory and in most of the chests around the world. Feel free to e-mail me with your thoughts on what I’ve done, and even ideas that you would like to see me add to this map.
DOWNLOAD
THE DOWNLOAD IS DOWN. IF YOU WANT MY MAP, EMAIL ME AND I WILL SEND YOU A COPY.
Have fun exploring all I have done and I apologize for the random clutter in the inventory and in most of the chests around the world. Feel free to e-mail me with your thoughts on what I’ve done, and even ideas that you would like to see me add to this map.
DOWNLOAD
THE DOWNLOAD IS DOWN. IF YOU WANT MY MAP, EMAIL ME AND I WILL SEND YOU A COPY.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
The Joys of Digging
Minecraft is one of the best games I have ever played. I am not joking. This is saying something due to a couple of facts. First is the simple truth that it was originally made by one man-god, Markus Persson (or Notch as he is also known) and the second is that I have played my fair share of games over the twenty four (soon to be twenty five) years I have been on this huge ball of rock. So I think it is a big thing for me to say that Minecraft is up there with games such as Super Metroid and Half-Life 2 when it comes to my favourite games. For those few who do not know what Minecraft is I will give you a quick rundown of the game, and then follow that with some screens of my own world to give you a sense of just how open this game is.
In the most basic of terms, Minecraft is a game about placing blocks. The games graphic style also reflects its basic concepts: you’re a little cube person, living in a world made up of countless cubes representing everything from water, to grass, to trees, to lava, and everything in-between whose job it is to do whatever you want. Yet this is not going to get you very far, as there is no tutorial what-so-ever and without some sort of guidance your first night is going to be harrowing experience. You are either going to be eaten by a zombie, shot by a skeletal archer, chased by a giant spider, or blown into a million pieces by a nasty little creature called The Creeper (most likely, you’re going to die from all of them all of the time). Once you learn how to start constructing basic tools (such as pickaxes, shovels, and swords), you can then start to mine various materials that then let you construct other things. A quick example is making a wood pickaxe to mine rock faster, then constructing a stone pickaxe (using the stone you just mined) so you can mine coal, combining the coal with wood sticks (which you got from either chopping down a tree with an axe, or by punching it down with your fists) to make torches so you can light up an area, and prevent monsters from spawning near you (they only spawn in the dark, which is what makes the night so terrifying). It seems like a lot, but once you get the hang of things you’ll be spelunking like the rest of us looking for diamonds and other rare materials, all in the name of fun.
One thing that draws a lot of people to this game is how open it is. There are no missions and there are no goals; you’re just a person in this world, and you get to do whatever you want. You want to explore the world, and find amazing vistas and caves spawned by the procedural generation of the world? Go right ahead. Or say you would like to build a castle, or recreate a scale replica of the Enterprise? Well, you can do that too. Whatever you want to do, you can do it. The game is like a box of Lego that has been dumped into a sandbox, and your imagination has been kicked into high gear.
In my single player game, I have spent the last couple of months (on and off) adding more and more to my world. I started off building a couple of towns, following them up with a personal mansion, a pyramid (The Temple of the Sun), an inn with a working fire place and jukebox (The Forest Edge Inn), and a long and winding road that connects them all. I am also working on a town in a frosty tundra region, and I have plans for a couple more large monuments (The Temple of the Moon being the next big one). For me, the style of the game makes me think of the old school RPGs of NES and SNES, and those games are what are inspiring me to build this cohesive little world. I will get some pictures from the multiplayer server soon; I want to get one when all of us are on and I can get some shots of everyone just doing their thing.
Every so often I also get a wanderlust that is only cured with hours of mindless wandering around the world, watching it form around me, and exploring what it has to offer. So with that in mind, I will leave this post with a couple of random screens of what I found the other during my wanderings; wanderings that should have been me working on another pointless paper. And what the hell, here are also some screens of the buildings I have made.
This is the "Temple of the Sun"
A huge stone Monolith I found while exploring the other day
My mansion on the lake
A sunrise over a frozen lake
In the most basic of terms, Minecraft is a game about placing blocks. The games graphic style also reflects its basic concepts: you’re a little cube person, living in a world made up of countless cubes representing everything from water, to grass, to trees, to lava, and everything in-between whose job it is to do whatever you want. Yet this is not going to get you very far, as there is no tutorial what-so-ever and without some sort of guidance your first night is going to be harrowing experience. You are either going to be eaten by a zombie, shot by a skeletal archer, chased by a giant spider, or blown into a million pieces by a nasty little creature called The Creeper (most likely, you’re going to die from all of them all of the time). Once you learn how to start constructing basic tools (such as pickaxes, shovels, and swords), you can then start to mine various materials that then let you construct other things. A quick example is making a wood pickaxe to mine rock faster, then constructing a stone pickaxe (using the stone you just mined) so you can mine coal, combining the coal with wood sticks (which you got from either chopping down a tree with an axe, or by punching it down with your fists) to make torches so you can light up an area, and prevent monsters from spawning near you (they only spawn in the dark, which is what makes the night so terrifying). It seems like a lot, but once you get the hang of things you’ll be spelunking like the rest of us looking for diamonds and other rare materials, all in the name of fun.
One thing that draws a lot of people to this game is how open it is. There are no missions and there are no goals; you’re just a person in this world, and you get to do whatever you want. You want to explore the world, and find amazing vistas and caves spawned by the procedural generation of the world? Go right ahead. Or say you would like to build a castle, or recreate a scale replica of the Enterprise? Well, you can do that too. Whatever you want to do, you can do it. The game is like a box of Lego that has been dumped into a sandbox, and your imagination has been kicked into high gear.
In my single player game, I have spent the last couple of months (on and off) adding more and more to my world. I started off building a couple of towns, following them up with a personal mansion, a pyramid (The Temple of the Sun), an inn with a working fire place and jukebox (The Forest Edge Inn), and a long and winding road that connects them all. I am also working on a town in a frosty tundra region, and I have plans for a couple more large monuments (The Temple of the Moon being the next big one). For me, the style of the game makes me think of the old school RPGs of NES and SNES, and those games are what are inspiring me to build this cohesive little world. I will get some pictures from the multiplayer server soon; I want to get one when all of us are on and I can get some shots of everyone just doing their thing.
Every so often I also get a wanderlust that is only cured with hours of mindless wandering around the world, watching it form around me, and exploring what it has to offer. So with that in mind, I will leave this post with a couple of random screens of what I found the other during my wanderings; wanderings that should have been me working on another pointless paper. And what the hell, here are also some screens of the buildings I have made.
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