Ep 67: Minecraft Tutorial

Topic: Minecraft Tutorial

 

While not as rich a narrative as Sonic, and not as engrossing number of titles as Mario, the undisputed champion of best selling game of all time is currently a game with pixilated boxes and simple, sandbox game play.  A game so simple, my nieces of 6 and 8 play it regularly.  So we need to figure this out, it’s time for Minecraft. 

 

Apologizes that some of the audio was corrupted toward the end of the episode. We left what was salvagable intact for those who want to listen.

 

What is it?

Minecraft is a 3D Sandbox game, using pixilated looking graphics and blocks designed for the world.  Unlike early 8bit and 16bit games of the late 80s - early 90s, Minecraft uses blocks 3d blocks with simple, pixilated graphics to represent various building material and natural resources.  Almost all elements of the game are based off these 3d Blocks, even down to the animals and items you can use.

 

A Sandbox game is a game in which the player is given creative freedom to progress through the game as they see fit.  Some games will still have stories and additional gameplay elements designed to keep players either on task or offering immediate concerns/gameplay, but players are free to do as they wish to reach those goals.  In the case of Minecraft, there is no true endgame and players have freely created a lot of their own new games from the core game.

 

 

Who? / When?

The game was created by Markus Persson, online name, “Notch”.  A former game developer for King Games, he primarily worked on browser (phone/website) based video games until early 2009.  In his spare time, he tinkered with making his own prototype games, employing elements of other games he liked and mixing them in to his creation.  When Persson left King in March 2009, he developed his game further, releasing an early version of the game in May 2009, based off a code he developed over a weekend.  This early/Classic version of the game had weekly revisions based off feedback from those who played it. 

 

In June of 2010, he released the Alpha version of the game, and shortly after left his currently game developer job.  By later 2010, The game was moving in to Beta version of the game, looking to fix bugs and progress elements of the game before release.  He also set up his own company to help work on the game, Mojang.  By November 2011, Minecraft was released as a full version, and shortly thereafter, the lead developer was passed on to Jens “Jeb” Bergensten. 

 

In 2014, Mojang was sold for 2.5 Billion dollars to Microsoft, where the game continues to be updated and developed to this date.  The most recent version being Minecraft Windows 10, which supports a number of different features, including VR, multiplayer functions with those playing other versions, and eventually ported to almost every single videogame platform, including Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, Playstation 4, Various mobile devices, and even on Standalone platforms like Amazon Fire Tv and Apple Tv. 

 

 

How to play?

Each game takes place in a procedurally generated world, meaning that the world itself is created at random, so that no two people would ever likely have the game play space.  Local areas, including forests, tundra, water, deserts, and other common elements are the same, but placed in different spots, and of differing sizes, so that no two place space are the same.

 

Once the game has loaded, players play from a first person perspective, meaning the player can only see what the character would naturally see.  From here, players may scout out the island in search of where they would like to start building their home.  The main feature of the game is the creation aspect, using various materials found through the game world.  Some materials, from dirty, grass, and wood, can be harvested easily by punching the ground and trees, while other material must be cut down or mined with tools.  To develop various tools, players combine the various materials they’ve harvested and create the necessary tools and items from them.  Players can also combine materials to make new items, including beds, doors, windows, and a variety of home furnishing.

 

The individual materials can also be used to create structures and stand alone objects.  Each material typically takes up to a 1x1x1 block space, and can be placed on the ground or stacked together to create buildings, stairs, or other various structures. Since the main feature of the game is built around creation, players have made just about everything: From famous locations, to entire cities and castles, even to fully functioning games and events.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l315VzDcLmI

 

There are a variety of game modes:

Survival Mode:

The earliest version included survival elements that kept played progressing beyond just building.  During the day, the played could gather elements, build shelter, and collect items freely.  But once night fell, zombies would come to hunt the player.  The player can protect themselves via homes, or venture out and defeat the monsters.  The player has limited life pool, but can be healed with items.  If the player is defeated, they return to a set point, and must venture out to reclaim their previous collected materials and items.

 

A variant to this mode is known as Hardcore, where the difficulty is ramped up, and a single death results in loss of all progress and end of game. 

 

Some villains or bad guys you might commonly find are the:

Zombie

Spiders

Wolves

Enderman

Skeletons

Creeper (Unofficial mascot)

 

 

Creative Move:

Unlike Survival Mode, Creative Mode is designed for players who just want to build stuff.  Players are given access to all elements and building blocks in the game, allowing them to spend their time just building out their world as they see fit.

 

 

Adventure Mode:

A mixture of Creative and Survival, this mode allows others to play in user created maps and adventures, designed to offer new challenges and customized experiences for players.

 

 

Due to the customizable nature of the game, players can download user created content for use in their own worlds, or even download whole worlds to play in.  Various texture packs exist on the market place, allowing people to add various new characters, blocks, and elements in to the game as they please.  Major theme backs include games from Mario Bros, Fallout, Mass Effect, and even other movies and tv show franchises. 

 

 

 

 

Spin Offs?

Minecraft: Story Mode

This was an Episodic Spin-off game in the vane of various Telltale Games.  Telltale Games present various choices throughout a game, and with each choice comes new dialog, events, and outcomes to the story.  Based on actions taken, some characters will either have new dialog options, differing opinions about the character, or in some cases, may even die.  Minecraft: Story Mode took players through a journey to defeat an Elder Dragon, and was available through various storied episodes.

 

Minecraft: Classic

Release in May 2019 during the 10th anniversary of the game, this version of the game is based off the original 2009 prototype game first released.  It is more limited in what it can do, as it’s a simplified and stripped down version from the version we know today.

 

Minecraft: Earth

A developed in July of 2019, it took the Minecraft gameplay and enabled in a real world setting using Augmented Reality (AR).  Augmented Reality is an interactive experience that maps items and events to real world locations; most of these items and events cannot be seen or interacted with without the use of a device that can see the reality.  In this case, Minecraft: Earth uses iOS and Android devices to allow people to view minecraft structures and items in the real world.  Currently this game in a beta state, but has shown promising advances.

 

 

 

Minecraft: Dungeons

Based on the world of Minecraft, Minecraft: Dungeons is a Dungeon Crawler game, released at the end of May 2020.  Played from an Isometric view, players equip armor and weapons and travel through various dungeons.  Unlike Minecraft, there is little creation elements in the game, and the majority of the game is meant to be fighting various bad guys and monsters from the game.

 

 

Homework:

Minecraft – Of any platform