Minecraft Videos

noreply@blogger.com (Surebrec) — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 12:11:00 +0000

it's been a while since I have posted anything on this blog, so I thought I'd at least try to keep it active by posting a few videos of what is in my opinion, one of the most addictive games I have ever played.

This is a video of my old base:

Here is a video of my new base:

And here's a video of a creeper statue:

(watch in HD!)

Minecraft Review

noreply@blogger.com (Surebrec) — Sat, 02 Oct 2010 11:04:00 +0000

Your base will serve as your shelter against attacks from "Mobs". This is where you can allow your creative mind to run wild.

One of the good things I find about the internet, is that once in a while, amongst the endless piles of useless junk, idiots and general annoyances, is that you come across a gem, usually in rough, uncut and unpolished form. These gems are sadly few and far between.

A few weeks ago, I stumbled upon one such gem, whilst casually doing my rounds online. It was by pure chance I stumbled upon a thread on the PCSpecialist forums dedicated to the game in question. I entered out of pure boredom more than anything, and after watching a few videos within, I found myself somewhat drawn to the game, so much so that I went out on a limb and purchased it.

It wasn't without trepidation that I made the decision, because having to rely on a very old computer, the first thing that enters my mind when thinking about buying a game, is whether my system would be able to handle it. Once I had been assured that it wasn't a GPU/CPU intensive game, I made the leap and paid the £9-ish to enable me to download and play.

Initially, I wasn't too impressed by the game, I have to admit. I think my first impressions were based mostly on the fact that I didn't know what I was doing. After "playing" for about 20 minutes, getting nowhere fast, I decided to close the game down, and do some research online.

The first thing I did, was to visit the official forums and read what was posted on there, which proved to be a big eye opener. From this wealth of information, I discovered a dedicated wiki site on the game, which I made my next port of call.

It was only after reading through the dedicated wiki site, that I plucked up the courage to give the game another go. This time, with the knowledge I had in my possession, I jumped right in and immediately became immersed.

So what is Minecraft?

Planting saplings will provide you with all the wood you will need! When chopping down the tree trunks, make sure to destroy the leaves. You can get a good haul of saplings from a single tree

Well, the best way to describe the game, is to say it is somewhat like a lego based game, except it's nothing like a lego game. If you are familiar with the "Blockland Mods" game from a few years ago, you will be somewhat familiar with the concept of Minecraft. The premise of the game is to build and construct using the materials at hand. That is the only similarity between the two titles though in all honesty as there is much more to playing Minecraft. The point of the game is to survive the first night by building a base to protect you from the "Mobs" (monsters that spawn at night with the sole intent of killing you), then advance your base onwards, outwards, upwards and downwards as your thirst for building materials expands almost as fast as your realm does.

One good tip that I would recommend, is getting your wood production up and running as soon as possible. To do this, when chopping down trees for wood, make sure you harvest the foliage blocks as well as the actual wood blocks. If you are fortunate, you can pick up a good stash of tree saplings by doing this, which when planted will grow into full trees in a few days worth of game time. You can then repeat this process on the newly grown trees and increase your sapling supply exponentially. There should be no reason why you can never have a good wood supply in this game if you employ a system of effective forestation. The same thing applies to planting seeds and farming wheat.

As your forestry activity picks up, it may be necessary to clear terrain and then level it to plant new saplings. This you should do during the daylight hours, whilst venturing back into your base, or into your well lit mines & caves to look for coal, iron and even gold & diamond (Though the latter 2 will require you to dig almost all the way down to bedrock levels.

All the materials you mine can be used to maufacture better tools, with the exception of redstone dust. For example, a diamond tipped pick axe will go much further before it breaks and becomes useless than an iron tipped pick, which in turn will go further than a stone tipped version. The only drawback to diamond mining, is that like in real life, they are very rare, so you will need to do a lot of mining for little yield.

You can increase your chances of finding diamond by employing the "Branch mining" method. A word of warning though, when mining for diamonds, you will most likely find them either on the edge, or very close to a lava deposit so always be ready with a good supply of stone to plug up any lava flows you might release before they get out of hand. Thankfully, lava flows much more slowly than water does, so quick reflexes are always of benefit.

There are 2 modes to this game, offline single player, and online multiplayer. while the single player mode plays well, the online mode is riddled with bugs and glitches. This is understandable considering the game is still in Alpha testing with a view to moving into the Beta stages in the near future.

Getting Started.

Crafting, the main component to Minecraft. It it within this box that you manufacture all the tools you will need to survive. *Tip*. The first thing you should craft is a workstation. A workstation allows you access to a 3x3 craft grid for making tools such as picks, axes, shovels etc.

The first thing you will need to get to grasps with, is the task of "Crafting". This is the part I had most difficulty getting used to. You will find a link at the bottom of this page that offers a good guide as to what crafting is, what it entails, and examples of all the tools utilities and resources you will be able to manufacture.

Once you have gathered enough wood, your next task is to make a makeshift base to protect you on your first night. The most handy way to do this, is find a rock face and dig in using your freshly made pick while sealing yourself off by building a wall for protection. If you are fortunate enough to find coal, you can use it to make torches to light your way as you are digging your ever expanding mine system.

The first few hours spent in the game will be taken up mostly by digging for coal to fuel your torches. It is down to plain luck as to where you spawn in single player mode as the map is generated from scratch the moment you enter. You may get lucky and end up just blocks away from a rich coal deposit, or adversely, you might find yourself in the middle of a flat expanse of land with no cliffs in sight.

If the latter is the case, you have 2 options open to you.

Explore.
Dig down.

1. This method leaves you with the possible scenario of finding yourself being caught exposed when the sun goes down, it's not advisable to wander too far in exploration of a suitable rock face.

2. This would be your best bet if you want to get a simple base set up to sit out the first night. Regardless of where you spawn, you are never more than a few vertical blocks from rock. You have less chance of hitting coal this way, you need to be aware of that, but it will get you protected and then allow you to sit the night out and wait for the sun to come up to allow you to resume your exploration.

Either way, you NEED to keep an eye on your surroundings, it is very easy to get lost in this game. The maps are huge and generate around you as you explore it. If you do get lost, and want to respawn from your original entry point, you can use the command "/home" to teleport you back to the first place you spawned.

While the graphics are about as basic as it gets, what they lack in detail, the gameplay more than makes up for in addictiveness . I'll be honest with you, if you are only concerned with cutting edge graphics, this game is not for you, don't waste your money, you WILL be disappointed. If on the other hand, you can look past the way a game looks and can see the potential in the way it plays, I would recommend it, I don't think you will be disappointed.

Mobs

BRAAAAAAAAAIIIIIINS!!!!!!!

You will find Mobs throughout the game, some are neutral that you can kill for food and resources, while enemy Mobs only exist with the sole intent of trying to kill you. You can find a list of all the Mobs currently included in the game, along with a list of items they drop when you kill them at the bottom of the page.

It is also worth noting that if you don't want to play with Mobs attacking you while you are trying to get started, you can easily disable them, leaving you free to explore the vast landscape in peace. To disable the spawning of enemy mobs, just press ESC to pause the game, go into options and then set the game to "peaceful" mode. You will not be inconvenienced by an unseen exploding creeper, or chased by skeletons & zombies again until you change the setting back to default.

One thing to keep in mind with regards to Mobs, although they can be very annoying when you are trying to go about your business, they do drop some key items that can be put to good use when you kill them, and because of this, it is wise to have them enabled at some point during the game.

There are ways to make killing Mobs to get the useful item drops much easier, but these involve making traps. This video shows how to make an effective Mob trap and what to do to use it properly.

So there you go, a quick review of the massively addictive Minecraft game. If you think the game might appeal to you and you are not hung up on the lack of AAA graphics, give it a go, I promise you, you will not be disappointed.

Summary.

graphics: 1/10
gameplay: 9/10
longevity: 8/10

Useful Links.

Minecraft Official Website
Minecraft Official Forums
Minecraft Wiki
Minecraft Crafting Guide
Minecraft Mobs Guide

Gameplay Videos