{"id":9688,"date":"2010-10-18T07:52:37","date_gmt":"2010-10-18T12:52:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/?p=9688"},"modified":"2011-02-07T09:22:39","modified_gmt":"2011-02-07T14:22:39","slug":"postcards-from-minecraft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/?p=9688","title":{"rendered":"Postcards from Minecraft"},"content":{"rendered":"

Minecraft is the exceptionally rare sort of game that can bridge the gap between myself and my kids. Most titles are a compromise of some sort. I can enjoy a bit of Mario Galaxy, but it doesn’t resonate with me the way it does with my son. They liked watching me play Half-Life 2 or Civilization V, but I don’t think they would have taken interest if not for the fact that I was playing. But Minecraft is just as fun at nine as it is at thirty-nine. And I think it’s the first time we’ve been able to really play together in a multiplayer setting. <\/p>\n

minecraft_statue2.jpg<\/td><\/tr><\/table><\/p>\n

A statue constructed by my daughter and me. It was an interesting challenge. We’re both very glad for the fact that you’re invincible in multiplayer. If we had to do a corpse run every time we slipped off the scaffolds, this would have been a lot less fun. <\/p>\n

minecraft_statue1.jpg<\/td><\/tr><\/table><\/p>\n

I notice most people like to build a lot of buildings. They build one, they move on, build another. But I keep tinkering with the same building, and improving it gradually as I learn. <\/p>\n

For a long time I had a lot of brick in my house. But the mixture of gray stone, brown wood, red brick, and glass block ended up looking too cluttered and unfocused. So I removed the brick and replaced it with stone. <\/p>\n

minecraft_shamus_house1.jpg<\/td><\/tr><\/table><\/p>\n

But now it looks too dull. I tried adding some white blocks (wool, actually) to give it a bit of texture. That helped, but it didn’t solve the problem. And you can’t get wool in multiplayer. (The wool I have now is from when I was playing single player. I copied my SP map to seed my MP server.) So now I’m playing around with tiered gardens. <\/p>\n

minecraft_shamus_house2.jpg<\/td><\/tr><\/table><\/p>\n

My house used to be a hill. I built into the hill, then on the hill, then around the hill, and now I’ll bet I’ve replaced every one of the original blocks. Foolishly, I removed all the grass. You can’t build grass, only dirt. Grass spreads on its own, and it does not spread quickly. So now I’m building all these dirt steps up the side of my house to get the grass to propagate to the upper floors. <\/p>\n

minecraft_beacon.jpg<\/td><\/tr><\/table><\/p>\n

A beacon. When you create a new map, its common to wander around for a bit until you find a spot where you’d like to build. The downside is that if you wind up back at the respawn point later, you might not know where your house is. There’s no in-game compass, no way to know your current position. You just have to navigate by landmarks. So it’s pretty common for people to build a huge pillar and light a fire on top in order to lead them home. <\/p>\n

While you can’t die in multiplayer, it’s still possible to get into a position where it’s easier to use the \/home command to escape a predicament. For example, if your last pick-axe breaks while you’re down in the bowels of the earth. If you were foolish you might find yourself with no digging tools, no wood to make tools, and no torches. (Always keep a small stack of wood if you’re going deep!) While it is<\/i> possible to dig free by digging with your hands in the dark, it’s a pretty time-consuming process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Minecraft is the exceptionally rare sort of game that can bridge the gap between myself and my kids. Most titles are a compromise of some sort. I can enjoy a bit of Mario Galaxy, but it doesn’t resonate with me the way it does with my son. They liked watching me play Half-Life 2 or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pictures"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9688\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shamusyoung.com\/twentysidedtale\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}