Minecraftforum.net is currently in read only mode while our team perform essential software upgrades to improve site performance. During this maintenance period all posts will remain accessible, however you will be unable to use any account functions.

We have prepared a handy list of activities that should keep you busy until the forum returns:

• Visit the Minecraft Forums IRC channel and chat with forum staff and other members
  
• Watch our Minecraft videos and subscribe to our Youtube channel
  
• Play the latest Minecraft snapshot
  
• Try out Minecraft Pocket Edition for iPhone, iPad and Android devices!
  
• Follow the Minecraft Forums on Twitter
  
• Take a peek at all our Minecon Fan Photos and Like us on Facebook
  
• Watch user submitted videos in our videos section
  
• Build your own Catacomb Snatch
  
• If you're in the United States of America enter to win YOUR Minecraft world 3D printed!
  
• Vote for your favourite video game characters in the March Curse Gaming Bracket Challenge!
  
• Find and try a Minecraft Mod, Minecraft Map or Texture Pack
  
• Play Cobalt
  
• View some Minecraft Fan Art!

If all goes to plan we will leave read only mode later today. Thank you for your patience, see you on the other side! Back to Top

After many months of providing an amazing plug-in service for the Minecraft community, Bukkit has officially joined the Mojang team!  There are some immediately obvious benefits - official support for the game, better resources to develop Bukkit further - as well as the ability to develop tools, mod support and more which can be officially integrated into the game!

Bukkit developer EvilSeph stated numerous reasons for the move, including a desire to have better mod support for the game, that was more easily accessible to the community at large.

EvilSeph said:

From that meeting, a partnership was born.  We here at Curse are proud to have supported Bukkit, and to do whatever it took to help them continue doing what they did best - making an incredible set of tools for Minecraft players.  We very much look forward to seeing a Bukkit-driven multiplayer experience in the coming days, and wish them the very best with their future at Mojang!  You can read EvilSeph's full write-up right here, as well as Mojang's official statement on their home page - check it out!

Bukkit started in December of 2010, with the intent to develop tools to help run and extend SMP servers.  Response to their project idea was massively overwhelming - so much so that their hosting server almost outright failed numerous times.  Around this time, Curse & Multiplay's Steve Hartland offered their support, to make sure Bukkit was able to keep moving forward.  While the Bukkit team had often dreamed of developing a proper Mod API (and certainly had the skill-set for it), they lacked the experience of handling something of that magnitude.  Mojang, upon meeting with them at Minecon, discussed their ideas and the future of both Bukkit and Minecraft, and from there, the rest is history.

Once again, a HUGE "congratulations" to the Bukkit team from everyone here at Curse and the Minecraft Forum!  Your hard work and perseverance definitely earned it!

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The March Gaming Bracket Challenge presented by Curse and Alienware is a tournament that pits random video game characters against one another!

Each week in March we will be matching up characters from your favorite Curse Network fansites; from Skyrim to Starcraft, WoW to Minecraft. Who gets through to the next round is up to you since your votes decide who rises up and who falls in this arena!  Do you want to see Steve, the Enderman or some other Minecraft star win the battle?  Head on over and vote on your favorite!

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Pico gives us news on Minecraft, LoL, Guild Wars 2, Realm of the Mad God, Aion and Border Lands 2 - check it out!

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Dead Worker's Party member Brent Copeland has a LP series!  Check it out! Back to Top

Something that's been growing in popularity in recent years is "demake" projects - taking modern games and recreating them in retro environments, typically 8 or 16-bit.  Notch is evidently working on a demake project of Team Fortress 2 (which you can watch live, here), and it certainly calls back to the pixellated top-down days of yore.  In the screenshot below, you can definitively make out the shapes of a sniper, doctor, soldier, heavy, scout and pyro, along with a healthy dose of pixel-bullets.

When (if ever) will this game be released?  According to Notch himself, "probably never".  The possibility exists that he is simply working on the project to give himself inspiration for other ideas.

Modern demakes are typically whimsical in nature and often combine the gameplay of the original with nostalgic genres like platform games and beat 'em ups.  Team Fortress 2 has certainly seen its share of demakes in the past - as well as other popular Valve titles, like Left 4 Dead - but it is only one in a long line of game demakes.  What makes them so popular?  It's hard to say; for older gamers, it may be the nostalgic sense they evoke, with their blocky sprites and chiptune background music - for younger gamers, perhaps the appeal of a simple, easy-to-approach style of gameplay.

For as long as he has it up, you can watch Notch working on the TF2 demake on his livestream right here!

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Time is running out to submit your entry to win a free 3D printout of your choice!  Be sure to check out the details, and get your entry in before March 4th!  Be sure to subscribe to the Curse Newsletter for more details, as well as chances to win in numerous contests and giveaways hosted every month! Back to Top

Today, some friends and I take a look at the Labyrinth of Irritation adventure map, by Shredster7! We won't show you the solutions to every puzzle (or the surprise ending) - those are for you to discover! As we spent more time playing the map than reviewing it in greater detail, I'd like to take a moment to go over the finer points of the map itself.

Overall, the puzzles on the map were clever, well thought-out and even humorous at times. The entire thing gives off a subtle "Indiana Jones" feel - very rarely was the pacing of the map broken by a particularly difficult puzzle, and the layout of the map itself was quite innovative. If you're looking for a casual adventure to kill a few hours or so with friends, this is definitely worth a look. Check out the author's thread for details!

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I am Sacheverell, and I am not a robot (I swear!). Check the front page for all the latest Minecraft news, videos and more! Back to Top

Interview with Jon Kagstrom

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Mojang's resident AI guru, Jon Kagstrom, to ask some questions about the highly anticipated 1.2 update. Here's what he had to say!

Sach: There have been a lot of features added in recent snapshots (more advanced Testificate behavior, smarter mobs etc) that seem to indicate a wide range of potential for the future of hostile and non-hostile NPCs going forward - what are some of your plans for that?

• Jon: My primary task at the moment is to improve mobs (animals+monsters+npcs) to do that I first move them to a new AI platform. Once a mob has been moved it's really easy to add new behaviors without breaking existing ones. This is when the fun starts. What I find really interesting is emergent behaviors from only a few lines of code. For example the villager children playing tag or the dynamic when zombies break doors and villagers are fleeing in random directions. There is no overhead "invade village behavior" it's all a mixture of smaller reusable behavior modules. Another interesting aspect is the emotional relationship the player builds up with mobs. It's worse to see a villager child being eaten by a zombie than a grown, so you want to protect the little ones. Also I really like small subtle behaviors that doesn't necessarily add something concrete to the game but only atmosphere, like the new Iron Golem giving a rose to the children in a village.
  

Cats and creepers have an interesting dynamic in regards to how they behave with each other - will there be similar "quirks" or relationships between other NPC/mobs in the future?

• Yes, in the future we will definitely see more mob interactions, not only between the player and the mob but also between mobs, we want the world to feel alive and dynamic. In Minecraft you can basically build anything and I like the idea of having an adapting dynamic population as well. Next step might be some kind of trading with the villagers now that they are getting some life. So you have a good reason to keep them happy by protecting them from monsters. But Jens and I haven't really planned any details yet.
  

There are now a wide variety of diverse biomes, with the jungle being the most recent addition - and it has biome-specific life! Will there be any alterations going forward for certain biomes to be preferred homes for pigs, cows...even certain monsters?

• Yes probably, nothing is planned but as we update mobs this is considered.
  

More information on the update will be forthcoming - keep an eye out!

Improved half-blocks? Coming soon!

Pocket Edition - The Saga Continues

Daniel Kaplan took a moment to talk about Pocket Edition recently, showing some love for the incredibly active Korean fan-base of the popular portable title. He went on to say that there are a number of bug fixes in the works, such as continuously burning after respawning (if previously on fire), and the stubbornly unmovable cloth blocks being fixed. Finally, he offers this helpful hint on flying in Creative mode:

Daniel Kaplan said:

The hit portable sandbox game continues to make huge strides, currently sitting as the #8 top-grossing (earning/selling) app in the US market! Features for Pocket Edition have been released at a steady pace, and we look forward to the next iteration of advancement.

This week, David & Toby cover the bustling world of Minecraft's numerous goings-on, including a look at the recently concluded Mojam event, yesterday's Snapshot (with particular focus on the new Iron Golem) and more - check it out!

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I am Sacheverell, and I am not a robot (I swear!). Check the front page for all the latest Minecraft news, videos and more! Back to Top

Minecraft for PS Vita? Unfortunately...

It seems that Minecraft will not be coming to Playstation after all. In a business meeting including Daniel Kaplan, it was confirmed that there were "no plans" to bring the indie title to PS Vita (Sony's handheld equivalent to the Nintendo DS), despite overwhelming success on the Sony handheld, Xperia.
Minecraft - Pocket Edition launched on Xperia Play last summer and quickly became the Android Market's most worldwide-downloaded app. Approximately 8500 people have played the game on the device since its unveiling. The recent Survival Mode update to the game makes Pocket Edition more of an action-oriented experience, with health bars, weapons and animals included, as well as the addition of more blocks from the PC version of the game.

The XBLA version of the game is still expected to hit consoles in March 2012.

Want to Code "Catacomb Snatch" Yourself?

With Mojam all wrapped up, Mojang's new title "Catacomb Snatch" is, technically, complete! However, Jeb has decided to encourage budding programmers by giving tips on how to use the open-source code of the game. He goes over his own history of getting into game development, as well as offering some helpful instructions to prospective game designers who might decide to take on the task of working on "Catacomb Snatch" further. He also offered sources for the development tools needed to code a Java game (using his examples), as well as positing a number of tasks and challenges for anyone brave enough to take them on. What can you add or improve on "Catacomb Snatch"?

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Dead Worker's Party - The Eye

The Dead Worker's Party begins a new adventure this week, "The Eye"! What strange things await the entrepid trio? Can they solve the mystery of their amnesia? Will they ever get that minecart to work correctly? Give it a watch to find out! Back to Top

Jeb and Jon have released this week's snapshot, 12w08a. This week's changes are as follows:

• Added a defense mob to villages
  
• Added up-side-down stairs
  
• Many changes to the world and lighting system

Client: download here
Server: download here

Need help using a snapshot? Badprenup has you covered!

1. Download the new snapshot minecraft.jar
2. Navigate to your .minecraft folder (On windows, you can find it by searching for %appdata%)
3. Put the new jar file in the bin folder (OPTIONAL: Back up your old jar file).
4. Open Minecraft via the launcher, how you normally would.

Let us know what you find! Here's a screenshot Jon provided of the new mob, the Iron Golem:

Back to Top

Jeb has released a teaser image for this week's upcoming Snapshot - upside-down stairs!  They can be placed by simply placing a normal stair against the bottom of a block, most easily done from below the block in question.  Decorators will no doubt benefit from the new change - I plan to redo my ceilings accordingly.

Last week's Snapshot covered a medley of updates - while a few new features were added, a large volume of the update was dedicated to engine tweaks, file format optimization and other updates to improve the overall performance of the game.  What awaits this week - aside from the improved stairs - remains a mystery.  We will update the community with all the juicy details of the upcoming Snapshot, so keep an eye out! Back to Top

Today, I cover an adventure map, "The Island of Dr. Gireaux" (no relation to Moreau, of course), made by PeligrosoBlanco! Based off of the highly popular H. G. Wells novel, this adventure leaves the player stranded on a strange island populated by all manner of oddities. With a rich back-story, clever layout and curiously disembodied NPCs, this map worth many hours of entertainment. In addition, I may or may not mess up hilariously along the way - check it out!

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Be sure to check out this week's Weekly Round Up, where Pico gives us news on Diablo 3, Guild Wars 2, World of Warcraft, Minecraft, Rift and Nitronic Rush! Back to Top

Minecraft has hit over 5,000,000 (five million) sales, and over 20 million registered users! It seems like only yesterday that Minecraft was fully released at Minecon, and features were still being added even then. From beds to bedrock fog, Minecraft spent 2011 in a constant state of growth, and continues to do so well into 2012. As the game grows, so does the player-base; it wasn't long before over 4 million people bought the game, and now, even that number seems so far away.

Now, it seems that Pocket Edition has some catching up to do! Having hit 750,000 sales in January, the portable Minecraft port has quickly become a fixture in its own right - how long will it be before we see over 1 million sales for this ever-expanding game for the travelling builder? Every update brings more and more of the popular PC title to handhelds, with the most recent update bringing elements of Survival to Pocket Edition, including monsters, tools and even more blocks than before, to name just a few.

It's almost impossible to really grasp the totality of how far Minecraft has come, and how much Mojang has grown. What will the next major landmark be for the smash-hit sandbox game, and the blockbusting team behind it? We're not sure, but with Mojam still in full swing, there exists ample opportunities to aim ever higher. Back to Top