I was somewhat disappointed with 1.8, kinda like Brink and DNF; it was fun, but it really didn't feel complete(yes I know, they split it up with 1.9 and 1.10. The feeling still remains), ands so it got old fast. However, 1.9 so far has been pretty nice. Only complaints I have are:
Swamps need to transition nicer, especially with trees. Its odd to see half a tree be one color, and the other half another.
Go back to pigmen like they had originally planned. The new villagers are ugly, and don't seem to fit Minecraft to me.
Make the swamp color change-able via texture pack. I don't mind the color(actually I really like it, especially the faint green lines in the water), but when I use a different texture pack, we should be able to make the swamps fit with that pack.
And the games that do have manipulable world variables tend to have them simply affect world gen. I don't doubt Minecraft will eventually implement world variable sliders on world gen (how forested the area is, how much water, how high 'ground' level is, etc.), but that's vastly different than eliminating a core game mechanic like hunger.
Quite right. Civilization comes to mind, along with Age of Empires 2. I look forward to the day when we have those controls in Minecraft- the 8 million mineshafts within 1000 blocks of spawn will be reduced to 8 on my world, and there will be a village for me to lord over. None of this wandering for days and days and still not finding a village, nor any of this digging a hole and always finding a mine.
I'm growing more and more accustomed to the look of the "squidward" villagers - they do seem to fit into Minecraft now. What I would like to see is the implementation of equivalent villages in the Nether with pigmen instead, but I'm not sure what the chances of that'll be!
I can not do any comments on the content there is. WHY? Because beta version is always a test version, not ready, not complete, not fully dome. At the moment we have a pre-release verson of a test version, so ANY criticism is just like comlplaining that a dish is not tasty before it's eaven cooked. It's just pointless.
What i can say now is that i really like Notch having his own vision of minecraft, his own opinion how things should be, and his own sense of what should be 9in the game and what should not.
But that's just it...that's really the point of it being in beta, is so that people can provide constructive criticism as to what should happen, rather than just letting notch do whatever. if something *really* isn't fun, or doesn't work right, then it needs to be fixed.
My main criticism is in the lag a lot of us are experiencing. I have a good cpu with 6 gigs of ram and a mid-level graphics card, but I have to play it on vanilla graphics with short rendering now.
1) Love the snow golems. It gives a fun use for pumpkins, and can be used for hours of mindless entertainment.
2) I like the monk look of the NPC characters. In my opinion, having the villagers look too human takes some of the fun out of being alone in the world. However, I've read comments that the added nose might be a bit strange for modders, and I'm inclined to agree. I'd give them a normal nose model whilst keeping their overall design. The village generation needs work too; it's no good having gravel cover half the doors and the others 6 blocks in the air. Beyond that, I trust Mojang to make them useful.
3) I agree with plans to nerf the Endermen's block carrying ability as is, but something should be done to make them more interesting. As of right now, they have too many weaknesses to make them a good enemy...
a ) Walking mindlessly into water- I'd have them wait on the shore. Water isn't a bad weakness, but there should be more to it than simply jumping into a pool when the going gets tough.
b ) Getting trapped outside a 2 block high doorway- I'd give them a form of ducking ability and/or the ability to destroy blocks when angered. Also, they should only spawn above ground, where they don't get lost in caves.
c ) Stopping in the middle of an attack upon looking at them again- When angered, they shouldn't stop for anything in their quest to kill you.
d ) Low attack strength- I'd up it to 2 on easy, 3.5 on normal, and 5 on hard. It's no fun taking one of these guys on when they can be killed as easily as zombies.
e ) Burn in sunlight- There's nothing rare about ender pearls that get dropped by just waiting for Endermen to die in the sunlight. They could simply vanish.
Also, they should have some objective with their block transport. Perhaps they could have their own unique biome where they can build weird structures to their heart's content, or just move around dirt in unique patterns, perhaps forming some sort of code.
4) I like the Nether updates. If another ore and/or a boss guarding treasure in the middle of the fortress were added, it would make the Nether essentially complete.
5) The mushroom islands are funny, but they need some expansion. How about some form of rare item, another silly mushroom mob and a (non-erupting) volcano in the middle?
6) Still waiting for those new sound effects and records...
But that's just it...that's really the point of it being in beta, is so that people can provide constructive criticism as to what should happen, rather than just letting notch do whatever. if something *really* isn't fun, or doesn't work right, then it needs to be fixed.
I very much like constructive criticism. The OP was very sensible with his opinions about flaws in the game. I wish everyone who disliked a feature would express their opinion in this matter. But on hand, I think Notch should listen to the constructive critism, but not let it control everything.
More to what I mean, Mojang is the developer, they should make the end choice, and the criticism should never be ignored. It should be a guide line, but perhaps it also should never be followed to the letter. That's just my personal opinion about the critism at hand here. So I really do agree with you completely in a sense, people should be able to have a say, just they should never be in complete control.
...
I suppose I'll make a start - that point about the swamp biome is my first one. I actually do like swamps overall. I like how Notch has listened to the community and implemented their ideas. The lily pads are an especially nice touch. However, I believe they could still stand to improve. As I mentioned, a nicer gradient would help that dark grass to blend in with the surroundings - at the moment there's a very sharp cut off between the dark green of the swamp biome and the more vivid green of its surroundings:
Furthermore, I reckon Notch could take the murky-coloured water a step further, and implement biome-dependent water elsewhere. I'd love to see deep blue oceans, green rainforest rivers and bright tropical shores. I know of a mod that does precisely this, so it's most certainly possible.
The swamp color transitions are a stark contrast, certainly just something that was overlooked in the 'pre.' I'd like to see some more water color variation for the other biomes as well.
Additionally I think the light cutoff under water should be removed (as you dive into water, somewhere around 12 blocks down it becomes dark very suddenly) in favor of a % loss (or gradual negation) of light per meter of water light passes through. Very deep bodies of water are going to be dark anyway, we don't need extra arbitrary enforcement of that darkness.
I'd like to see more diverse biomes. Making the biomes bigger was a great start. I love big oceans in particular, and have made my home on an island ever since the 1.8 patch. However, I do feel they're lacking a bit in variety somewhat. For instance, you almost never see mountain biomes or plains with trees - you might find one solitary tree in them occasionally, but that's about it:
What I think this comes down to is separating the geology, and flora and fauna, from the topography. Elevation should have nothing to do with whether or not the ground is sandy / stony / grassy (with perhaps an exception for extremely high elevations being proportionally more stony). The combination of elevation and geology can determine flora and fauna distribution to some extent (high mountains and oceans), but in most cases only the geology should matter.
I'd add that I love that there are oceans now, they've been sadly missing for a long time. We seem to have lost our beaches though, perhaps a bit more sand and gravel for the transitions out of the Ocean biome into other biome types. I think we could find something to fill them up with now too, such as some flora for starters:
Coconut Palm trees - for the terrestrial edges of ocean
Kelp - reverse gravity growth effect of vines, grow in limited clusters like mushrooms
The village NPCs seem a little too prone to wandering away from their homes. There probably ought to be some way to leash them to their spawns (might work well for animals too). Their appearance doesn't bother me, I assume the testificate is only the first of many models.
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More Ocean Life: Kelp, Coral, Crabs and Jellyfish; Coconut Palm trees for beaches and islands. Terrain Generation Changes: Which biomes and world-building features are most in need of change?
There's lots of things I like and don't like about 1.8 & 1.9, but for me there's only one that I could call deal breaking: biome sizes. Believe it or not, there are people who find them boringly huge and people who lack the hardware support to wander far. This is my only problem significant enough to affect whether I can/want to play. An option to cut their sizes in half would be very nice and not take anything away from people that love them as they are. Or a mod, which I've suggested but haven't had response to.
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Wynne is currently:Today: Seeking support for my Smaller Biomes mod suggestion! This week: Playing 1.8 This month: Working on texture pack.
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I've read amany forum posts lately about how Notch and Jeb are 'Killing the game' and most of them are people just bashing an idea without any valid or constructive points.
The 1.8/1.9 updates have a solid feeling but also feel disjointed in what content they are giving us. For instance 1.8 gave us Mineshafts, Strongholds and endermen which gave us a solid adventure aspect to the game while 1.9 gave us Nether content which actually gives the nether a reason to exist. But why add Snowmen? It just seems silly.
The NPC villiages will be without a dout a great addition to the game. On of my griefs is with countless threads about the NPS current texture, They are called TESTIFICATE!, The current textures are placeholders for whats to come.
I would also like to add that I love the RPG elements that will be added to the game.
There's lots of things I like and don't like about 1.8 & 1.9, but for me there's only one that I could call deal breaking: biome sizes. Believe it or not, there are people who find them boringly huge and people who lack the hardware support to wander far. This is my only problem significant enough to affect whether I can/want to play. An option to cut their sizes in half would be very nice and not take anything away from people that love them as they are. Or a mod, which I've suggested but haven't had response to.
Larger biomes were more well received I think, so I doubt they will make an alteration in this department. I know the Phoenix Biome Terrain mod enabled you to change biome size, I am sure when it updates it will still keep that feature. But this mod seems like your best future solution if you enjoy single player and want small biomes.
My only problem thus far is the large waves of mushrooms. I do not like how it is so easy to get mushrooms now, and how they spread, bonemeal, mooshrooms, etc. Also all we can do with mushrooms is make stew or grow them. New uses for them will be great and I am sure with the new apothecary/alchemy addition to the game it will get vamped up.
Also Yrael, it would be pretty cool to maybe list the subjects of concern in the OP and then under that list the suggestions people give? It would be quite bomb to follow this thread, read first post, find a subject already spoken about, see the changes given, so maybe we can agree/disagree with those (this can start trolling/flame tidbits between members, but it would be helpful)
tbh, i think snowmen were just a fun addition to the game, and like a lot of fetaures or build features, the choice to use them is down to the player, dont like? done make.
Endermen (!) need to be bad MF and quite rare and the more blocks they pick up the better? why shouldnt they attack your creations (they were here before you)
But my biggest gripe, is there's too much water, I love the rivers,, love the ocean biomes, but its seems no matter what seed I use off late, its like every biome is an island (apart from snow ones for some reason)
I'd probably just like a slider bar on seed creation screen for more water or less water.
Actually, a customizable water level config wouldn't be a half bad idea. I for one have used the PTM mod back in the day and you can make a waterless world or even water world, both of which were extremely fun. And this would be even more fun on servers. I always tried to find a water world server. This is all in my personal opinion of course.
I personally think Notch made snowmen A.K.A Snow Golems head a bad choice. I perfered the real like snowman look. I like how he made pumpkins have another use but it just doesnt fit for me. Who else thinks they arent the right choice for Snow Golems?
There's a number of complaints I have about 1.8+, but only two of them really mean a damn thing (though I will list the others).
Bedrock Fog; This is annoying in two ways. First, it seems incredibly arbitrary. All it does is annoy the player and it doesn't balance anything and there is no benefit for dealing with it that was not there before the fog was put in place. Second, it is not internally consistent. I can light an area near bedrock beyond any hope of mobs spawning there, yet if I walk ten blocks away, I can't even seem the torches I placed down. That sort of breaks verisimilitude.
Animal Spawning; Loads and loads of one or two specific animals will spawn per chunk, but all the chunks in a fairly wide area will spawn the same animals. This is forcing players to spend longer amounts of time hunting for basic resources (leather, feathers). Depending on the spawn, leather and bows can be rendered practically useless; leather for being more rare than iron and bows because there's no chickens to be found. There needs to be something put in to ensure that at least some of every animal spawns in a given area.
The other piddly issues for me are Endermen moving tree blocks (makes the forest look silly), Testificates' tall heads (another internal consistency issue), the occasional complete and utter lack of roses and iron bar placement behavior. As I said though, none of these are all that big. The two above are my only real complaints about 1.8+.
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All moderation on forums is biased. Mods and admins do play favorites. Thus there is truly no point in "playing by the rules" since enforcement of said rules is subjective. That is why I refuse to censor my speech and will call things exactly as I see them without reservation.
I personally think Notch made snowmen A.K.A Snow Golems head a bad choice. I perfered the real like snowman look. I like how he made pumpkins have another use but it just doesnt fit for me. Who else thinks they arent the right choice for Snow Golems?
I actually like it because it gives that feel of slight difference to the game world. Also, unless I am mistaken, there are regions where pumpkins are used in this manner.
If I were to make any change to them, it would be to require the use of a jack-o-lantern to make the eyes and mouth glow. It doesn't have to shed actual light (this would be a problem in SMP) but it would look damn cool.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
All moderation on forums is biased. Mods and admins do play favorites. Thus there is truly no point in "playing by the rules" since enforcement of said rules is subjective. That is why I refuse to censor my speech and will call things exactly as I see them without reservation.
Also Yrael, it would be pretty cool to maybe list the subjects of concern in the OP and then under that list the suggestions people give? It would be quite bomb to follow this thread, read first post, find a subject already spoken about, see the changes given, so maybe we can agree/disagree with those (this can start trolling/flame tidbits between members, but it would be helpful)
That's a great idea! :smile.gif: I'll go through some of the thread now and post summaries in the OP - I won't have time to do it all now unfortunately, but I'll finish it tomorrow.
Minecraft is unique in that, it is the only game I know of where millions are playing...in beta.
I think that is what some people forget is that this is a beta version, and not complete. The developers can do whatever they want, and they are listening! We are all just testers.
I love the route Minecraft has gone. I began playing in 1.6 I believe, and one thing I have always loved about the game is the depth. There are so many craftable items, and I love that this is growing.
I do feel like the jump from 1.8 to 1.9 was too soon, and now we are getting yet another 1.9 prerelease? Wow, maybe they should of just waited to an official 1.9 release.
My only dream for Minecraft is that they CONTINUE updating even once the full versions is complete; keep adding features to this ever-expanding game!
Swamps need to transition nicer, especially with trees. Its odd to see half a tree be one color, and the other half another.
Go back to pigmen like they had originally planned. The new villagers are ugly, and don't seem to fit Minecraft to me.
Make the swamp color change-able via texture pack. I don't mind the color(actually I really like it, especially the faint green lines in the water), but when I use a different texture pack, we should be able to make the swamps fit with that pack.
Quite right. Civilization comes to mind, along with Age of Empires 2. I look forward to the day when we have those controls in Minecraft- the 8 million mineshafts within 1000 blocks of spawn will be reduced to 8 on my world, and there will be a village for me to lord over. None of this wandering for days and days and still not finding a village, nor any of this digging a hole and always finding a mine.
But that's just it...that's really the point of it being in beta, is so that people can provide constructive criticism as to what should happen, rather than just letting notch do whatever. if something *really* isn't fun, or doesn't work right, then it needs to be fixed.
1) Love the snow golems. It gives a fun use for pumpkins, and can be used for hours of mindless entertainment.
2) I like the monk look of the NPC characters. In my opinion, having the villagers look too human takes some of the fun out of being alone in the world. However, I've read comments that the added nose might be a bit strange for modders, and I'm inclined to agree. I'd give them a normal nose model whilst keeping their overall design. The village generation needs work too; it's no good having gravel cover half the doors and the others 6 blocks in the air. Beyond that, I trust Mojang to make them useful.
3) I agree with plans to nerf the Endermen's block carrying ability as is, but something should be done to make them more interesting. As of right now, they have too many weaknesses to make them a good enemy...
a ) Walking mindlessly into water- I'd have them wait on the shore. Water isn't a bad weakness, but there should be more to it than simply jumping into a pool when the going gets tough.
b ) Getting trapped outside a 2 block high doorway- I'd give them a form of ducking ability and/or the ability to destroy blocks when angered. Also, they should only spawn above ground, where they don't get lost in caves.
c ) Stopping in the middle of an attack upon looking at them again- When angered, they shouldn't stop for anything in their quest to kill you.
d ) Low attack strength- I'd up it to 2 on easy, 3.5 on normal, and 5 on hard. It's no fun taking one of these guys on when they can be killed as easily as zombies.
e ) Burn in sunlight- There's nothing rare about ender pearls that get dropped by just waiting for Endermen to die in the sunlight. They could simply vanish.
Also, they should have some objective with their block transport. Perhaps they could have their own unique biome where they can build weird structures to their heart's content, or just move around dirt in unique patterns, perhaps forming some sort of code.
4) I like the Nether updates. If another ore and/or a boss guarding treasure in the middle of the fortress were added, it would make the Nether essentially complete.
5) The mushroom islands are funny, but they need some expansion. How about some form of rare item, another silly mushroom mob and a (non-erupting) volcano in the middle?
6) Still waiting for those new sound effects and records...
I very much like constructive criticism. The OP was very sensible with his opinions about flaws in the game. I wish everyone who disliked a feature would express their opinion in this matter. But on hand, I think Notch should listen to the constructive critism, but not let it control everything.
More to what I mean, Mojang is the developer, they should make the end choice, and the criticism should never be ignored. It should be a guide line, but perhaps it also should never be followed to the letter. That's just my personal opinion about the critism at hand here. So I really do agree with you completely in a sense, people should be able to have a say, just they should never be in complete control.
The swamp color transitions are a stark contrast, certainly just something that was overlooked in the 'pre.' I'd like to see some more water color variation for the other biomes as well.
Additionally I think the light cutoff under water should be removed (as you dive into water, somewhere around 12 blocks down it becomes dark very suddenly) in favor of a % loss (or gradual negation) of light per meter of water light passes through. Very deep bodies of water are going to be dark anyway, we don't need extra arbitrary enforcement of that darkness.
What I think this comes down to is separating the geology, and flora and fauna, from the topography. Elevation should have nothing to do with whether or not the ground is sandy / stony / grassy (with perhaps an exception for extremely high elevations being proportionally more stony). The combination of elevation and geology can determine flora and fauna distribution to some extent (high mountains and oceans), but in most cases only the geology should matter.
I'd add that I love that there are oceans now, they've been sadly missing for a long time. We seem to have lost our beaches though, perhaps a bit more sand and gravel for the transitions out of the Ocean biome into other biome types. I think we could find something to fill them up with now too, such as some flora for starters:
The village NPCs seem a little too prone to wandering away from their homes. There probably ought to be some way to leash them to their spawns (might work well for animals too). Their appearance doesn't bother me, I assume the testificate is only the first of many models.
Terrain Generation Changes: Which biomes and world-building features are most in need of change?
This week: Playing 1.8 This month: Working on texture pack.
The 1.8/1.9 updates have a solid feeling but also feel disjointed in what content they are giving us. For instance 1.8 gave us Mineshafts, Strongholds and endermen which gave us a solid adventure aspect to the game while 1.9 gave us Nether content which actually gives the nether a reason to exist. But why add Snowmen? It just seems silly.
The NPC villiages will be without a dout a great addition to the game. On of my griefs is with countless threads about the NPS current texture, They are called TESTIFICATE!, The current textures are placeholders for whats to come.
I would also like to add that I love the RPG elements that will be added to the game.
Larger biomes were more well received I think, so I doubt they will make an alteration in this department. I know the Phoenix Biome Terrain mod enabled you to change biome size, I am sure when it updates it will still keep that feature. But this mod seems like your best future solution if you enjoy single player and want small biomes.
http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/313991-173-phoenixterrainmod-new-status-update/
There is the link if you want to check it out. But like I said, it’s not up-to-date yet.
Also Yrael, it would be pretty cool to maybe list the subjects of concern in the OP and then under that list the suggestions people give? It would be quite bomb to follow this thread, read first post, find a subject already spoken about, see the changes given, so maybe we can agree/disagree with those (this can start trolling/flame tidbits between members, but it would be helpful)
Actually, a customizable water level config wouldn't be a half bad idea. I for one have used the PTM mod back in the day and you can make a waterless world or even water world, both of which were extremely fun. And this would be even more fun on servers. I always tried to find a water world server. This is all in my personal opinion of course.
Bedrock Fog; This is annoying in two ways. First, it seems incredibly arbitrary. All it does is annoy the player and it doesn't balance anything and there is no benefit for dealing with it that was not there before the fog was put in place. Second, it is not internally consistent. I can light an area near bedrock beyond any hope of mobs spawning there, yet if I walk ten blocks away, I can't even seem the torches I placed down. That sort of breaks verisimilitude.
Animal Spawning; Loads and loads of one or two specific animals will spawn per chunk, but all the chunks in a fairly wide area will spawn the same animals. This is forcing players to spend longer amounts of time hunting for basic resources (leather, feathers). Depending on the spawn, leather and bows can be rendered practically useless; leather for being more rare than iron and bows because there's no chickens to be found. There needs to be something put in to ensure that at least some of every animal spawns in a given area.
The other piddly issues for me are Endermen moving tree blocks (makes the forest look silly), Testificates' tall heads (another internal consistency issue), the occasional complete and utter lack of roses and iron bar placement behavior. As I said though, none of these are all that big. The two above are my only real complaints about 1.8+.
I actually like it because it gives that feel of slight difference to the game world. Also, unless I am mistaken, there are regions where pumpkins are used in this manner.
If I were to make any change to them, it would be to require the use of a jack-o-lantern to make the eyes and mouth glow. It doesn't have to shed actual light (this would be a problem in SMP) but it would look damn cool.
And once upon a time so was slime balls.
That's a great idea! :smile.gif: I'll go through some of the thread now and post summaries in the OP - I won't have time to do it all now unfortunately, but I'll finish it tomorrow.
I think that is what some people forget is that this is a beta version, and not complete. The developers can do whatever they want, and they are listening! We are all just testers.
I love the route Minecraft has gone. I began playing in 1.6 I believe, and one thing I have always loved about the game is the depth. There are so many craftable items, and I love that this is growing.
I do feel like the jump from 1.8 to 1.9 was too soon, and now we are getting yet another 1.9 prerelease? Wow, maybe they should of just waited to an official 1.9 release.
My only dream for Minecraft is that they CONTINUE updating even once the full versions is complete; keep adding features to this ever-expanding game!
Oh and maybe someday...a Minecraft 2?