![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
On Minecraft
Feb. 19th, 2026 12:38 amI've felt like writing about Minecraft, and the relationship I've had with it throughout the years. One of the reasons is that I realize I've never given modern Minecraft's content a fair chance, mostly due to lack of interest, and it's a bit hypocritical when I find myself interested in Hytale.
I was introduced to Minecraft during the early Classic days, and got into creative multiplayer servers, but that's not what I want to talk about. I'm thinking more about the survival aspect of the game. I discovered that aspect later, with Minecraft Alpha.
I have fond memories of my first Alpha world.
I remember building a starter shack out of wood, then thinking it would be a genius idea to add a lava moat around it to keep hostile mobs away. You guess how that went. I eventually rebuilt that house out of cobblestone, so fire wasn't a concern.
I did a lot of stuff in that world. For a while, I had someething keeping me excited, could feel the desire to go back to my little Minecraft world and continue doing this or that little project.
I found a backup of my old Minecraft worlds. It includes a bunch of stuff over several years. The old Alpha worlds were just "World 1", "World 2", and so on. You had 5 slots and you couldn't yet give them names.
World 1 was my first world. It appears that it was last played in Minecraft Beta, probably version 1.7.3 or so. I tried loading it into modern Minecraft, but it suffered from chunk corruption. So I loaded it in Beta 1.7 instead, and for the most part, that worked.
This was the final iteration of my home. It was rebuilt out of bricks, had more floors added, and so on. The upper floors have remained pretty empty.
The interior. I had built an extension with a nice lounge area and a bit of a storage backroom.
I can no longer control the dogs. I guess it's because I've since changed usernames, the Minecraft account system has changed, all that.
It feels like returning to a place you haven't been to in years. It feels oddly familiar, but it's not the same... in some eerie way.
There was a secret piston door in the wall, for no reason other than it was nifty. I had even installed a redstone XOR gate, so it could be opened or closed from both sides.
The door led to this room. It was the collection area for a passive mob trap.
The mob trap itself. It was a pretty basic design, not very efficient. Mobs would fall into the water and eventually drown. Their drops would fall down the chute into the collection area. The pressure plates there were connected to a note block, acting as a simple notification system.
Overhang from the mountain with the mob trap. Old Minecraft did have interesting terrain generation.
Nether portal, from the day the Nether was added. There wasn't really anything to do in there, but I had experimented with the Nether blocks for things like non-torch light sources.
I had dug out a tunnel connecting my spawn area to the area beyond the lake. I had even added rails, as a rudimentary subway system. Never really did much in that other area...
I had been digging and mining a lot in the same area, which eventually lead to a pretty large room being carved out. I even made it rectangular. I seem to have used the place to experiment with redstone contraptions. I remember seeing this room with the thick fog they later added when you get close to bedrock, and it's pretty... impressive.
There is also another room which is filled with torches, separated by wool blocks. This happened when a rumor was sprouted that Mojang would make torches burn out instead of being a permanent light source - and that already placed torches would be converted to (permanent) lanterns, but torches in your inventory would remain, well, torches. So this was intended as a torch storage for a scenario that, in the end, has never happened.
There was also an Aether portal. I remember that at some point I had tried the Aether mod. It was certainly interesting, but I felt weird about using items and materials that weren't part of the vanilla game - like I wasn't playing the game as intended.
I remember eventually finding a spider dungeon, and repurposing it into a string farm. Couldn't find my way back to it, though.
-
I felt a progressive disconnect as Minecraft changed into its modern form, as changes were made that, well, changed how you play the game.
One such example was the addition of the hunger mechanic.
Before that, food items were just a way to heal yourself up. Given this, and how mob spawning worked, I found that I had no incentive to farm food. If I was running low on food, I could just go out and hunt pigs.
The changes in modern Minecraft make this strategy far less viable. Hunger is something that needs constant maintenance - you can avoid actions that deplete your hunger, like sprinting, but you'll still go hungry eventually. Mob spawning was also changed in such a way that they spawn a lot less frequently, so just hunting them for food isn't really viable beyond short term. In my experience, these mechanics make it required to get some type of farm going.
Not necessarily a bad thing, but it changes how you play the game. Maybe it makes the whole thing feel different...
-
Maybe for me the game just gets old after a while... then you return to it, get bored again, and so on.
Besides my singleplayer world, I've also played on several multiplayer servers throughout the years. I fondly remember the early janky SMP.
A lot of it was the social aspect. Old Minecraft didn't have much in terms of progression, so I've always found that once I had built a decent house, and had enough resources to feel comfortable, I didn't really know what to do anymore. There is acquiring more materials to maintain your level of comfort, but after a while, it feels very... same old shit. There is building new things, but part of me has always wanted builds to have a particular purpose. I guess that's my practical, down-to-earth side.
You can also make large builds. Projects that take several days, weeks, months to complete. I think I'm too ADHD for this, but it's always interesting to see what other build.
I can imagine Mojang has been trying to address this feeling by adding more depth to the game, progression, an actual end goal.
From my perspective, all those changes turn Minecraft into something different. Still has the basics of Minecraft, but there's a lot more to it, and it feels that the way I used to play won't cut it anymore. Essentially, I would have to invest time into rediscovering the game, trying to recapture a fresh perspective.
-
I can see that what I said about old Minecraft also applies to Hytale in its current form. There isn't much yet to it, and once the progression paths are exhausted and the novelty wears off, it will feel the same way, atleast until new content is added.
The impression I get from Hytale is that the developers have a vision, an idea of what they want it to be. It remains to be seen how well that will be executed.
This brings me to what I feel about Minecraft. That disconnect, like... feeling alienated? I can see a point the game went into a different direction, kind of like switching to a different vision of what it should be. I guess Hytale had the benefit of being a blank slate, for me. I wish I could recapture that feeling about Minecraft...
I don't know. I like the idea of building stuff on an interesting map, making it a cool little world. I just... ADHD.
I was introduced to Minecraft during the early Classic days, and got into creative multiplayer servers, but that's not what I want to talk about. I'm thinking more about the survival aspect of the game. I discovered that aspect later, with Minecraft Alpha.
I have fond memories of my first Alpha world.
I remember building a starter shack out of wood, then thinking it would be a genius idea to add a lava moat around it to keep hostile mobs away. You guess how that went. I eventually rebuilt that house out of cobblestone, so fire wasn't a concern.
I did a lot of stuff in that world. For a while, I had someething keeping me excited, could feel the desire to go back to my little Minecraft world and continue doing this or that little project.
I found a backup of my old Minecraft worlds. It includes a bunch of stuff over several years. The old Alpha worlds were just "World 1", "World 2", and so on. You had 5 slots and you couldn't yet give them names.
World 1 was my first world. It appears that it was last played in Minecraft Beta, probably version 1.7.3 or so. I tried loading it into modern Minecraft, but it suffered from chunk corruption. So I loaded it in Beta 1.7 instead, and for the most part, that worked.
This was the final iteration of my home. It was rebuilt out of bricks, had more floors added, and so on. The upper floors have remained pretty empty.
The interior. I had built an extension with a nice lounge area and a bit of a storage backroom.
I can no longer control the dogs. I guess it's because I've since changed usernames, the Minecraft account system has changed, all that.
It feels like returning to a place you haven't been to in years. It feels oddly familiar, but it's not the same... in some eerie way.
There was a secret piston door in the wall, for no reason other than it was nifty. I had even installed a redstone XOR gate, so it could be opened or closed from both sides.
The door led to this room. It was the collection area for a passive mob trap.
The mob trap itself. It was a pretty basic design, not very efficient. Mobs would fall into the water and eventually drown. Their drops would fall down the chute into the collection area. The pressure plates there were connected to a note block, acting as a simple notification system.
Overhang from the mountain with the mob trap. Old Minecraft did have interesting terrain generation.
Nether portal, from the day the Nether was added. There wasn't really anything to do in there, but I had experimented with the Nether blocks for things like non-torch light sources.
I had dug out a tunnel connecting my spawn area to the area beyond the lake. I had even added rails, as a rudimentary subway system. Never really did much in that other area...
I had been digging and mining a lot in the same area, which eventually lead to a pretty large room being carved out. I even made it rectangular. I seem to have used the place to experiment with redstone contraptions. I remember seeing this room with the thick fog they later added when you get close to bedrock, and it's pretty... impressive.
There is also another room which is filled with torches, separated by wool blocks. This happened when a rumor was sprouted that Mojang would make torches burn out instead of being a permanent light source - and that already placed torches would be converted to (permanent) lanterns, but torches in your inventory would remain, well, torches. So this was intended as a torch storage for a scenario that, in the end, has never happened.
There was also an Aether portal. I remember that at some point I had tried the Aether mod. It was certainly interesting, but I felt weird about using items and materials that weren't part of the vanilla game - like I wasn't playing the game as intended.
I remember eventually finding a spider dungeon, and repurposing it into a string farm. Couldn't find my way back to it, though.
-
I felt a progressive disconnect as Minecraft changed into its modern form, as changes were made that, well, changed how you play the game.
One such example was the addition of the hunger mechanic.
Before that, food items were just a way to heal yourself up. Given this, and how mob spawning worked, I found that I had no incentive to farm food. If I was running low on food, I could just go out and hunt pigs.
The changes in modern Minecraft make this strategy far less viable. Hunger is something that needs constant maintenance - you can avoid actions that deplete your hunger, like sprinting, but you'll still go hungry eventually. Mob spawning was also changed in such a way that they spawn a lot less frequently, so just hunting them for food isn't really viable beyond short term. In my experience, these mechanics make it required to get some type of farm going.
Not necessarily a bad thing, but it changes how you play the game. Maybe it makes the whole thing feel different...
-
Maybe for me the game just gets old after a while... then you return to it, get bored again, and so on.
Besides my singleplayer world, I've also played on several multiplayer servers throughout the years. I fondly remember the early janky SMP.
A lot of it was the social aspect. Old Minecraft didn't have much in terms of progression, so I've always found that once I had built a decent house, and had enough resources to feel comfortable, I didn't really know what to do anymore. There is acquiring more materials to maintain your level of comfort, but after a while, it feels very... same old shit. There is building new things, but part of me has always wanted builds to have a particular purpose. I guess that's my practical, down-to-earth side.
You can also make large builds. Projects that take several days, weeks, months to complete. I think I'm too ADHD for this, but it's always interesting to see what other build.
I can imagine Mojang has been trying to address this feeling by adding more depth to the game, progression, an actual end goal.
From my perspective, all those changes turn Minecraft into something different. Still has the basics of Minecraft, but there's a lot more to it, and it feels that the way I used to play won't cut it anymore. Essentially, I would have to invest time into rediscovering the game, trying to recapture a fresh perspective.
-
I can see that what I said about old Minecraft also applies to Hytale in its current form. There isn't much yet to it, and once the progression paths are exhausted and the novelty wears off, it will feel the same way, atleast until new content is added.
The impression I get from Hytale is that the developers have a vision, an idea of what they want it to be. It remains to be seen how well that will be executed.
This brings me to what I feel about Minecraft. That disconnect, like... feeling alienated? I can see a point the game went into a different direction, kind of like switching to a different vision of what it should be. I guess Hytale had the benefit of being a blank slate, for me. I wish I could recapture that feeling about Minecraft...
I don't know. I like the idea of building stuff on an interesting map, making it a cool little world. I just... ADHD.
