Minecraft

[Sly Reflex]

I spent the last couple of sessions playing with water and although it took me a while to get my head around it I've got a good understanding how it works. I can now build ponds that can acts as infinite resources of water, which is nice.

I got the idea in my head that I wanted to do the same for lava, but it appears that 1 block of lava will only ever be 1 blcok of lava, no matter how you arrange it. It just moves differently. It's got my killed loads of times where it has spread out in an area I wasn't expecting it to. I did manage to find a bug or glitch that allows you to clone it. I'm not really into duping items, but getting lava is a serious ball ache. Because the lava is limited within a world it means that the obsidian is too, which is super lame.

Anyway, The whole point Was I wanted to build a water reservoir and a lava reservoir on a site and then build a house out of obsidian by casting it. I can still do it with the weird duping lava thing I found but it's still a load more pissing around than if it just worked the same as water.

I did notice while playing around with the lava that it is a wicked lighting source. I'm going to try and see if I can make some lamp posts using lava as the light source. Sure it might be easier to put torches down, but I cannot use them as down lighting in houses. Next play session I'm going to have a play with some glass and lava and see what it turns out like.

[Hendo]

I forsee disaster with that!

[Sly Reflex]

I forsee disaster with that!

I had a few close calls but managed to avoid setting myself on fire. Have a gander at what I have done.

The wireframe in the distance is my underwater dome.

This is the shithole I call home. It's basically the place where I spawned into my map. I cut straight into the hill and set up shop in the area. I mainly stayed here because theres a fuck load of sand in the desert next door.

I needed all the sand to make glass for this. Parts of it are still not finished, I need to dig a lot of the crap out that I ended up tunnelling through. I only do a bit at a time because it is really boring.

This is the wireframe that you can see in the first picture from the inside.

This was my first attempt at a lava torch. It's a bit ugly, but it throws just as much light out as a torch does. I did do another one which looks nicer but the uploaded messed it up.

I decided to see if I could use lava to light indoors. This building is my little sleep and construct shack made from obsidian.

I couldn't really see the benefit of the lava lighting in the ceiling of the obsidian house so did it where I store all my crap. As a space saving feature I guess it's handy, because you can't put anything on the same square the torch touches. Remove the torches and you gain space to store all the junk you've acquired. This area was pitch black as I blocked all light sources before to see how good the light would be.

I just cleared this hill side off so I can make a mushroom farm. I have no idea what the hell I'm doing, but I'll sort something out. You can see the obsidian safehouse and lava lamps to the right.

If you want I'll try to take pics as I build my mushroom farm. Like I said though, this is all trial and error for me, I have some idea what I want to do but actually putting that into practice is a different thing completely.

[Jimboxy]

I can't wait to get into this once my points get here. It's like grown up Lego.

[Sly Reflex]

It's a jewel in the XBLA crown. They could have released this as a retail game if they really wanted to. It's magnificent once you get into it.

[DANGERMAN]

I've just tried playing it on my phone, it ran nice and smooth but I dont think it's saved my progress. I started near a peak, so I climbed that and built a 'house' (no roof and it was going to be a stupid shape because the peak wasn't wide enough)

I'm still not seeing the point though, especially as I couldn't get the crafting table to work

[Sly Reflex]

Martha has the mobile version. He'll know about that. I don't know what version the mobile one is though, there are so many updates and cuts for certain versions it's hard to tell what you can do and what you cannot.

[hinn888]

Bloody hell Sly, awesome work.

Also.. UPDATES!

Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition is already pretty cool, but it’s about to get even better.

The team at 4J and Mojang are cooking up a sizeable update for the game, fixing a bunch of issues and introducing loads of new features. Expect more too, as just as in the PC version we’re expecting a constant stream of new stuff. This is just the beginning.

Below you’ll find the update notes. No release date just yet.

Features:

* Added an autosave, and the ability to turn autosave off, or set it from 15 minutes up to 2 hours in 15 minute steps.

* Split the sensitivity controls into an in-game sensitivity and an in-menu sensitivity.

* Added an Interface Opacity slider in the settings for plasma screen users.

* Added a gamertag display in splitscreen, and the ability to enable/disable it in the settings.

* Added an option in the settings menu to enable/disable in-game hints.

* Added an option in the settings menu to enable/disable tooltips.

* Added a co-ordinate display to the in-game map.

* Added new sections in the How To Play on Multiplayer, Sharing Screenshots, and What’s New.

* Added a warning message when attempting to place lava near the spawn area.

Fixes:

* Fix for the leaderboard crash when toggling between filters/leaderboards.

* Fix for server disconnect message appearing when offline or in leaderboards.

* Fix for issue where posting a screenshot to Facebook caused a back out to the main menu.

* Fix for clay generation.

* Fix for ‘Awaiting Approval’ showing all the time on some signs.

* Various crafting menu fixes.

* Fix for being able to stand on sugarcane.

* Fix for intermittent crash on saving.

* Fix for duplication bug with the furnace.

* Fix for not being able to place water near the spawn area.

* Fix for intermittent problem on entering the Nether putting the player above the Nether world.

* Fix for frame-rate drop around the edge of the world.

* Fix for intermittent problem where some achievements were not being awarded.

* Fix for graphical issue with stairs.

* Fix for issue with enemies spawning inside a house when they shouldn’t.

* Fix for Zombie Pigmen not being counted for leaderboard scores.

[Sly Reflex]

I finished my mushroom shed.

I start out thinking that this will do. After standing back and looking at what I have done, I decide it isn't enough. I need to think big

So I do. I climb right to the top and make a spur off which will carry the water which will eventually wash all the mushrooms down for easy collection once everything is done.

I build the first water drop and test it to make sure everything is working fine.

I start laying down part of the shed in preparation of filling out the top mushroom darkroom.

I flesh out the one side with dirt, make sure everything is fine before continuing.

I make a colection pool that funnels all the mushrooms to the front of the path for easy collection. I start removing the dirt guidelines and replacing them with cobblestone.

I started on the other side mirroring what I had done already on the top deck. I managed to finish the top deck before darkness rolled in, shortly after I took this picture night folded in and I had to sleep.

This is pretty much done, it functions ok, it's just a case of tidying it up so it looks presentable when you walk past.

This is the final layout. If I can be bothered I'll make a pixelart mushroom to go above the 'M'. There's still a tiny bit of landscaping to do around the side where I walk up to release the water but it's really minor stuff.

It wasn't actually as hard as I thought. I really wanted to have it so that pulling a level made the water wash the food down but couldn't see a way to do it without having to reset the water up top, to which point I might as well go up there myself. When the pistons DLC comes out I made it so that I think it'll be compatible, although I wont know until the bloody update comes.

If you want to come and have a look or need help building something like this in your world just say. Please get all the materials though, I don't want to be collecting shit when I could be building. I think the next thing on the agenda is to make a massive fucking warehouse somewhere with a crate specifically for each material so nothing is mixed up. Either that or I might make a massive fucking glass tube in the smack centre of my map as high as I can possibly go, then fill it with lava. It'll be like a big fluorescent tube or some shit.

[halfagogo]

feck you sly, your making me want to buy this game (and i probably will).

the mobile version is ok, i started on the one where you have infinite everything (freeplay?) then moved to the survival, it was great as you kind of had infinite of most things.

then the updates came & introduced crafting & limited resources (and breaking tools - cept shears & sword).

its made it alot more fiddly, plus loads of bits from the main game are missing - buckets, lava etc.

its not that fun anymore as the day/night cycle is ridiculously quick too with enemies persisiting well into the short days too.

obviously from the platform its on, the world is very limited too.

free play is best so you can build all the castles in the sky!

it runs perfectly well on the gs2 though.

the 360 version does look gorgeous.

[Sly Reflex]

Survivals your only choice in this so far, although I'm certain they will make a create mode where you just have unlimited everything. I don't think that's as much fun though, survival all the way for me.

I carried out my last few ideas apart from the massive warehouse. You guys should come and have a look in my world sometimes. I've started to scout out the land where I'm going to put my warehouse, but I need to get some idea of how many chests it will need before I can start putting some foundations down.

[Sly Reflex]

Scowling had a walk around my world today. I'll leave him to post what he thought about it. I think he liked it, even though he noticed everything was regimented and planed to the mm.

I dug two shafts next to each other down to bedrock today with the intentions of one letting you get to the bottom quickly and the other getting you to the surface quickly. Getting down is the easy part of the design, you just put a pool of standing water than you can jump down into.

However, creating the elevator to get you to the surface quickly has completely flummoxed me. I tried suspending minecarts over holes so I could shift from one to the other and I couldn't get the carts to sit right without falling down.

After failing with the cart idea I tried to make a water life where you sit in a boat and ride up a wall of water, but the sheer pressure of the water trapped me against the wall. Not to be deterred, I put some water on the wall that i was being pushed into, although this only made it so that I was span frantically around the waves. It was fucking useless but it did give me an idea for a rapids ride sometimes down the line.

After that I just filled the whole lot in with water meaning that as soon as I got in the boat, buoyancy would do the rest and float me right to the surface faster than my breathing meter would run out. Except it fucking didn't and it nearly drowned me. So now I have this one hole that I have to figure out an easy way to get to the surface fast otherwise it was a bloody waste me digging it in the first place. I'll have a few other sessions at it to see if I can get something workable, but I think this challenge I have set myself might be a bit too much for me to handle. I don't actually know if it's possible.

Anyway, do you want to see what the sky looks like from the bedrock?

[Sly Reflex]

I did a bit more pissing about trying to build elevators and cracked it. I can now go from bedrock to the surface in about 5 seconds. The downside? It took me 17 minecarts to do it. Still, I'm very proud of it. The exploring how the game works and seeing how I can use it was really gratifying. There's not many games that can give that eureka moment.

Elevator from the bottom.

Twin mine shafts from the top.

Looking down on the elevator shaft.

Craymen had a ride on it. I think he liked it.

[Craymen Edge]

I had a bit of trouble getting off your lift at the top, nearly fell back down again. The mushroom shed is very nifty too. I enjoyed the guided tour of your world, it puts my mud hut with an angry zombie in it to shame

I need to create a couple of new worlds until I get somewhere decent to start from. I've been dumped up on a barren snow capped mountain both times I've created game now, putting me at an instant disadvantage as it's almost night before I even find a couple of trees. If I can get a good start, I might be able to start doing something interesting.

[Sly Reflex]

I cannot remember which one I did, but either 'Battlefield' or 'battlefield' was a really nice seed. Reasonably flat, loads of open caves with resources near the entrance, scatterings of trees and shallow water sources. Give them a try and see if they are the same, either way they'll be better than what you have now.

[Sly Reflex]

I spent last night before bed making the square where I will be placing store houses around to put all the crap I've accumulated in one place. I couldn't help myself to put a decorative feature in the middle of the square and put some sort of monument in it, so I did this. It is an under lit by lava so on a night the monument is lit up from under the actual water. Looks nice on a night.

I uploaded this picture then the game them promptly crashed and I lost every last modification. Oh well I think I built it too far across to the water anyway. Still bloody annoying though. I should be able to throw that lot back up in an hour now though, now I have some vague idea of what I am doing. The ironic thing is, but the time I've built this storage square I probably wont have anything to put in it.

[halfagogo]

do you have to be invited to look around worlds or can you hop into anyone on your friends list?

cant wait for this to go down in points (1200 is my tops).

looks lovely and slys pics are giving me the bug, i do see problems in OCD-ing on it though, especially when there is nothing to measure your OCD against.

do a night-time pic of that feature, looks sweet, is it an infinite tap?

[Sly Reflex]

I lost that particular tap to the stupid glitch that kicks you out to menu if you do a picture upload. I did make another one though which you can see in these two pictures. Here I am flooding the area and making a dam as I am going to build out over the sea but don't really want to lose out on surface water. Getting the water level takes a serious amount of OCD getting it so that it looks like it's just standing water. I was stood on top of my mushroom shed when I took these pictures.

Eventually I'll have water right up to the dam, maybe then I'll start tidying the area up so it looks nice. If I remember I'll get a picture of the tap lit from the bottom when I play next. I've not actually got any torches in that area at all as it stands, so it'll be interesting to see just how lit up it stays. I do think I need to remove the cobblestone area and drop the fence down a block as it's really hard to see into the pool being as high as it it.

[halfagogo]

this is briliant and will no doubt be appreciated here.

[Sambob]

Still don't fully understand this game, but that stuff looks good Sly, you can see the effort that's gone into it.

Is it basically that you get dropped somewhere and then have to make something before zombie monsters come and kill you at nightfall? Do you fight the monsters or just barricade you in?