Minecraft gamers revel in building landscapes, killing zombies and creating their own imaginative storylines around virtual reality worlds. It’s a game with seemingly endless possibilities and pretty much no plot or story whatsoever. But that’s all about to change with the story mode version coming to Amazon Oct. 27.
Available on X-Box, Playstation, computers and Android phones and tablets, Minecraft Story Mode will be a different approach from projects developer Telltale is known for, includingThe Walking Dead, Game of Thrones and Fables. Rather than transforming a story-heavy work into a streamlined video game, Minecraft Story Mode will be taking a story-absent work and giving it a different angle.
Minecraft developers presenting during a live demo at the X-box E3 2015 briefing in Los Angeles, June 15.Source: Damian Dovarganes/AP
Still, it appears this is exactly what the Minecraft developers were looking for. The game trailers depict new characters and a series of plot-related adventures. Fans of the original Minecraft will still be able to come up with many of their own creations to give the game a similar look and feel to its predecessor. According to chief word officer Owen Hill of Mojang, creators of Minecraft,
The interactive storytellers at Telltale are giving players the chance to explore their own unique interpretation of the Minecraft universe. They’ve crafted a story that follows the logic of Minecraft but still manages to feel original. It’s actually pretty funny too. And the pig is adorable. We’re super excited about players digging deeper into the world of Minecraft: Story Mode later this year.
The game will come in five separate episodes, with the following four to be released at later dates.
Quicksilver – Castle Bound, is out October 10th! But wait, where’s Issue 6?
Ok, so the Stone Marshall Studio has been busy putting together this epic storyline I’ve been working on. We’re creating origin stories, writing epic backstories, developing character relationships and trying to get all the characters together at the right time along the timeline.
And after all this we finished an issue out of order. Doh! But it’s ok, with all the flashbacks that show characters backstories, you can pretty much read these issues in any order you want.
Above: Twitch plays Minecraft plays Pokémon Red, anyone?
You can make almost anything in Minecraft, and fans have shown over and over that they will.
One community creator, who goes by the name Magib1 on Reddit, is attempting to rebuild all of the original 1996 role-playing game Pokémon Red. They’re actually using command blocks, which basically enable players to write programs inside the Minecraft world. People have previously used this to make calculators and other computers, but — as with all things — Pokémon was inevitable.
Magib1 has worked on this project for a while, and they have made some serious improvements to the way it performs.
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In a post on Reddit from today, Magib1 noted that they have made the game look better by smoothing out the graphics. The big change on this front comes in the form of the full walking animation for Ash. This latest build also adds collision detection and the ability to hold down buttons.
Another major improvement came when Magib1 was able to change how he stored the information for menus. This helped him eliminate 25,000 command blocks … which is a huge number. This also improved the responsiveness of the onscreen (on a screen) action and it helped reduce the overall file size drastically.
If you want to download this to try it, Magib1 has some good and bad news regarding that.
“I do plan on releasing the map once it gets far enough along to actually be playable, but that is still a ways off,” they wrote.
What kinds of things does Magib1 need to finish before releasing it? Well, they next plan to work on reducing the delay when holding down a movement button even further along with improving (or adding) basic menus.
Once all that’s finally finished, maybe we can finally get Twitch Plays Minecraft Playing Pokémon.
Minecraft is about to get an update on PlayStation platforms with the PS4, PS3, and PS Vita versions all receiving a new patch that will both fix problems and add content. The big piece being added is the Doctor Who Skin Pack, which has been available on Xbox for some time. PlayStation owners are used to getting these a little bit later though, so it’s good to see the packs continuing to be ported over, despite Microsoft’s purchase of the series and its developer.
As with every Minecraft update, this one contains a ton of smaller fixes and changes. You can check out the full patch notes for each version here: PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, PS Vita. The gist is that these versions of the game will all be getting the aforementioned Doctor Who Skin Pack, along with a bunch of technical fixes.
Those fixes include a memory leak that would cause a framerate issue and an issue where signs would go blank when playing the game over the network. The PS3 version is also getting some updates to its Trophies to bring it more in line with the other versions of the game.
Minecraft is available now on PS3, PS4, PS Vita, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PC, and mobile.
Available now in Europe, with North America and Japan getting it later today (Update: It’s out now in North America), Minecraft update 1.20 on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation Vita adds support for the new Doctor Who Skin Pack, while also fixing a couple of issues, including a memory leak that caused frame-rate problems.
Here’s the full list of patch notes for today’s update, which apply to all platforms unless otherwise noted:
Additions
Added Doctor Who Skin Pack Bundle trial content.
Fixes
Fixed a memory leak causing frame-rate issues.
Fixed an issue causing signs to go blank for network players.
Updated trophies to include all those already on other platforms. 23 added in total. (PS3 only)
Discussing the future of big Minecraft updates on consoles, developer 4J Studios said earlier this month:
No news yet, other than we’re working on it. The next few updates will be small, while we get the 1.8 update ready.
If you’re looking to purchase the Doctor Who Bundle, it’s available through the PlayStation Store for $5.99 (PS4, PS3, PS Vita).
Here’s the description:
Launch yourself on an epic adventure in space and time with this bundle of Minecraft Doctor Who Skins Volume I and Volume II. With the combination of these two skin packs you will have over 100 characters from all eras of the show’s history including all the Doctors, Amy Pond, Clara Oswald, Rose Tyler, Zygons, The Master, Weeping Angels, the Daleks, Davros, Donna Noble, Captain Jack Harkness, K9, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, the Sea Devil and the Cybermen.
You can check out some screenshots in the gallery below.
As Telltale Games and Mojang announced recently, Minecraft: Story Mode is coming to PS4 and PS3 this October through digital and retail stores.
If you’ve been playing Minecraft: Pocket Edition [$6.99] since the big 0.12 update, you’re probably enjoying how the game is now closer to the PC version than ever before with all kinds of new features added and plenty others reworked. Still, the work doesn’t end here since the developers are currently working on the 0.13 update that should add working redstone circuits among other features. One new feature that we now know about is the addition of rabbits, one of the later additions to the PC version. However, these bunnies will be different than the ones in the PC version: they are smaller, will run away from you, can be one-shot with a bow, only spawn in forests, and they’ll eat your crops. Now, that last one is going to be…fun. I can see myself turning into an old geezer with a bow screaming at those bunnies to leave my crops alone.
In addition to the bunny addition, going by developer Tommasso Checchi’s twitter feed, the stonecutter might go the way of the dodo and there will probably be some changes to the UI since he feels there are issues with the UI in the mobile version (he doesn’t specify what issues). He’s also experimenting with dragging & dropping items in the toolbar. Mojang plans to have a live 0.13 developer stream tomorrow at 11:30 EST at its Twitch channel to talk about the upcoming update. They will be answering questions from here, so you still have time to go post some questions.
Quicksilver – Castle Bound, is out October 10th! But wait, where’s Issue 6?
