Xbox boss Phil Spencer spent a part of his day today with the team at Minecraft developer Mojang, he said on Twitter. While he didn’t get into specifics about what he saw, Spencer said it was a “Great day with the team [at] Mojang seeing the future work on Minecraft.”
He added: “Very cool to see the new ideas the team has come to life.”
Minecraft Nintendo Switch Edition won’t be quite as expansive as PS4 and Xbox One versions, it has been revealed.
Minecraft was recently given a May 11 release date on Nintendo Switch, although UK fans will have to wait until May 12.
But there’s good news and bad news for Nintendo Switch owners, as Mojang reveals more about world sizes and how they compare to Wii U, Xbox One and PS4.
On the plus side, the Nintendo Switch version will support worlds much that are much larger than the ones featured in the Wii U Edition.
The Wii U edition only supported the Classic world type, which is 864×864 blocks.
The Switch version also supports Classic, as well as Small worlds of 1024×1024 blocks and Medium worlds with 3072×3072 blocks.
Unfortunately, however, it won’t support the Large worlds (5120×5120 blocks) found in Xbox One and PS4 versions of the game.
Ultimately, however, the ability to play it on the go makes the Nintendo Switch version an attractive prospect.
Scotland’s remote St Kilda archipelago has been digitally recreated in video game Minecraft.
Games company ImmersiveMinds spent more than 125 hours and used more than three million virtual bricks on the 1:1 scale map of the islands.
St Kilda lies about 40 miles (64km) west of North Uist, the nearest inhabited place to the archipelago.
The last islanders left the main island of Hirta in 1930 after life there became unsustainable.
People only now live on Hirta on a temporary basis to work at the military site, or on wildlife conservation projects.
The Minecraft version of St Kilda has been made to help mark Tuesday’s World Heritage Day.
The map is available for public download to allow gamers all over the world to explore the archipelago’s history, heritage, stories, people and landscapes.
Nick Smith, heritage manager at Western Isles’ local authority Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, said: “This is a really exciting way to use technology so that people can discover a remote and difficult to access place.”
The team from ImmersiveMinds worked closely with Jonathan Wordsworth, the St Kilda archaeologist with The National Trust for Scotland, to ensure that this digital world is as accurate as possible.
The virtual build features abandoned blackhouses, boats and underground structures called souterrains.
Super League Gaming, a Santa Monica, California-based gaming company, partnered with Harkins Theatres to host tournaments for kids and teens in one of its Gilbert locations.
“We’ve looked at Phoenix and long believed it was a great city due to its family-friendly focus — we partnered with Harkins, and they helped us decide that Gilbert’s audience in particular would be a great place for this offering,” said Ann Hand, CEO of Super League Gaming.
Kids cheer at the Minecraft City Champs events.
Competitors vie for a spot on the city teams, which include the Phoenix Blaze team, to compete nationally. Events kicked off in March and continue to run through May.
“Super League is bringing an experience that kids already love — playing Minecraft — to a local level,” said Hand. “With Super League, gamers have the opportunity to play face-to-face with their local team, building, creating and battling against other local communities which fosters a stronger sense of teamwork and city pride.”
Hand said the demographics for the tournaments historically has been between the ages of 9 and 13, while the gender skews male.
A Harkins representative for Scottsdale-based Harkins Theatres, said the partnership is part of the company’s venture into unique viewing experiences.
“Whether it’s broadcasting the NCAA Finals, showing the season premiere of BBC’s hit show Sherlock or allowing gamers to play their favorite games on the big screen, Harkins is always looking for new opportunities to create memorable experiences for guests,” said the Harkins spokesperson. “The in-theater Minecraft tournament is just one more opportunity to use the state-of- the-art technology and larger-than-life screens to bring fans together to share in an experience unlike anything available at home.”
The theater chain also has endeavored into eSports by broadcasting video game League of Legends national and global tournaments at various Valley locations. The Harkins representative said the company is in the process of planning for more eSports broadcasting.
Prahlad Wulf’s eyes are locked on his laptop screen and his fingers tap the keyboard in complete absorption, his focus broken only by the time taken to grab a few corn chips to eat.
Six boys sit next to him, each similarly focused.
They are all playing Minecraft, the massively popular game where blocky-pixelated characters explore, build, and live in a limitless blocky-pixelated world.
But unlike the other boys, Prahlad has type 1 diabetes.
He was diagnosed at the age of eight, and spent two weeks in hospital learning how to manage the condition via the rituals of daily injections, blood glucose checks and watching what he eats.
“I was really young then so I didn’t really understand most of it, it was a little bit scary,” Prahlad said.
For his father Josh Wulf, the experience was tough to handle.
“If anything happens to your children it really hits you, you know?” Mr Wulf said.
The experience stuck with Mr Wulf, who now runs programs helping children learn coding through Minecraft.
“I realised we could make a difference for children and families living with type 1 diabetes in terms of learning how to manage their condition in a safe way, and a fun way,” he said.
With a group of volunteers, he has been building a modified version of Minecraft and they have been spending weekends together fine-tuning and testing the game.
GIF: A modified version of Minecraft helps children manage their diabetes
In the modified version of Minecraft, players walk around the world and play through stories, with the added challenge of monitoring their blood glucose and insulin.
“They focus on playing, they focus on the story, they focus on the magic, and they just learn how to manage diabetes in the course of that,” Mr Wulf said.
He hopes the finished game will help children with type 1 diabetes connect online, as well as help their friends without diabetes better understand the condition.
QUT associate professor Michael Dezuanni studies how kids learn playing games and he would like to trial the game with newly diagnosed kids in hospital.
“They would be able to play the game, and it would be able to become one part of their education around type 1 diabetes,” he said.
The project has also attracted international attention.
Mr Wulf said a Danish pharmaceutical company that manufactures insulin approached him after hearing about the project.
“We’re working with their scientists on the modelling of the metabolism in the game, and we’re going to visit them in Denmark in June to talk further about that,” he said.
Llamas, shulkers and more! Android beta coming soon!
What could follow The End? The Epilogue Update? The Appendix Update? The Bit Where We Thank Our Cat Update? No! These things would imply that our work on Minecraft is coming to a close. It couldn’t be farther from the truth! (Although we are eternally thankful to our cat. You complete me, Mr. Mittens.)
In fact, there’s loads and loads more coming in 1.1, aka The Discovery Update! Android users can get a taste of what’s on its way with the beta that we are opening up for testing in the near future. We’re not ready to open the beta up quite yet, but as soon as we are we’ll let you know! Promise!
It’s not called The Discovery Update for no reason: there are many mysterious and wondrous things to uncover. Barter with a cartographer for a treasure map, sling your supplies into a llama’s pack (or into a shulker box) and embark on an epic quest to locate the dank and dangerous forest mansion! Does your route take you across an impassable river? The Enchantment of Frostwalking will solve that problem! Meanwhile, the Enchantment of Mending will keep your swordblade sharp no matter how many mobs you slay along the way. Defeat the sinister illagers who lurk within the mansion and make off with their precious loot – the Totem of Undying – and cheat death as you throw yourself into further peril!
Crafters looking for a more sedate pace of discovery will be pleased to hear you can now dye beds, smelt ingots, and build with the fancypants new blocks: glazed terracotta and concrete. And those with an even more experimental inclination, will find the expansion of Add-Ons to their liking: you’ll now be able to remix mobs’ movement properties!
And these things are just the start – we’ll be revealing even more of the Discovery Update’s secrets in the coming weeks!
