We’ve all been very impressed by the numbers that PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and Fortnite have been putting up in the past few months. PUBG is regularly pulling in three million concurrent players and more than 25 million people own it on Steam, while Epic’s action game has 40 million players, and recently passed the 2 million concurrent player barrier. But there’s a game that’s outstripping them both: Minecraft.

New head of Minecraft Helen Chiang has revealed that the game had 74 million active users in December—the most in a month since it released nearly nine years ago. In total, more than 144 million copies of the game have been sold. “We just recently set a new record in December for monthly active users, so now we’re at 74 million monthly active users—and that’s really a testament to people coming back to the game, whether it’s through the game updates or bringing in new players from across the world,” she told PopSugar.

Now, we don’t know how many of those are on PC. Minecraft is on every major console, as well as on tablets and phones, so it’s not a fair fight. But still, 74 million active players is a hell of a lot. Combining PUBG’s PC and Xbox One sales figures gets you to about 30 million. And that’s total owners, not active players (granted, Minecraft has been out for many years longer, and at the current rate PUBG is going to get there eventually).

I’ve heard a lot of people frustrated with the lack of meaningful updates to the game recently, which is a fair criticism. 2018 does look like a fairly big year for it, though, starting with a beefy ocean update coming in Spring.

What would you like to see change in Minecraft?

Minecraft had 74 million active players in December, a new record for the game

Minecraft developer Mojang will join us on-stage at the PC Gamer Weekender to discuss future updates for the game, as well as offering insight into how features for the game are conceived and developed. The studio’s lead creative designer Jens Bergensten will present at 16.00 on Sunday, 18 February at the Olympia in London. Come along, and learn more about what they’ve got in store for 2018.

Minecraft, of course, just had its biggest active month ever with 74 million users. Hell, you know what it is. This is a great opportunity to go behind-the-scenes with the developer, and while you’re at the Weekender, you can check out many more speakers, games and booths.  Tickets are available now from £12.99, and you can save an extra 20% with the voucher code PC-GAMER20.

Mojang will talk about 2018 Minecraft updates at the PC Gamer Weekender

Minecraft developer Mojang announced that its tactical card game Scrolls would be shutting down on Tuesday, February 13.

Released at the end of 2014, Mojang revealed they would stop development of the game way back in June of 2015. They committed to keeping the servers running until at least July of 2016, though they’ve clearly lasted much longer than that.

As part of the announcement, Mojang also revealed that they are working to make the Scrolls server software public, allowing the community to host their own servers and continue playing online. They said they can’t guarantee this will happen, but that they have “high hopes that we’ll be able to do this in the next few weeks or months.”

As a final goodbye, a community tournament will be held on February 11. Additionally, Mojang developers will be online playing Scrolls with its players on February 9.

Minecraft Developer’s Scrolls Will Finally Shut Down Next Week

As technology offers students more access to the digital world, teachers have to start thinking outside the box on how to prepare their students for the future.

King High School teacher Katherine Hewett is doing just that, but using an unorthodox but futuristic method.

“I use the game Minecraft to teach my students about 21st century skills,” she said.

That’s right, Hewett is using video games in the classroom, and it’s not as crazy as some may think.

“About five years ago, I was having conversations with my students about video games,” said Hewett, who is a career and technical education teacher at King. “I was listening to them tell me about how video games impacted their learning and as a teacher, this was an awakening. I realized kids were receiving an alternate education when they got home.”

Hewett said she started to ask herself questions about who was teaching and mentoring these students when they entered these virtual worlds.

“I was wondering why weren’t adults, teachers, not taking more of an interest and using this is as a tool?” She said.” Why weren’t they in those worlds with them?”

That was when Hewett decided she was going to integrate to virtual reality.

Her goal? To teach the students design, coding, programming and visual media so that they are prepared for the future.

And Minecraft came on to the market, Hewett knew she had a chance to make this dream a reality.

“Here was a VR space that visually looks like Legos and had sandbox features to build, create and design 3-D worlds,” she said. “I approached the administration about it and when I suggested it to them, they were all in! I remember, when we ordered the licenses they told us we were 1 in 700 in the country that integrated the game into a class.”

Since Hewett started the course in 2013, she has had students find careers in the information technology field working for big data companies or working on virtual reality projects of their own.

Hewett said the class starts with a theme topic.

“Each class agrees on a topic where they then start researching and begin replicating the build in Minecraft,” she said. “Students collaborate and communicate to create a really large size 3-D model.”

This year’s classes have different worlds as the game is integrated into all of Hewett’s classes. Some class periods are designing fantasy worlds like Mario World and Tron whereas others are replicating real life places like Alcatraz Prison and the Winchester Mansion.

Sophomore Brendan Fuller said taking  the animated course will open doors for him in the future.

“I’ve always been great with technology, but taking this course has definitely taught me a thing or two about animation,” Fuller said. “I want to use these skills one day when I become an architectural engineer. Learning how to create 3-D models now will benefit me greatly.”

Hewett said “Minecraft” has not just changed her students lives but hers as well.

The King High School teacher said as she was working on her doctorate, she focused her dissertation on her class. Now, her research on the “21st Century Classroom Gamer” has been accepted into the international journal “Games and Culture.”

“This course is everything,” she said. “I’ve learned so much with my students immersing myself into this gaming culture.”

Hewett said the animation course is a first step. She plans to take the next step with virtual reality soon.

“We don’t know what the jobs will be in the next five to 10 years,” she said. “So I’m trying to teach them all the 21st century skills they need to prepare them for jobs that don’t even exist yet.”

King High School teacher prepares students for the future with ‘Minecraft’

Dragon Quest Builders Screenshots

In DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS, players are tasked to construct a wide variety of structures as they receive ever-more extravagant requests from expectant citizens eager to find a new home. Explore with the freedom of sandbox gameplay, combined with an immersive and charming DRAGON QUEST story – battling with iconic DRAGON QUEST monsters and interacting with gorgeously designed 3D characters along the way.

1 / 14

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Dragon Quest Builders (Nintendo Switch)

£34.99 £34.99

Dragon Quest Builders Nintendo Switch REVIEW: Minecraft meets Zelda RPG is no bad thing

Though Philadelphia resident Gabe Young doesn’t have enough hours in the day to explain all of the twists and turns players of the video game Minecraft can take, this weekend he and a team of gaming enthusiasts will attempt to share what makes the game truly unique with Peninsula residents.

With opportunities to experience the game in virtual reality, live entertainment on four stages and several young gamers sharing tips and tricks with fans of the game, Minefaire, the event Young is coordinating at the San Mateo County Event Center this Saturday and Sunday, is set to immerse players of all ages and ability levels in a game that’s captivated the minds of many.

By gathering resources and building structures like staircases, mazes and amusement parks in the game, Minecraft players can create their own worlds and solve problems in creative ways, said Young. In giving players the option to work with or compete against others and code within the game to create maps of new worlds, Minecraft offers players a seemingly boundless environment to explore, said Young.

“Basically there’s no limit to what you can do with Minecraft,” he said. “Your only limitation is your imagination.”

And perhaps that’s why so many kids have been drawn to the game since it was released in 2011, drawing anywhere between 10,000 to 15,000 people to the five Minefaires Young and event cofounder Chad Collins have pulled off since they started convening enthusiasts in 2016.

Young said he enjoys seeing players, many of whom are accustomed to playing on their own, come alive when they meet others as bullish on the game as they are. Though the events are aimed at attracting all ages, Young said kids ages 6 to 12 have come to enjoy meeting peers and discovering new ways to approach the game. Getting the chance to meet other youth who have made a name for themselves on YouTube as experts in the game is as exciting as it’s been for generations of kids to meet star athletes and celebrities, said Young.

“These kids they see these YouTubers as their A listers in a way that we can’t imagine,” he said. “It gives a lot of these kids the motivation and the energy to keep going.”

Though Young and Collins have experience convening kids at events like a Lego convention, Young said it wasn’t until they saw their own children playing the game that they saw how captivating it was and decided to focus their energy in planning Minecraft events.

“We were blown away with how much we’re learning by watching [them] learn,” he said. “There’s a lot of things happening in these little brains.”

A go-to activity for his four kids before dinner, Young said he’s realized how much the game is teaching them about topics like agriculture, history, geology and architecture, all without their feeling like they are being taught. And he’s hoping the same understanding spreads among parents in the 11 cities expected to play host to Minefaire this year.

Young’s advice to other parents attending the event with their kids is to be open to experiences they might not have had as kids and let them teach them about a game they’ve spent hours exploring.

“These kids are going to grab their parents by the hand and say look what I’m doing,” he said. “Now they’re going to have a better idea of how to guide their kids.”

Minefaire will be held 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Feb. 10 and 11 at the San Mateo County Event Center, 1346 Saratoga Drive. Visit minefaire.com for more information and to purchase tickets, which start at $45 and are free for children age 2 and under.

Minecraft enthusiasts, novices unite

Yes, we’re a week into February now and we have smartphones and whatnot in 2018, but awesome gaming calendars for only $3.74 each? You could literally mark your Nintendo calendar with all of the awesome Switch releases coming up this year. You can check out the full list of discounted calendars along with their official descriptions below.

The Legend of Zelda 2018 Wall Calendar – $3.74: Set off on an epic journey with our hero Link as he embarks on a series of quests to save the Hyrule Kingdom and Princess Zelda. The Legend of Zelda 2018 Calendar takes you into the action-packed adventure with colorful, iconic images from one of the bestselling Nintendo video games.

On a related note, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild The Complete Official Guide Expanded Edition is on sale for 40% with a release date of February 13th.

Super Mario 2018 Wall Calendar – $3.74: Join Mario on an incredible adventure as he navigates the world of the Mushroom Kingdom in this 16-month wall calendar. Featuring fan favorites including Luigi, Bowser, Toad, Princess Peach, and Yoshi, this calendar is sure to make 2018 a year of fun and games.

Splatoon 2018 Wall Calendar – $3.74: Make your way through 2018 with colorful 3D art from the chaotic world of Splatoon, the newest video game franchise from Nintendo. Splatter enemies and claim your turf with ink-spewing, squid-like characters called Inklings. Change from humanoid to squid and back again to make your way across the battlefield at top speed.

Overwatch 2018 Wall Calendar – $3.74: Overwatch, Blizzards highly anticipated multiplayer game, is an action-packed adventure set in the not-so-distant future, after a fierce battle between humans and robots. Named for the peace-keeping task force dedicated to protecting humanity, Overwatch offers a full range of playable characters including both females and males, robots, and even a gorilla. Keep track of important dates, birthdays, anniversaries and more with this Overwatch wall calendar.

Minecraft 2018 Wall Calendar – $3.74: Build, explore, survive, and thrive in Minecraft, the game in which a few blocks are the beginning of many an adventure. Create a castle, fight a battle, search for resources, and encounter friendly and hostile mobs in the 2018 Minecraft Calendar that includes the last four months of 2017. The spacious grids, printed on paper certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, include plenty of room to write in your appointments and plans for Minecraft world domination.

Note: If you purchase one of the awesome products featured above, we may earn a small commission from the retailer. Thank you for your support.

Get Nintendo, Overwatch, and Minecraft 2018 Gaming Calendars for Only $4

Jeremy Smith wanted to talk about Jesus, so he picked up a shovel and headed out to build a tunnel.

A virtual shovel, that is. As both a Christian and a fan of the video game Minecraft, Smith has one foot in two different communities coming into contact more frequently in the fuzzy halls of cyberspace.

And, as a senior writer at the online ministry ChurchMag, Smith uses each of these communities to serve the other. He “vlogs” — creates online videos of himself playing Minecraft — while simultaneously explaining Christian ideology in a series titled “Minecraft Theology.”

“I wanted to look at some of the more basic stuff, some of the core competencies of Christianity,” he said in one of these videos as his Minecraft icon sped across a screen full of the chunky landscape Minecraft allows users to create and navigate via a computer mouse.

 “Part of the prayer process is admitting that you’ve sinned. If you are of the mindset that you are perfect, then you should probably just go ahead and turn this episode off because I got nothing for you,” he continued. “We have confession when we say ‘yes’ to Jesus and become saved.”

In the realm of video games, the 149 views Smith’s video has logged may be far from viral, but Minecraft is becoming what some video game makers hoped Christian-themed games like Catechumen and Adam’s Venture that failed to sell well would become — a tool for exploring and advancing religion among gamers.

“Because Minecraft is so open any player can design a world,” said Vincent Gonzalez, a scholar who did his doctoral dissertation on Christian video games. “And whenever things are open, religious people tend to use it to express themselves.”

Ithaca College professor Rachel Wagner sees the use of video games like Minecraft as part of what she calls the “gamification” not only of religion, but of the world. She says religions and video games have several things in common — rules, rituals, and a bend toward order and structure.

“Even if they are ‘open’ in the sense of allowing players to construct entire worlds for themselves, as Minecraft does, games always offer spaces in which things make sense, where players have purpose and control,” she said. “For players who may feel that the real world is spinning out of control, games can offer a comforting sense of predictability. They can replace God for some in their ability to promise an ordered world.”

Minecraft is what techie types call a “sandbox” game: It has few rules, so players can dig in anywhere and build what they like. They build with virtual bricks — think digitized Legos — to create bulky buildings, plants, people, anything, in mostly primary colors.

There are Minecraft versions where players try to survive or go on adventures of their own devising. And there are versions where people — sometimes children, sometimes adults like Smith — construct homes, buildings, bridges, churches and other houses of worship.

Some Minecraft users even “build” their own religious icons. Using blocky “skins” — Minecraft lingo for a character — they create Jesuses, popes, priests, rabbis, angels, and more to populate Minecraft worlds everywhere.

But while Minecraft can be used by players of every religion, it seems to be most popular among Christians. Gonzalez, who catalogs religious video games at religiousgames.org, estimates there are about 1,500 religion-themed video games, of which two-thirds are Christian.

Take a peek at Planet Minecraft, a fan site where users can share their creations. It lists 716 “Jesuses” and about 1,000 Catholic priests, but only 58 Jewish rabbis. There is even a Minecraft Richard Dawkins for virtual atheists.

Certainly, not all Minecraft players use religious skins or the churches and other houses of worship they build for some spiritual purpose or for proselytizing. But how they use them is hard to pin down.

“No one’s pastor is telling them the best way to minister to people is to pretend to be Jesus in a Minecraft world,” Gonzalez said. “So the question of why people want to dress up as Jesus and go around in Minecraft is hard to say.”

Still, Minecraft and other computer and video games have become so closely aligned with religion in some circles that the American Academy of Religion created a scholars’ group dedicated to its study four years ago.

“For most people, their virtual lives are an extension of their real lives,” said Gregory Grieve, a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro who has studied the two decades religious people have engaged in video games. “Among Christians it was a place for proselytizing and a place for meeting people they would not otherwise meet. People who are religious just see these games as an extension of their religious practice.”

Some build houses of worship — YouTube is rife with virtual tours of churches, cathedrals, synagogues, and mosques, both real and imaginary. Some build Noah’s Ark or Solomon’s Temple or their own versions of Jerusalem and other “Bible lands.”

The Australian digital design firm Islam Imagined encourages young users to build the “mosque of the future,” and Jewish educators are enlisting Minecraft to visualize Jewish history and culture for students.

Others users create faith-based Minecraft “servers” — private virtual enclaves where members agree to certain rules (no swearing is a common one) and play the game in a form of religious fellowship.

These groups recently became a meme — or joke spread rapidly among internet users — in which users sardonically responded to foul language by uttering different versions of: “Sorry sir, this is a Christian server. No swearing allowed!”

But Eric Dye, editor of ChurchMag, says its Christian-oriented Minecraft server is merely a reflection of how its users see, or want to see, the real world.

“We can build things in it, like themed cities, and there is actually a church,” he said. “It is not like we have church services or anything but it seemed something fun to have. It seemed fitting. That is why you see religion manifested in Minecraft — it is just an extension of people’s interests in what they create.”

Constructing Religious Worlds With Minecraft

Dragon Quest Builders for Switch review: Minecraft for less imaginative people

One of the best alternatives to Minecraft comes to Nintendo Switch, with a charming spin-off that’s not just for existing fans.

It’s always seemed odd that no major publisher has ever tried to copy the success of Minecraft. There have been plenty of indie clones, but the only thing that’s come close from a traditional games company is the low profile Lego Worlds. And now this. Whether you care anything about the Dragon Quest games is irrelevant, as this offers a substantially different experience to both its inspiration and its parent franchise. And it’s a game that works particularly well on the Switch.

What excited us most about this game, when it was originally released in late 2016, is that it’s by Kazuya Niinou, creator of Etrian Odyssey – which happens to be one of our favourites. Although we’re sure most Western gamers have probably never heard of it, or probably Dragon Quest for that matter. Even though the latter is the most popular role-playing series in Japan. But if you are a fan there is a story connection here to the very first game, since you play in an alternative version of its ending – where the evil Dragonlord and his monsters actually managed to win.

The unusually non-combative solution to this problem is to rebuild the land of Alefgard from scratch, mining resources and constructing buildings by hand. But although it is still a sandbox game, where you’re free to go and build whatever you want, there’s a properly structured story to follow and non-player characters to talk to and recruit. Plus, some of that ‘mining’ involves beating up classic Dragon Quest monsters and using their carcases to build your home.

Another clear distinction between Dragon Quest Builders and Minecraft is that this is purely a single-player experience. You’re cast as the arts and crafts equivalent of the chosen one, with the plot hinging on everyone else having forgotten how to create anything with their own hands. Which as demonic curses go is a new one on us. They’re all keen to learn though, and the initial hours have you building up your first village from nothing and having various characters come to move in and help.

Unlike Minecraft, you’re treated to some very specific tutorials, that show how for the most common materials you need venture only a little way out of town to mine ores from the ground or harvest the local vegetation for organic materials. As you can see, the entire world is constructed out of little Minecraft-esque cubes; leaving you free to make the minimum of environmental impact with your excavations or carve out a giant statute in the side of a mountain, depending on your preference.

Monsters are little more than a nuisance at first, but inevitably they end up being the source of some of the rarer items. The combat is real-time and reminiscent of the top down Zelda games, so nothing like traditional Dragon Quest games – or at least certainly not the first one. The stronger monsters are what encourage you to build a blacksmith and armoury, and from there new weapons and armour. Before long your village is not only teeming with people but a self-propagating factory for its own enlargement.

All of this is hugely charming and enjoyable. Dragon Quest Builders is not a fast action game, but is instead meant as a counter to such things. You’re rarely in much danger, or under any time constraint, allowing you to take the game at your own pace and digress into building things that have no real benefit to the main story. There’s an old-fashioned playfulness to the game that manifests not just in its lack of pressure or hand-holding but in the Nintendo-esque dialogue that’s entirely PG-friendly but still has flashes of wry, knowing humour.

And unlike most construction games it doesn’t get bogged down in complications during the end game. The crafting elements do get increasingly complex, but at the same time villagers start to help with the busywork, preparing chests full of restoratives and defending the village if it’s attacked. As you gain experience it’s they, not you, that are levelling up and earning more perks and abilities, which is a neat reversal of the usual role-playing formula.

Given anyone can see the influence from just looking at a screenshot, it’s unfortunate that Dragon Quest Builders is often dismissed as a mere Minecraft knock-off. Especially as that leaves it open to complaints that it’s not nearly as open, with very little ability to dig straight down into the ground and some nasty invisible walls whenever you come across water.

But those are stylistic choices as much as anything else, and the only major technical problem is the sometimes awkward camera system. There’s no significant difference between this Switch version and the original PlayStation 4 release, but the unhurried pace and simple controls make it perfect for the Switch and playing on the go (there’s already a PS Vita version). We’re happy to know that a sequel is already on the way, but for now it’s well worth digging out the original.

Formats: PlayStation 4 (reviewed) and PS Vita
Price: £49.99
Publisher: Square Enix
Developer: Square Enix
Release Date: 14th October 2016
Age Rating: 7

Email gamecentral@ukmetro.co.uk, leave a comment below, and follow us on Twitter

Dragon Quest Builders review – make the switch from Minecraft