Morning Discussion

This week, I'm getting my hands on some 3D tech to play with. My big question is how the technology will affect multiplayer gameplay. Will it make things easier or harder? Will I even notice a difference? Why is the sky blue?

Those kinds of questions. Expect coverage out of it (especially the "sky blue" thing). Until then, get to chatting!

Xav de Matos was previously a games journalist creating content at Shacknews.

From The Chatty
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    November 17, 2010 5:12 AM

    Wednesday Morning Minecraft Thread!
    Coinbath Edition!!!

    Switched back to the Painterly Pack today; the NES style wall paintings are pretty neat! I’m tiling my house with Scrooge McDuck sprites!

    Multiplayer Servers!
    MercFox1 : shackeast.sytes.net / se.shkn.ws / shackeast.shkn.ws
    Shadowdane : shadowdane.shacknet.nu / sd.shkn.ws / shadowdane.shkn.ws
    Chicken Fur : 69.169.149.253 / cf.shkn.ws / chickenfur.shkn.ws
    m0rfus (PvP/Mobs on) : morfus.dyndns.org / morfus.shkn.ws
    Haxim (TNT Server) : asplode.dyndns.org / haxim.shkn.ws

    Teamspeak : ts.shackbattles.com:9987

    Check out this mod that aaarrrgh linked to in the previous thread! http://www.minecraftforum.net/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=76184

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      November 17, 2010 5:13 AM

      Guides and Utilities

      - Oizomapper! Map your single player or multiplayer levels! By mroizo40
      http://www.digitized-e.com/mroizo/OizoMapper.zip

      - Shackwiki Minecraft page!
      http://shackwiki.com/wiki/Minecraft

      Video Guides!
      - (Series) X's Adventures in Minecraft! Linked by zuff!
      http://tinyurl.com/2ah7sex
      Lots of useful info in here!

      - (Series) Minecraft Minecart Tutorials! Boosters! Track switches! Et cetera!
      http://tinyurl.com/2udl2lt

      - Water Physics Tutorial by Arctic Fox!
      http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=24127669#itemanchor_24127669

      Written Guides!
      - Beginner’s Guides to Minecraft, originally linked by at0micgarden!
      (Work in Progress) Guide to Alpha: http://www.minecraftforum.net/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=17021
      How to Survive Your First Night: http://www.minecraftforum.net/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=19065

      Shacker Help!
      - Things I Wish I’d Known, a retrospective by Ebu!
      http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=23608826#itemanchor_23608826

      - Linkmania! By zuff!
      http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=23514788#itemanchor_23514788
      http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=23533536#itemanchor_23533536


      - Ores, and How to Find Them, by Fooldozer and CodeRedBeard!
      http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=23582115#itemanchor_23582115

      - Multiplayer Tips from BlackCat9
      http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=23641449#itemanchor_23641449

      - Circle guides! More useful than they sound!
      http://www.agentpothead.com/minecraft/sphere.html linked/hosted by AgentPothead!
      http://www.shackpics.com/files/radii_even_to_100_pgzh2n77iabkgcmee93q.png hosted by Arctic Fox!

      - Beginner’s Guide to Redstone, links by The Grolar Bear!
      http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=24044649#itemanchor_24044649

      - And some generally useful keys to press!
      F11 - full screen!
      F3 (hold) - CPU/ memory usage bar! Spikes for CPU/ red box for memory, I think!
      F5 - third person mode!

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      November 17, 2010 5:13 AM

      Early, labeled correctly, AND no tag fuck-ups? Unpossible!

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      November 17, 2010 5:15 AM

      how are you guys liking that halloween patch/changes?

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        November 17, 2010 5:17 AM

        [deleted]

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        November 17, 2010 5:17 AM

        I hear that a few people are upset! Apparently it introduced a few bugs, and certain server mods are having trouble maintaining compatibility with the new patch!

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        November 17, 2010 5:18 AM

        [deleted]

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        November 17, 2010 5:28 AM

        Biomes are mostly awful. Don't add content if you don't make it right.

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          November 17, 2010 6:01 AM

          What do you think is awful about them? I think they're pretty awesome but definitely need more work and additions

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            November 17, 2010 7:21 AM

            Well for one the world screws up when you start running into them in previous saves. I guess it works ok if you start a new world. But they are still too small. Love the idea, needs work.

        • Zek legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
          reply
          November 17, 2010 6:05 AM

          I think they're fine, they just need to be much much bigger. There's a fast travel dimension now, biomes should cover a very large area.

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            November 17, 2010 6:10 AM

            Yes a 15*15 patch of snow in the middle of a field is ridiculous.
            In fact Minecraft should generate a generate a simple 100*100 pixel biomes map when creating a world.

            It would be a 100k*100k blocks pattern by which all chunks should be generated.

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            November 17, 2010 6:18 AM

            Yeah I'd like them to be four or five times the size they are now.. Hopefully hell add options for how big you'd like them to be

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        November 17, 2010 5:42 AM

        [deleted]

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          November 17, 2010 5:50 AM

          This. He has issues paying attention and staying on task, it was fun while it lasted but that was then.

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          November 17, 2010 5:54 AM

          whoa, they're really working on a "new game" already?

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            November 17, 2010 11:20 AM

            The second game is completely independant from Minecraft though. It has no effect on Minecraft. He basically hired a guy who had that idea for a game and that guy is creating it. Notch is and always was on Minecraft alone. He has a couple guys who might help out a bit here and there.. but it sounds like it will mostly be him for a while. I really don't think the second game plays into this at all, in fact I think it was a great idea if he wants to run a company... it's good to have a new game cooking in the background for when Minecraft sales start to die out.

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          November 17, 2010 6:00 AM

          [deleted]

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            November 17, 2010 11:20 AM

            It will be at some point... probably not so long now that he's really getting back to work lately.

        • Zek legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
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          November 17, 2010 6:03 AM

          Where do you guys get this stuff? He's said explicitly that he's going to keep developing the game for the foreseeable future. This is not a rational conclusion to reach from the fact that there are bugs in the alpha.

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          November 17, 2010 6:08 AM

          He didn't hire "like 10 people". He hired "like" 4 and one is working on another game and one does art on both and one helps out on both games.

          "I''ve pretty much lost all faith in notch. If Minecraft is actually ever updated with real gameplay, I will be pleasantly surprised, bu I'm not counting on it. My guess is that he will get SMP to match single player, tweak a few things here and there, add some worthless new recipes (fishing, the nether, etc) and call it done. " <-- When this is done he's calling it beta and charges 20€.

          He's SAYING he's going to update it for as long as people plays it.

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          November 17, 2010 6:28 AM

          [deleted]

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          November 17, 2010 9:46 AM

          Are you serious? He's making a new game with this money? haha, how odd.

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      November 17, 2010 5:17 AM

      When am I going to be able to play this on my phone? I want to recreate the saint Charles street car line while I'm on the street car.

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      November 17, 2010 5:23 AM

      cool terrain in the new world I started. Its a word of buttes. I've been building solely on the buttes as it makes things very monster-safe.

      http://shkn.ws/mc/onhouse.jpg
      http://shkn.ws/mc/portal.jpg
      http://shkn.ws/mc/portal2.jpg

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      November 17, 2010 6:17 AM

      Twitter update!

      DrArcticFox
      @notch any word on when the 'reappearing blocks' issue introduced in the last patch will be fixed? It's pretty much emptied my server :(

      @notch Markus Persson
      @DrArcticFox next update!


      and this should stir you all up into a froth:

      Speiderspeider
      @notch is there a timeframe for when you think SMP will have damage?

      @notch Markus Persson
      @Speiderspeider I expect to have most of it done today. I'm not sure when the release is.


      http://twitter.com/notch/status/4899588016181248
      http://twitter.com/notch/status/4852551459540992

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      November 17, 2010 7:45 AM

      Shadowdane's server renders are broken. Are they going to be back?

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      November 17, 2010 7:49 AM

      I have a solution for everyone in here waiting on Notch to fix his game (which is still in Alpha mind you): Play Dwarf Fortress !!

      The UI sucks, the graphics are ASCII, but damn me if it isn't the most deep and complicated sim/sandbox type game I've ever played. For those of you that haven't played it, read this: http://playthisthing.com/dwarf-fortress

      When you are knee-deep in managing dwarves and staying off goblin invasions you'll realize that Notch will have already fixed SMP damage weeks ago :p

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      November 17, 2010 8:45 AM

      Silly minecraft water!

      http://i.imgur.com/H2NyO.png

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      November 17, 2010 8:51 AM

      I want these so badly

      http://kotaku.com/5691896/play-minecraft-on-your-fridge

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      November 17, 2010 9:10 AM

      I saw this in Earth (Jon Stewart) and thought of Minecraft: http://www.shackpics.com/files/earthwelike_tep5kwnsj9nvzmxcfy6h.jpg

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      November 17, 2010 9:53 AM

      So what's the best minecraft texture pack? I have yet to try one out.

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      November 17, 2010 10:16 AM

      Conandan? Where aaaarrrreeeee yooooooooou

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      November 17, 2010 11:03 AM

      [deleted]

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        November 17, 2010 11:10 AM

        For keyboards, either Das Keyboard or the very awesome Unicomp keyboards (they use the same buckling spring technology as the old IBM Model M keyboards)

        Their office will sound something like this:
        CLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACK
        CLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACK
        CLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACK
        CLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACKCLACK

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          November 17, 2010 11:14 AM

          [deleted]

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            November 17, 2010 11:58 AM

            I bet! Especially because the old buckling-spring keyboards give two CLACKS for every keypress, making it sound like you're twice as productive :P

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          November 17, 2010 1:52 PM

          I've got the Das Model S "Silent" at work and it's not silent but it's not loud enough to really bother anyone else either.

          (It's also not as nice as a Model M but it's not bad)

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        November 17, 2010 11:12 AM

        watch, he'll add a bug preventing us from moving or re-break minecarts.

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          November 17, 2010 11:31 AM

          @notch Monsters now spawn in minecarts. I recently broke the walking animation so I gave them minecart shoes like rollerskates

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            November 17, 2010 11:33 AM

            hahaha monsters are now incredibly fast. lol fail.

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        November 17, 2010 11:37 AM

        Things must be pretty crazy if mentioning you're going to work on the game for two full days is blogworthy.

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        November 17, 2010 1:04 PM

        I hate to be overly optomistic on this... but if he can add server-side damage, fix the lag issues and improve performance in an update coming out in a few days (while avoiding to add other completely bizarre game crushing bugs in the process) ... next week could be an awesome week in Minecraft!

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          November 17, 2010 1:07 PM

          [deleted]

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            November 17, 2010 1:41 PM

            Hopefully the bugs will be awesomely hilarious. Something like, all blocks are randomly affected by gravity and crush players to death unexpectedly.

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              November 17, 2010 1:46 PM

              i think it's a virtual guarantee that things that shouldn't kill you will kill you when server-side damage hits. it's going to be awesome

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                November 17, 2010 1:48 PM

                OH I bet he'll do a COMBO BUG - the reappearing blocks bug will return in a lagged form - thus you'll be mining, then blocks will trap and telefrag you!

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                  November 17, 2010 1:50 PM

                  oh snap, i can see it already. this will definitely happen and it will be awesome

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              November 17, 2010 1:55 PM

              [deleted]

        • Zek legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
          reply
          November 17, 2010 1:39 PM

          Server-side damage is brand new so even if he adds it this week I'm sure there will at least be bugs related to that until next week.

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      November 17, 2010 1:37 PM

      People in charge of waterpark construction, I need your input / approval.

      I have constructed a cart track from south of Lamplopolis (the martini glass) to the outskirts of the water park. I've been informed that no tunnels are wanted inside the park, and I don't think I've violated that yet. If I have, I can change my plan and remove any offending structure. My intention was to make a easy way to travel to the park that was less of an eye sore than that 1 block wide, 3000 block long dirt 'bridge'. I've tried to make the path to the park interesting and scenic, with as little alteration the the terrain as possible. You can see the path on the gmap render.

      I need to know how to finish the path (or if I should remove how it currently connects to the waterpark.
      The track currently goes through a glass underwater tunnel across the final 'ocean' to the park. It does not block boat travel to the park, and give a nice view of the entrance sign.

      Proposals:
      http://www.shackpics.com/files/parktrackplan_ipf2gguqdvktkrr61f0l.png

      The glass tunnel with the track is the purple line. It currently ends at that corner of the island.

      I would like to follow the red line, in front of the sign near water level as to not block the sign from the water, but give the cart riders a good view of the sign. I'm not sure what to do then. I could then follow the orange line, either bridging over the canal in the trees or tunneling under it, then coming down the west side the the bay, to where the log flume is and end the track there. Or I could roughly follow the yellow line, coming south from the end of the sign and tunneling under the bay, and coming up in the 'docks' area and have the dock be the arrival point for both carts and boats.
      Or, I could just head south from the purple tunnel along the blue line, widen the path to the 'races' and have the tracks come across that bridge, again ending near the 'docks' area.

      Or I could do something completely different that you could suggest in reply!

      The purple tunnel is 4 blocks wide - with only one track in it currently. The current track starts near Lamplopolis by the martini glass, and comes all the way here, mostly on the ground, but there are a few bridges and tunnels between islands before this long glass tunnel. It takes a somewhat scenic route, but I find it to be much more interesting than a straight 3000 block long track in an underground tunnel. The glass tunnel is wide enough for another line (in the opposite direction?) and the needed boosters, but I currently have no plans for adding another track (people leaving can use /spawn). However, without a return track, incoming carts would have to be melted down in a 1x1 lava pool or else they would pile up quickly.

      Hopefully carts long distance travel will be fixed in the upcoming SMP patch that has been mentioned.

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        November 17, 2010 2:15 PM

        If you're waiting for eonix to reply to this, well, you'll be waiting a while. http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?id=24441633

        If you want my input, stopping outside the waterpark is fine. There's no need for a path through the waterpark -- it breaks the nice skyline that the park has, and only adds clutter. I really like the current entrance -- through a little copse of trees, then it opens up to this epic park. It's great.

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          November 17, 2010 2:16 PM

          also, you know that there is already a canal that runs from Lamplopolis, right?

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