The Fun of Creation Block by Block

People sometimes ask me how I stay so relevant to the gaming industry and the community itself.  The simple answer is that I do not.  I, as well as all my writers, have so, so much to do.  Some of us have things we cannot avoid -- Julian Horan, for instance, lost his computer to a rampaging virus, most likely from, let's be honest, all the porn.  Others have time consuming activities to do during the day, which I believe are called "jobs."  And still there are some who attend school in hopes to, one day, find one of these unheard of jobs and life comfortably for the rest of the foreseeable future.  Now besides all of these incredibly reasonable excuses, there are also ones like having spent too much time in search of diamond to build a pickax, in order to mine obsidian, in order to build a blast wall that can withstand large explosions.  There is a chance I have used that last one.

For those of you who do not know by now, Minecraft is an amazing time waster that gets more addicting the more you play.  I personally held off on buying the game, despite all the acclaim and the low price of $15, because I am not a creative person.  Suuuure... I can write about videogames and other such things for which I have a wealth of knowledge, but if you put a pen and paper in my hands and tell me to draw someone, it will be a stick figure with not-quite-circular eyes.  If you want me to play you a piece by Mozart, expect to hear something along the lines of several car alarms going off at once.  So you can understand my resistance to play something which relies heavily on your ability to create.  But, from here on out, I will cease to describe Minecraft to you and simply relate my experience.  This is because merely explaining what the game is about does not do it justice: mine things, craft those things to mine new things, build.  There is no story, there is no point.  Just build.

And build, and build, and build.

Before I got into the game, I decided to check out some videos on YouTube, while my girlfriend was beside me falling asleep, of all the amazing things people have done that I could possibly, theoretically, steal.  After understanding my inadequacy better, I looked for what normal people would do.  I mean, really, you build a base to escape monsters during the night, build a better base, build a house, build a better house, then build whatever you want, one block at a time.  Sounds repetitive and complicated.  I don't know how to build a house.   Then something amazing happened:  my girlfriend and I both became enthralled.  We kept wanting to see what people would build, how they would get materials, where in this MASSIVE (trust me, it warrants all caps) world they would explore.  It actually ended up with her buying the game and us having a combined world, in which there is a glass house on the top, one block of a mountain, a black house with a "lava-fall" near the highest point of the sky, and seemingly endless caves which my girlfriend loves to explore.

Goddammit I refuse to lose my sh*t again!

For the first, oh, dozen hours or so, I was clearing away a giant area in order to make a farm.  Soon, I realized animals would actually disappear after a while, even if I ever managed to get them inside the fences.  So, back I went to the caves beneath my base.  I have four large chests, after owning the game for about a week, all filled with rock and dirt; another filled with sand and coal, and one more filled with random things like flint, glass, animal products, etc.  Only within the past day or two have I started to build.  It's disgusting how much time I've spent mining for minerals and smelting them.  Which, to be fair, is still far less than others who have apparently dedicated their lives to the game.  Often have I died and lost everything in my inventory (once, that included diamonds), but have always remade everything and returned to the lava pit or to where those damn skeletons and their arrows killed me.  This is all in single-player mode, mind you.  If you get the IP address of a server, you can go online and see what others have built and/or grief them.  I advise everyone to fork over the money (or get your girlfriend to) and experience this game for yourself.  It can still get boring and you may lose interest, but I'm sure you'll get your money's worth.

4/5 Near Perfect Score! Super Good!