The Creative Exercise of World Building in Minecraft

Video Game Journals

Pong is actually not a bad game, considering what it is. It requires hand and eye coordination, like any other game, and it is a no-frills, simple, straight-forward game requiring no thought other than anticipating the trajectory of a bounce. Galaga is somewhat similar in that it is the same basic 2D concept, sliding an object left to right (instead of up-down) to destroy enemy combatants—a lot like Tetris in a way. Ms. Pacman adds a dimension of strategy to this concept and uses the space well to give the interactive experience more nuance. Super Mario Bros really builds on it by creating a world that goes beyond the frame: it scrolls on and on as the character moves left to right; and there is a narrative built into the gaming journey. The character can jump and duck and it combines strategy with hand-eye coordination skills. Sonic the Hedgehog really builds on Super Mario by taking it to the next level with better visuals and a faster-paced experience overall. I would say just the ability of games to be immersive and life-like in their rendering is what has changed over the years. But the basic idea is the same: there is a narrative built-in and it requires some exploration of a world that goes beyond the frame upon the screen (Domsch, 2013).

For this exercise, I played Minecraft for 30 minutes. I chose it because it is a popular world-building game that I had never played, and so I wanted to experience it. I was surprised and yet not surprised that it is as popular as it is. The graphics are generic—but that is actually part of its appeal; some games get way to caught up in the rendering and they lose a little bit of fun in the process. Minecraft was simply about exploring and building and being creative within the confines of the world of the game. I initially thought it was silly but I found myself totally immersed in the world after 30 minutes. I can easily see now why it is a popular game and what the appeal is, even if there is no narrative to it or any objective really. Before video games, kids used to draw or sketch or paint or write; today, they build digital worlds using the Minecraft platform, and it is the same kind of creative outlet. It is a way for a person to have fun, make something unique, just as a painter would with a canvas, tubes of paint, and a brush (Blanco-Herrera et al., 2019).

After watching Markiplier play Heave Ho and Mr.Beast play Minecraft, I guess I can see what people would watch these, because it is no more or less entertaining than anything else. It’s unscripted, and you are experiencing the game through the experience of these gamers. It is a kind of voyeuristic feeling, I suppose. Would I want to waste an hour watching this? No. Would kids? Yes, if they are allowed to. Why? Because it is hypnotic. There is a lot of visual stimulation for the eye, and audio stimulation for the ear. It is a sensory experience.

But in my life game and sports spectatorship plays almost no part. I rarely watch sports, and if I do, I only have it on as background noise, really: I might watch it for a few moments before I become somewhat bored by the repetitive nature of the contest. I really find matches only interesting if they are close and the clock is winding down; then it becomes exciting because both teams are playing hard and every move counts, every mistake can be fatal. As for video game spectatorship, this is more of just a guilty pleasure; if the gamers are having fun playing, it can be entertaining because laughter is contagious. But overall, I consider this type of entertainment as trivial and kind of wasteful. Hill (2019) calls it metagaming, but I call it rather mundane.