Minecraft For Dummies E-Book

Jacob Cordeiro

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 164

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

Craft yourself an amazing game of Minecraft!

More than just a game, Minecraft consists of players using an avatar to create or destroy various types of blocks, form fantastic structures, create artwork, and do much more, all in a three-dimensional environment and across various multiplayer servers in multiple game modes. With this fun and friendly beginners guide, you will quickly grasp how to play Minecraft in the three modes of game play: survival, creative, and hardcore. The easy-to-understand writing style walks you through every step of the way, from downloading the game to choosing a gaming platform to defending your creations against monsters and winning the game by defeating the Ender Dragon.

• Explains how to use blocks to build amazing creations and engage in gameplay with other players
• Details techniques for travelling across the biomes
• Zeroes in on playing wisely in Survival mode so you can acquire resources to maintain your health and hunger
• Shares tips for playing carefully in Creative mode, using your unlimited supply of resources, the ability to fly, and more
• Helps you play in Hardcore mode

Minecraft For Dummies, Portable Edition goes where you go as you create a world you won't want to leave!

Leseprobe

Minecraft® For Dummies®, Portable Edition

Published byJohn Wiley & Sons, Inc.111 River StreetHoboken, NJ 07030-5774www.wiley.com

Copyright © 2013 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey

Published simultaneously in Canada

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permitted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone]. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Trademarks: Wiley, the Wiley logo, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, A Reference for the Rest of Us!, The Dummies Way, Dummies Daily, The Fun and Easy Way, Dummies.com, Making Everything Easier, and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission. Minecraft is a registered trademark of Notch Development. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book.

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2012955540

ISBN 978-1-118-53714-5 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-118-53713-8 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-53715-2 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-53716-9 (ebk)

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

About the Author

Jacob Cordeiro has been playing Minecraft since the Alpha pre-release. Jacob attends Stanford Online High School and won an award for his game entry in the 2011 Scholastic Art and Writing competition.

Dedication

To my mom — thank you for all your support throughout the writing of this book. You have raised me to reach toward my own goals and have guided me with truth and respect, and I owe you my awesome life.

To my dad — thank you for giving me all the resources I ever could have wanted and for sparking my interest in both computer games and writing.

To Mrs. Melanie Nelson, who made all of this possible by placing her trust in me and taking the time to get me off the ground — you found me this opportunity, and you taught me how to appreciate computer games in your Game Maker group.

Finally, to all of my friends and, specifically, Alec, Sam, Renee, Noel, and my brother, Adam, who, throughout both school and leisure, have been great peers.

Author’s Acknowledgments

Thanks to everyone I worked with — Amy Fandrei, for taking a chance in hiring me; and Kim Darosett and Rebecca Whitney, who were very considerate in making the process easier for me and whose efforts made Minecraft For Dummies, Portable Edition a project to be proud of for a long time. I also want to thank my friend, Alec Hendricks, who was helping me write a book before I even knew it.

My instructors and mentors gave me the skills necessary for writing this book, and Mrs. Nelson, who’s known me my whole life, put her word in to give me this opportunity.

Also, thanks to my parents and brother, who went as far as to change their own schedules to fit mine. You respected me enough to make my own choices with my time, and both high school and this book have been so much easier because of that choice.

Publisher’s Acknowledgments

We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments at http://dummies.custhelp.com. For other comments, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax [phone].

Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:

Acquisitions and Editorial

Senior Project Editor: Kim Darosett

Acquisitions Editor: Amy Fandrei

Copy Editor: Rebecca Whitney

Technical Editor: Alec Hendricks

Senior Editorial Manager: Leah Michael

Editorial Assistant: Annie Sullivan

Sr. Editorial Assistant: Cherie Case

Cover Photo: Image courtesy of Jacob Cordeiro

Composition Services

Senior Project Coordinator: Kristie Rees

Layout and Graphics: Jennifer Creasey

Proofreaders: Cynthia Fields, John Greenough

Indexer: Potomac Indexing, LLC

Publishing and Editorial for Technology Dummies

Richard Swadley, Vice President and Executive Group Publisher

Andy Cummings, Vice President and Publisher

Mary Bednarek, Executive Acquisitions Director

Mary C. Corder, Editorial Director

Publishing for Consumer Dummies

Kathleen Nebenhaus, Vice President and Executive Publisher

Composition Services

Debbie Stailey, Director of Composition Services

Minecraft® For Dummies®, Portable Edition

Table of Contents

Introduction

About This Book

Foolish Assumptions

Icons Used in This Book

Conventions Used in This Book

Bonus Content at Dummies.com

Where to Go from Here

Chapter 1: Entering Minecraft

Registering a Minecraft Account

Purchasing and Installing Minecraft

Playing the Game

Logging in and operating the main menu

Starting your first game in SinglePlayer mode

Understanding basic controls

Watching the Heads-Up Display (HUD)

Chapter 2: Planning for Your First Night

Devising a Game Plan

Using Your Inventory

Manipulating Your Inventory

Setting Up for Your First Night

Harvesting trees

Building a crafting table, chest, and shelter

Completing Optional Day One Activities

Sticks and wooden tools

Cobblestone and coal

Bed

Preparing to Survive

Chapter 3: Overcoming Long-Term Obstacles

Understanding and Avoiding Hunger

Acquiring food

Eating food

Building, Mining, and Farming

Building an effective house

Starting on a mine or an excavation

Starting a farm

Advancing Toward the End

Obtaining better ores

Reaching the Nether

Finding the Stronghold

Conquering the End

Staying busy in the afterglow

Chapter 4: Discovering Blocks and Implementing Items

The Wooden Age

The Looting Age

The Stone Age

Using the Furnace

Chapter 5: Mastering Mines and Farms

Mining Efficiently

Cave mining

Branch mining

Staircase mining

Quarry mining

Building the Perfect Farm

Crops

Basic plants

Animals

Mushrooms

Chapter 6: Surviving through Invention

Building Masterpieces

Engineering with Redstone

Transmitting power with redstone wire

Using other redstone mechanisms

Applying redstone circuits

Advanced redstone circuitry

Enchanting Weapons, Tools, and Armor

Enchanting an item

Powering up

Using enchantments

Brewing Potions

Brewing basic potions

Using potions

Modifying potions

Brewing negative potions

Brewing splash potions

Creatively Improving Your World

Playing in Creative Mode

Chapter 7: Understanding the Natural World

Sightseeing in the Biomes

Examining Different Types of Mobs

Docile mobs

Hostile mobs

Neutral and allied mobs

Chapter 8: Understanding the Man-Made World

Trading in Villages

Exploring village features

Trading with emeralds

Surviving zombie sieges

Excavating Structures

Desert temple

Jungle temple

Dungeon

Witch hut

Abandoned mine shaft

Stronghold

Nether fortress

Chapter 9: Playing with MultiPlayer and Cheats

Starting or Joining a Multiplayer World

LAN server

Public server

Using the Chat Menu

Commands that can be used by all players

Operator-only commands

Operator-only, public-server-only commands

Nonspecific parameters

Chapter 10: Customizing Your Experience

Surviving Hardcore Mode

Exploring Adventure Mode

Implementing Additional World Options

Customizing a superflat world

Making your own options

Managing the .minecraft Folder

Using .minecraft

Recovering .minecraft

Checking Out External Sites and Resources

Chapter 11: Ten Helpful Survival Tips

Digging Safely

Cooking Efficiently

Obtaining Obsidian and Portals Quickly

Mining in the Right Location

Avoiding Overexertion

Defeating Basic Mobs

Amassing Colored Wool

Crafting Quickly

Checking Basic Equipment

Finding Natural Comfort

Introduction

If you enjoy games about building, survival, engineering, and adventuring, Minecraft is for you. Having attracted more than 9 million players, Minecraft is a loose-ended yet adventurous sandbox game that becomes whatever you make of it.

Minecraft is about gathering resources and building structures while facing monsters. The world of Minecraft is composed of cubic blocks, which you can break and replace to build houses and craft items. That’s all there is to it. The game has evolved to become so balanced and complex that it has attracted millions of satisfied fans. While skimming or scouring Minecraft For Dummies, Portable Edition, you can apply every bit of Minecraft information you need to start playing the game to your liking.

About This Book

This book assumes no knowledge of Minecraft, and it can guide you from registering a Minecraft account to crafting various items to building automatic farms and giant buildings and machines, all with an assortment of basic building blocks.

Although Minecraft has a gigantic community of players who design their own third-party programs, Minecraft For Dummies, Portable Edition, focuses primarily on the game itself. This book is a helpful resource for new Minecraft players to gain momentum in the game and recall information they may have otherwise forgotten. Though this book goes only so far in giving strategic guidance, leaving most of the game to the player’s creativity, you can find extensive notes in this book on many of Minecraft’s most complex systems and game components.

Minecraft continually releases new updates and features — this book is accurate to Minecraft version 1.4.5. Because later Minecraft updates aren’t likely to change the primary game mechanics, this book encompasses most of Minecraft’s main features.

Foolish Assumptions

Rather than try to consider every single type of reader who might pick up this book, I’ve made certain assumptions about you, the reader:

You have a computer, and you know how to use it.

You know what a web browser is, and you can surf the web.

You have an e-mail address, and you know how to use it.

Your computer can download and run Java programs.

You have a functioning keyboard and computer mouse.

Icons Used in This Book

I’ve placed various icons in the margins of this book to point out specific information that you may find useful:

This icon calls attention to any tip or trick that you can use to enhance the gameplay.

This icon emphasizes points that you should attempt to retain in your memory. If you can remember these special points, you’ll be a better player.

If you see this icon, read its information! Warnings can prevent you from making a big mistake that can be hazardous to your Minecraft world (or your computer).

You can safely skip this geeky stuff. However, it deserved a place in the book, so you may be interested in reading it.

Conventions Used in This Book

In Minecraft For Dummies, I use numbered steps, bullet lists, and screen shots for your reference. I also provide a few sidebars containing information that’s non-essential but may help you understand a topic a little better. Web addresses appear in a special monotype font that looks like this:

www.dummies.com

Bonus Content at Dummies.com

You can find a free bonus chapter, “Exploring Other Blocks and Items,” and the appendix, “Blocks, Items, and Crafting Recipes,” available for download at

www.dummies.com/go/minecraftfd

Where to Go from Here

Reading Minecraft For Dummies, Portable Edition, from cover to cover provides a lot of useful information, but you can just as easily skip around to find specific topics of interest to you. If you’re new to Minecraft and you want to know what the game is all about, read Chapters 1 through 3 and skim most of the other ones. They delve into more detail than is necessary at first. You can always return to those bits later.

If you’re more experienced in Minecraft and you want to deepen your understanding (if you haven’t done so already), simply skim the first three chapters and find some interesting topics later in the book. Also, be sure to check out Chapter 11, of course, which has a top ten list of Minecraft tips.

Occasionally, Wiley’s technology books are updated. If this book has technical updates, they’ll be posted at

www.dummies.com/go/minecraftfdupdates

1

Entering Minecraft

In This Chapter

Registering your account

Buying and downloading Minecraft

Starting your first game

Recognizing the basic controls

In the sandbox-survival game of Minecraft, you build structures, fight monsters, collect items, mine minerals, and work toward your own goals. This 3-D, grid-based game features naturally generated landscapes and challenges.

In Survival mode, you must manage your resources and acquire increasingly useful items to advance through the game. In Creative mode, you can build or design whatever structure, setup, or invention you want in your personal universe. However, most of the information you need is found in Survival mode. This chapter explains how to obtain Minecraft, start on a Survival world, and familiarize yourself with the basic game controls.

Registering a Minecraft Account

To jump into the action, you first have to register a Minecraft account. Then you can play in Demo mode or upgrade to a Premium account, which you need for the full version. Follow these steps to register an account:

1. Go to http://minecraft.net.

The Minecraft home page opens.

2. Click the Register link in the upper-right corner of the page.

The Register New Mojang Account page appears.

3. Fill out all the information requested in the text boxes, specify your date of birth, and answer the security questions.

4. Click the Register button to finish.

5. Check the e-mail account you entered for a verification message from Minecraft.

6. Click the link provided in the e-mail to complete your registration.

Check out the next section to find out how to purchase the game.

Purchasing and Installing Minecraft

To buy and install the game, log in to your account at http://minecraft.net. (See the preceding section for details on registering.) Then follow these steps:

1. Click the large Buy Now button on the home page.

The Minecraft Store page opens.

2. Click the Buy Minecraft for This Account option in the upper-left corner of the store, as shown in Figure 1-1.

At the time of this writing, the cost of the game is $26.95.

If you can’t click the button, you may not be logged in (or you may have already bought the game).

3. Fill out your payment information and then click the Proceed to Checkout button.

Figure 1-1: Buying the game

4. Follow the necessary steps to complete your purchase.

5. Return to the Minecraft home page. On the right side of the screen, the large Buy Now button should now be labeled Download Now. Click this button to open the Download page.

6. If you’re using Windows, click the download and save the file anywhere on your computer.

To view instructions for other operating systems, click the Show All Platforms button.

7. Double-click the file to install the game.

Your payment is immediately attributed to your account, so, if necessary, you can download the file again for free. The Minecraft home page also gives you the option to play from your browser — click the link under the Download Now button.

Playing the Game

After you install Minecraft, you’re ready to start playing the game. To start, run the launcher you downloaded.

Logging in and operating the main menu

The launcher opens the news screen, which displays game updates and links. Enter your username and password in the lower-right corner and click Log In to continue to the main menu, as shown in Figure 1-2.

Figure 1-2: Main menu

This list describes what you can do after you click the buttons on the main menu:

SinglePlayer: Start or continue a basic game. This chapter covers the options for starting a game in SinglePlayer mode.

MultiPlayer: Join other players online. You can find more information about MultiPlayer mode in Chapter 9.

Languages: Change the language of the text in Minecraft. This tiny button next to Options holds a speech bubble containing a globe.

Options: Manage game options such as sound, graphics, mouse controls, difficulty levels, and general settings.

Quit Game: Close the window, unless you’re in In-Browser mode.

Starting your first game in SinglePlayer mode

To start your first game in SinglePlayer mode, follow these steps:

1. Click the Singleplayer button to view a list of all your worlds.

If you’re just starting out in Minecraft, this list should be empty.

2. Click the Create New World button to start a new game.

The world-creation page appears, as shown in Figure 1-3.

Figure 1-3: Creating a new world

3. In the World Name text box, type whatever name you want and click the Create New World button at the bottom.

The Game Mode and More World Options buttons are covered in Chapter 10.

To turn on game cheats, special powers that provide a more casual experience, click the More World Options button, and then click the Allow Cheats button to turn cheats on or off. Cheats make the game stress-free when you’re getting started by giving you more control over the world. Chapter 2 explains how to use a basic cheat for surviving your first game.

When you finish creating your world, the game automatically starts by generating the world and placing your avatar (character) in it.

Understanding basic controls

The world of Minecraft, shown in Figure 1-4, is made of cubic blocks, materials such as dirt or stone that you can break down and rebuild into houses or craft into useful items. A block made of a material such as sand is referred to as a sand block. Because the side length of every block measures 1 meter, most distances are measured in blocks as well: If you read about an object that’s located “three blocks up,” it’s the distance from the ground to the top of a stack of three blocks.

In addition to building and crafting, you have to defend against monsters and eventually face them head-on. As the game progresses, your goal becomes less about surviving and more about building structures, gathering resources, and facing challenges to gain access to more blocks and items.

Figure 1-4: The look and feel of Minecraft

To survive, you have to know how to move around, attack enemies, and manipulate the blocks that comprise the world. Table 1-1 lists the default key assignments for each control.

If you reassign any major keys, you may cause confusion later in the game.

Table 1-1 Default Controls in Minecraft

Action

Control