Entertainment

A brief history of Minecraft

Kevin Nixon
May 9, 2023

Minecraft has gone through so many changes over the years, and its community is no exception.

Minecraft’s fanbase has gone from just a few people playing around with four kinds of blocks, to millions of people crafting entire worlds using hundreds of blocks and tools.

Minecraft’s community started just shortly after release when on May 17, 2009, one player built a sprite of Mario from the original Super Mario Brothers game with only dirt, cobblestone and wood.

This was the first ever known bit of pixel art in Minecraft, and it probably helped jumpstart the building community that still thrives today.

After a few months and updates, the fanbase was introduced to Minecraft’s way of power: redstone.

With this material, the community was able to create circuits that can aid with gameplay. All you need is an item that gives a trail of redstone dust, and then you can use the redstone power pistons or ignite TNT blocks.

However this item has stuck with the community, and has evolved so much, with creators building massive chains of redstone that can do many things like be a viable calculator, or even emulate classic Nintendo games, like “Mr.Squishy’s Pokemon Red” emulator that he built in Minecraft.

On Nov. 18, 2011, Minecraft was officially released into the gaming genre, and with its full official release, many people started to play it, with one very influential group being YouTubers.

YouTubers are most likely the main reason why Minecraft got so popular as they showcased mods and custom builds. They inspired many to play Minecraft.

On the topic of mods, mods are one other way that the game has gotten a massive fanbase. With Mojang giving permission for people to distribute mods, the community has been able to develop many incredible addons to play with.

Mods like the “Lucky Block Mod” add a sense of luck in the game, giving players more reason to come back. Others change the game by adding new mechanics, like the “Pixelmon Mod,” which combines the gameplay of Pokémon with Minecraft.

Finally there are the mods that make the game harder, like the “RLcraft” modpack, which completely flips the entirety of Minecraft on its head by adding new mobs and methods to the game.

With such a massive community, there are many positives, but there are also many negatives. Within the Minecraft community there’s bound to be drama and toxicity that run rampant in parts of the community.

For example there’s been many cases of online harassment, bullying, racism and griefing—the practice of going out of your way to annoy other players, whether it’s by spawn killing them, destroying their builds, or just annoying them with chat messages.

Despite the small and vocal negative side to the community, Minecraft is still one of the best games released in the past decade, and its community has positioned the game to enthrall its player base for many years to come.