Zero Punctuation on Minecraft: The Delight in Creation Comes From Earning Resources to Create With First

After much anticipation, famed game reviewer Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw has appraised Minecraft, and if you're already familiar with the Zero Punctuation video column, you know it's totally not safe for work viewing. So here we go, and be sure to watch toward the end, where he makes a very good point about user-generated content that's generally applicable beyond Minecraft:

Did you catch it in between all the bracing, British-flavored vulgarity?

Part of the appeal of building is the effort required to gather materials. That 80 foot [NSFW NSFW NFSW] wouldn't be so satisfyingly turgid if it weren't for the entire continent you had to turn upside down to find all the ore.

This reminds me of an idea I had when I was at Linden Lab, way back in 2003: What if, I casually mentioned to Philip and Cory, instead of just rezzing prims out of thin air, you actually had to harvest them? You'd get metal prims from mountains, wood prims trees, and so on. Then you'd end up with an economic system that was truly wedded to the world, not floating arbitrarily above it, and emergent societies based around the precious resources they happen to own, and so on. Ah well, it could have worked. Now Minecraft has 1 million paying customers. The upcoming new Lego MMO also has a mechanic of earning the blocks you build with.

In any case, if you like Zero Punctuation, do read my interview with him from a couple years back.

Comments

[Domchi Underwood]

I wholeheartedly disagree. We don't need no stinking grinding in SL. It would be just another meaningless game that way. It's hard enough to create quality content as it is (it's always hard to create quality stuff), and if I had to grind for minerals as well... let's put it this way, Minecraft leaves me unimpressed and uninterested for precisely that reason; I see no point in digging for materials. It's an open-ended game where you gather rocks. The person with most rocks wins and can create a big pile of rocks. Yay.

Make no mistake - you can't do anything really useful in Minecraft. It's hip right now, and people are having fun exploring the ways you can arrange cubes around... but that won't last unless Notch doesn't reinvent it.

I suppose it's fun when you're a gamer... but creating stuff in Minecraft is in essence the same as equipping your WoW character with stuff. In SL, on the other hand... you can create anything. You can do stuff in-world that communicates with RL stuff. You can meet with your architect and walk through the your future house before it's built. You can run simulations that are too expensive to create without virtual world. You can train AI you're developing and have it communicate with real people. You can shoot machinima instead of rendering stuff in Maya. Sure, you can play dress-up with your avatar... but if that's all you do, you're kind of missing the really interesting stuff...

[John Lopez]

I disagree with Domchi's disagreement. I don't think SL would be improved by grinding equipment (so, partial disagreement I guess). I *have* seen plenty of the people who went "meh" to Second Life embrace Minecraft as a creativity outlet I never expected from them.

The comment above indicates that not only did Domchi survive the "different from every other MMO control scheme ever, but hey it works like Maya" travails, but can "do stuff in-world that communicates with RL stuff", which indicates a level of SL expertise I associate with "day job is technical in nature".

Not that there is anything wrong with that: I wrote SL scripted objects and sold them, so I can't cast stones at that perspective. What I can do is notice the glazed over look the "normals" get when I describe SL and my projects within it. Yet, there they are, frolicking in massive Minecraft fortresses with working minecar rollercoasters they built themselves.

Minecraft doesn't compete with SL at all. What it does do is bring a whole new cohort of 3D world builders into the fold, some of which will move on to SL or whatever the future holds for such endeavors. In that regard it is like Lego Universe... the more products in the space that inspire people, the happier I am.

[Adeon Writer]

I love Second Life and minecraft, and grinding has no place in SL. The day I need to grind a few hours to gather my scripting keywords...

[Arcadia Codesmith]

My favorite activities in MMOs are prospecting and crafting. I like the thrill of discovery from finding a precious resource (and I feel distinctly cheated by the current trend to put materials in predictable and visible nodes -- where's the fun in that?) One person's "grind" is another person's pleasure.

That said, I'd agree that it would not be ideal in a world where you also have to be a coder, graphic designer and marketer to make anything of note. It might have worked well if Second Life had an integrated toolkit that was easy and intuitive to use, but that never materialized and probably never will.

My ideal crafting system for an MMO looks like the prospecting systems of Project Entropia and Star Wars Galaxies, a basic creation system similar to the Spore editors, a deep customization system that includes a professional-grade mesh editor and 3D texturing app, and a way to distribute and monetize your creations like Second Life (but much easier to use).

And as for people who hate resource gathering, well, prospectors love people like that. I can get you all the iron you can use... for a price.

[Pathfinder]

"Grinding" is satisfying because it taps into a key human desire.

We love being rewarded for our efforts.

The real problem is that this desire is very simple to hack. You can create environments that reward people for effort that is pointless ("Dig 1,000 holes!") while offering rewards that are essentially valueless ("Here's a gold star to stick on your profile!").

The trick is to simply fool the brain into *believing* that the reward was worth the effort.

And the most hilarious thing is that, once you get your reward, your brain *automaticaly* attributes perceived value to it because you *worked* so hard to get it!

"Wow, that was a lot of clicking on the screen to dig those holes. Huh. I have a gold star now. THIS STAR IS PRICELESS."

This trickery is called "making engaging games."

If grinding is introduced into a virtual world, that virtual world ceases to be a platform for open-ended use. It becomes a game. Period.

[Maria Korolov]

It goes back to the age-old question -- is Second Life a game or a platform?

If Second Life is a game, then game-like rewards and motivators make total sense.

If Second Life is a platform, then all those things would just be in the way.

Take, for example, your favorite blogging service: would you still choose it if you had to "earn" every letter you posted?

But Scrabble, say, wouldn't be anywhere near as much fun if you could have as many letters as you wanted.

However, I can definitely see someone starting a grid in OpenSim on this principle -- no prims for anyone until you earn them (so you'd have to use a custom viewer, with building turned off -- maybe a version of a Unity 3d-based viewer like Canvas or Rezzable). And the prims would be your building blocks -- pieces of wood, metal, or whatever.

Obviously, no hypergrid teleports in or out, either -- otherwise, people would smuggle prims in. :-)

-- Maria

-- maria

[Arcadia Codesmith]

"If grinding is introduced into a virtual world, that virtual world ceases to be a platform for open-ended use. It becomes a game. Period."

There's no open-ended use in Second Life. Never has been. You have to 'grind' for resources (land and prim allotment). The difference between SL and an MMO is that while an MMO allows you to 'grind' within the context of the world (trading time and effort for resources), SL requires you to either 'grind' in the real world for real money to invest in the world or game other players for their money.

There is no vw/game switch. It's a continuum, not an either/or binary.

[Thre gods are control freaks who micromanage with their technology]

THE WOMEN IN A "NORMAL" FAMILY (non-masculinized/male charecteristics) ARE YOUR "HOLY PEOPLE"!!! THEY ARE YOUR BEST INTERFACE WITH THE GODS!!!
Their role throughout history has been to communicate the god's wisdom given because of their favor so the entire family can progress when reincarnated. Effectively acomplishing this task may buy them a quality opportunity to ascend in their next life.
What about fucked up families where the man submits and the woman is masculinized? When the woman has adopted too many male charecteristics nobody receives the wisdom so necessary for progress to be made and the family remains near stagnant for that generation unless some epiphany is realized.
Your job as a future mother is to learn the god's ways and to help your child understand the proper way to live despite the negative reinforcement and conditioning of today's society. Without consciousous parents fulfilling this role the child will have no hope, and may even exaserbate their disfavor by becoming corrupted in today's environment.
Your ultimate goal is to fix your relationship with the gods and move on. You don't want to be comfortable here, and the changes in Western society in the last 100 years has achieved just that, decreasing the god's role in our everyday lives (medicine cures sickness, drought/weather and the family farm, etc).
1000 years with Jesus is the consolation prize. Don't be deceived into thinking that is the goal.

The gods use all their tools as temptation. Much like Artificial Intelligence misleading people into the concept of "earning", their "clone hosts" promoting The Beast's Californication agenda through popular culture, so too are the god's prophets used in the capacity of temptation. Like the other prophets Mohhamed (polygamy/superiority over women/misogyny) and Jesus (forgiveness/savior), the gods use me for temptation as well. In today's modern society they feel people are most weak for popular culture/sensationalism, and the clues date back to WorldWarII and Unit731:TSUSHOGO, the Chinese Holocaust. They used this Situation to bury Japanese atrocities. The gods never committed despite tens of billions in mass media, product development and natural disasters/tragedy, so they will enjoy the freedom they positioned into the Situation and CHEAT me out of everything.
The gods selected their prophets, used their powers to make it happen, abandoned their prophets and left them stranded to die.
It has been discussed that, similar to the Matrix concept, the gods will offer a REAL "Second Coming of Christ", while the "fake" Second Coming will come at the end and follow New Testiment scripture and their xtian positioning. I may be that real Second Coming.
What I teach is the god's true way. It is what is expected of people, and only those who follow this truth will be eligible to ascend into heaven as children in a future life. They offered this event because the masses have just enough time to work on and fix their relationship with the gods and ascend, to move and grow past Planet Earth, before the obligatory xtian "consolation prize" of "1000 years with Jesus on Earth" begins.

The Prince of Darkness, battling the gods over the souls of the Damned.
It is the gods who have created this environment and led people into Damnation with temptation. The god's positioning proves they work to prevent people's understanding.
How often is xtian dogma wrong? Expect it is about the Lucifer issue as well.
The fallen god, fighting for a chance for the disfavored, for justice, banished to Earth as the fallen angel?
I believe much as the Noah's Flood event, the end of the world will be initiated by revelry among the people. It will be positioned to be sanctioned by the gods and led for "1000 years with Jesus on Earth". In light of modern developments this can entail many pleasures:::Medicine "cures" aging, the "manufacture" of incredible beauty via cloning as sex slaves, free cocaine (space coke), etc.
Somewhere during the 1000 years the party will start to "die off", literally. Only those who maintain chaste, pure lifestyles, resisting these temptations, will survive the 1000 years. Condemned to experience another epoch of history for their ignorant pursuit of xtianity and worship of their false god, they will be the candidates used to (re)colonize (the next) Planet Earth, condemned to relive the misery experienced by the peasantry throughout the course of history due to their failure to ascend into heaven before the Apocalypse.
Never forget:::It is not a house of Jesus.
If this concept of Lucifer is true another role of this individual may be to initiate disfavor and temptation among this new colonist poulation, the proverbial "apple" of this Garden of Eden. A crucial figure in the history of any planet, he begins the process of deterioration and decay that leads civilizations to where Planet Earth remains today.

Consistant with "reverse positioning" understand the REAL Second Coming would equate with The Matrix's Anti-Christ, the fake battle of good and evil which will come at the end.
Understanding how they use the political environment to redefine people's value system, realize anyone who speaks of the old world and its ways will envoke hatred. So when/if the Anti-Christ comes along speaking of reverting back to what liberalism would consider regressive and unfair, it may be the only hope to salvage the god's favor and buy more time rather than begin the 1000 year clock. The fake Second Coming will feed into this political enviornment.
Also consistant with "reverse positioning" recognize the gods will offer a REAL Anti-Christ, also known as The Beast. I have addressed these issues in years past::::
The gods will offer clues throughout every dynamic of life. Geographical features on the world map is yet another.
The Beast is not a person, as the xtian Bible would suggest. It is a place:::The San Francisco Bay Area. And it refers to the socio-political poison the region exuded in the latter 20th century which promoted indecent behavior among the people and caused rapid deterioration of their favor among the gods. This decay spread to other states and countries, fulfilling the region's role as The Beast of the Apocalypse.
Another feature which the Gods offer as a clue is very foreboading. Mt. Zion is a mountain to the north of the eye of The Beast Diablo and one which has a working quarry at its base. Consistant with the decay we experience in society, Mt. Zion is being eaten away, slowly stripped of its resources, until one day paradise will be a mere shell of what it once was.
Metaphorically, the Dark Side of the Moon isn't the side which is hidden from us. The benevolent "Man in the Moon" is the one we never see.
We experience the wickedness of the dark side daily through their actions, using their positioning to midlead the disfavored into Damnation by selling them on "earning", among other tactics.

Forgiveness aside because it is bullshit lip service, the price of experiencing this modern societal decay is the revision down of potential time received. Because of these factors those who participated have experienced a lowering of the benefit ceiling that was in place. Whereas centuries ago they were eligible for immortality, theoretically, now that potential has dramatically lowered because of their wicked, immoral behavior of the last 50 years. You may work on your relationship with the gods and even repair it, ascending in some future life. But because you fell for such evil temptation in the 20th & 21st centuries you won't be around nearly as long as your chaste, pure antecedent who ascended centuries before.

If you have got chronic problems you should pray nightly, go back to your place of worship. Only by doing the right things will the gods allow improvement, and only through attonement will they allow progress. You know all the evil you've committed in your life. Observing your parent's issues will help you understand what you've done in a prior life, for the gods reincarnate based on this legacy.

AIDS in Africa was a clue from the gods in an attempt to correct their promiscuous sexual behavior, as was female genitile mutilation. Their positioning says Italian revenge.

A good example of societal decay and how the gods manage their culpability is birth defects. In the past the gods occassionally punished people by divinely creating birth defects in the womb. Now, with the advent of biotechnology, they tempt the mother with "earning" and compell her to take a substance in utero which deforms the fetus, dispelling the gods of blame and future compensation to the disfavored. Incidentally, they use liberal policies in today's socio-political environment to pay for these individuals, ensuring a lifetime wasted, for they have no hope for progress. Too often in the past they were mercifully killed by loved ones and upon reincarnation brought back without this handicap, allowing them a chance to achieve progress immediately.
The gods are washing their hands of culpability.
The gods are washing their hands of Planet Earth.

The gods have no sexual organs. The reproduce via cloning. They don't respect sex. You can understand this clue with how the most disfavored around us behave sexually and the use of promiscuity among the young people.
The gods take children because of their innocence and purity. When a child ascends into heaven AI relieves them of this temptation that is their sexual organs.

Much like the immigration issue, the reason Muslims cover their women isn't because of the god's REAL reason. Sex is the African's biggest problem, and concealing their women allows the gods to justify containing men's behavior.
In the 60s and 70s the discussion was public that how women dressed caused their own sexual assault and rape. And this is very much true. In today's society these men have release, the women are sluts, for if they continued to dress this way without conceeding sexual relations there would be far more incidents than are reported.
Women are to blame for the deterioration and decay of society and will be responsible for the end on Planet Earth. Throguhout history they were enforcers of decency among favored people, married at 15 and used to contain men's behavior in the context of society, and as we slipped into the indecency of patriarchy the women relinquished control,
The gods did this all to you. They used their tool of xtainity to achieve it. And it fits their agenda for decay, allowing them to ultimately justify Apocalypse.

Don't forget:::Whether war, slavery, torture, any holocaust, crack babies, drive by shootings, AIDS or any other misery inflicted on mankind throughout history know the gods did this to you for evil of your past lives.
The gods are control freaks who micromanage through their technology. The "Man in the Moon" feature illustrating their benevolence quite frankly is inaccurate in the dying days of this or any planet.

The symbol of the false god Jesus is a cross.
The symbol of the gods is a star, perhaps with a circle.

A victim of the god's irresponsible use of their power::::
The gods selected their prophets, used their powers to make it happen, abandoned their prophets and left them stranded to die.
Considered necessary for positioning despite destroying my youth and my life, taking my health was a fatal mistake.
The Crucible:::"Go along" with positioning or die.
-The exploited. The gods suggest they will only telepathically admitt any of this is true (based on level of favor) only after I die.

You fuckers need an epiphany. Like the species die-off wasn't enough? How about when we experience an massive closure of churches across the country?? When that day comes you will have waited too long. It will be too late.