“Minecraft” is that type of game that has withheld the test of time. It has been supported by the chunky 16-bit blocks for over a decade and has secured its spot as the second-best-selling video game of all time (falling short of “Tetris”). Is anyone shocked? The ultimate sandbox game has been charming people for 13 years and it doesn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon.
It has seen an immense number of changes, starting with only grass and cobblestone, to adding mobs and different biomes, to being able to change your avatar’s skin, to flowers, to the nether, to even more mobs being added. Minecraft is never short of an expansion. With that being said, the earlier Minecraft versions were best.
“The Golden Age,” if you will.
There is a reason that so many gamers return to dated versions of Minecraft and play on 1.2.5, or even the alpha and beta versions of the game.
As an incredibly sentimental and nostalgic person, I obviously must be incorporating my own biases. Yes, maybe there is some bias there. I reminisce of the days when I didn’t know how to advance and built dirt huts, only for them to be destroyed by creepers and endermen. I stroll down memory lane to the late hours I would play with my friends and brother building and mining and crafting. Even so, I find that the earlier versions were just as strong as today, possibly even better.
The reason for this is simplicity.
The Minecraft of today has been so diluted and bloated with so many new additions that starting a new world can feel overwhelming. The player is faced with far too many choices: “Where do I build my house: the jungle or the cherry blossom forest? Where should I start: mining or getting food? What do I even do?” These problems were not entirely resolved in the earlier versions of the game. You still had to decide where to start, where to live, and what to do in this endless sandbox. However, the options were significantly fewer.
You didn’t have as many options, there were fewer mobs, fewer blocks, fewer biomes, fewer everything. Of course, you could play today and just try to ignore these elements, but that’s difficult when the original foundation of the game has been uprooted and replaced. There is no longer the same world generation and combat is entirely different than it once was. These are a fraction of the changes. The mindset to just ignore them if they do not interest you and to let other players enjoy them is not applicable. That is not to say that they are bad. The developers are incorporating more for the player to utilize, but in the process the simplicity and peacefulness of the game is being lost.
When we return to “The Golden Age,” everything is limited and there is no one direct path of what to do. You can build and never have the desire to get diamonds if you don’t want to, or you can mine and get the strongest armor. The possibilities seem endless, without a pressure that there is stuff to get done. It feels tranquil, like a respite from the world.
Minecraft, as a sandbox, is in the same realm of Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing, two games known for being peaceful and just enjoying the day in and out of the game. Minecraft, evidently, has a lot more freedom and caters to a wider range of players than these two games will (with combat and freedom to build). It no longer has that relaxing and childlike touch to it.
Minecraft is not a bad game. It never was. It has been a game that millions of people have found comfort and enjoyment in. However, “The Golden Age,” as the title suggests, was the strongest. The feeling of simplicity and unadulterated bliss secured it as the greatest generation of Minecraft versions that the current ones have yet to compare to.
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