Minecraft Video Game Series

The full version of the game was released in 2011. Minecraft offered five gameplay modes after all updates were included. The basic ones were Creative and Survival. The first focuses exclusively on the creative layer: here we have access to an unlimited number of resources, in addition to being able to fly, which makes it much easier to erect more complex structures and orient ourselves. The second makes the game similar to survivalist productions, forcing the player to independently and painstakingly acquire resources and produce items. In addition, we encounter all sorts of monsters on the map, which forces us to build shelters and produce weapons. The other available modes are Hardcore (the game is much more difficult, and the death of the protagonist means the end of the game), Adventure (allows designing adventures and challenges for other players) and Spectator (we freely explore a given world, but cannot interact with it). The title is being developed all the time, and with successive updates new content appears - for example, in June 2016 a Battle mini-game appeared, allowing PvP play.

The title was also released on mobile devices as Minecraft: Pocket Edition. Initially, its content was much poorer than the basic version, but over time it got elements unavailable in other editions. Cooperation with Microsoft also resulted in the release of the game Minecraft: Education Edition, conceived as a tool to support teaching. Interestingly, the production was used not only to teach mathematics or programming, but also art history or poetics. A distinctive feature of this edition were numerous facilities for teachers and students - including improved maps, an expanded multiplayer mode and the ability to take screenshots.

In the series Minecraft the player finds himself in a world created from small cubic blocks, known as voxels. The blocks represent different materials - grass, earth, stone, wood, lava or water - and have corresponding properties. The idea of the game is to build and destroy structures built from these elements. The gameplay does not give the player any guidelines - he has a free hand in shaping the virtual world in any way he wants, and it depends only on his invention what he decides to do in it. The physics of the world is not realistic - most elements do not yield to gravity, so it is possible, for example, to create flying structures by removing the "supports" of the objects in question.

The game has a day and night cycle, each of which lasts about twenty minutes of real time. When the sun is shining, we are generally safe and can focus on building and exploiting the world without worry. After dark, however, monsters come out into the world, forcing us to wait out the danger in a hideout or arm ourselves with weapons and appropriate armor. Hostile creatures also appear during the day in places where light does not reach, so before venturing deep into the virtual universe it is worth stocking up on torches and other sources of fire.

The series has been an incredible success around the world. In June 2016, the media reported 100 million copies sold, which would mean that Minecraft is the best-selling production on personal computers and the second - after Tetris - the most sought-after game in general. The series has also made its presence felt in popular culture. The series boasts its own line of LEGO bricks, toys, books, magazines or clothing. Fans of the game gather every year at the MineCon convention, which has been held practically since the beginning of production. In 2015, the event attracted 10,000 people, making the event the largest event dedicated to a single game. In late 2015 and early 2016, Telltale Games studio released an episodic game Minecraft: Story Mode, which was an original combination of the elaborate stories characteristic of the American developer with the voxel-based world of Minecraft.