VOL 17 March/April

gamesradar+

re e w
uurew
ss
e
100% UNOFFICIAL!
0
aattd-n-n
PRESENTS

ffee nnd
10
ffttbrraa
raa f b
eccrs oof

MINECRAFT
in e e s
M i ng e
paag
p
M

PS4 n XBOX ONE n SWITCH n PC n PS3 n 360 n PS VITA n iOS n ANDROID

PS4 n XBOX ONE n Wii U n PC n PS3 n 360 n PS VITA n iOS n ANDROID
challenge of
a lifetime
10 MODS TO PUT YOUR
SKILLS TO THE TE
ST
Ultimate evil

Perplexing
Puzzle Maps
Create your own devilishly
cunning conundrums

The
Ultimate
Survival
how to
protect
your home

Guide
Survive an
Everything you alien invasion
need to stay alive Bite-sized
for longer build guides
Edition
Digital

far lands or bust king of the castle not like this…

Second
edition

Inside one player’s six-year quest! Create your own impenetrable fort The worst ways to die in Minecraft
 gamesradar+
PRESENTS

MINECRAFT
Survival is the very bedrock on which Minecraft is built. While it’s always
amazing to see what weird and wonderful creations avid builders come
up with, the thrill of using those crafting skills to stay alive against
all odds in harsh climates packed with aggressive mobs is practically
unparalleled. That’s why we chose to dedicate this edition to practical
survival – using the tricks and techniques you’ve mastered in the
peace and quiet of Creative mode to make your Survival adventures as
flexible, interesting, and pain-free as possible. Whether it’s fortifying
your homestead to protect against wild creatures, upgrading to an
impenetrable fortress to call home, or crafting devious traps to make
short work of your foes, you’ll find loads of cool ways to get creative in
Survival mode in the pages that follow. And for true Minecraft masters,
we’ve curated lists of the best mods that will put your survival skills to
the ultimate test. Are you up to the challenge?
 gamesradar+
PRESENTS

MINECRAFT
Future PLC One Lombard Street, Suite 200
San Francisco, CA 94111 (650) 872-1642

Editorial
Editor Ross Hamilton
Senior Designer Adam Markiewicz
Editor in Chief Jon White
Senior Art Editor Andy Downes
Contributors
Amy Best, Wesley Copeland, Emma Davies, Samuel Horti, Joel McIver,
Dom Reseigh-Lincoln, Mark Wynne
All copyrights and trademarks are recognised and respected
Advertising
Media packs are available on request
Commercial Director Clare Dove
[email protected]
International
International Licensing Director Matt Ellis
[email protected]
Circulation
Head of Newstrade Tim Mathers
Production
Head of Production Mark Constance
Production Project Manager Clare Scott
Advertising Production Manager Joanne Crosby
Digital Editions Controller Jason Hudson
Production Managers Keely Miller, Nola Cokely,
Vivienne Calvert, Fran Twentyman
Business
Vice President, Sales Stacy Gaines
Vice President Strategic Partnerships Isaac Ugay
East Coast Account Director Brandie Rushing
East Coast Account Director Michael Plump
West Coast Account Director Austin Park
Director of Marketing Robbie Montinola
Director, Retail Sales Bill Shewey
Management
Managing Director Aaron Asadi
Commercial Finance Director Dan Jotcham
Editorial Director Paul Newman
Head of Art & Design Greg Whitaker
Distributed by Curtis Circulation Company, 730 River Road,
New Milford, NJ 07646-3048
Phone: (201) 634-7400
www.curtiscirc.com
Minecraft is a trademark of Microsoft. 2018 © Microsoft

Gamesradar Presents The Ultimate Guide to Minecraft Volume 17

© 2018 Future Publishing Limited

We are committed to only using magazine paper which is derived from responsibly managed, certified forestry and chlorine-free manufacture. The paper in this
magazine was sourced and produced from sustainable managed forests, conforming to strict environmental and socioeconomic standards. The manufacturing paper
mill holds full FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) certification and accreditation

All contents © 2018 Future Publishing Limited or published under licence. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be used, stored, transmitted or reproduced
in any way without the prior written permission of the publisher. Future Publishing Limited (company number 2008885) is registered in England and Wales. Registered
office: Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA. All information contained in this publication is for information only and is, as far as we are aware, correct at the time of
going to press. Future cannot accept any responsibility for errors or inaccuracies in such information. You are advised to contact manufacturers and retailers directly with
regard to the price of products/services referred to in this publication. Apps and websites mentioned in this publication are not under our control. We are not responsible
for their contents or any other changes or updates to them. This magazine is fully independent and not affiliated in any way with the companies mentioned herein.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to PO Box 2024, Langhorne, PA 19047, USA. Ride-Along Enclosure in the following editions: None. Standard Mail Enclosure in the
following editions: None. Canadian returns should be sent to IMEX Global Solutions, PO Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2, Canada. Future US, Inc. also publishes Maximum
PC, Official Xbox Magazine, and PC Gamer.

PRODUCED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

Future plc is a public Chief executive Zillah Byng-Thorne

company quoted on the Non-executive chairman Peter Allen
London Stock Exchange Chief financial officer Penny Ladkin-Brand
(symbol: FUTR)
www.futureplc.com Tel +44 (0)1225 442 244

Part of the

gamesradar+ bookazine series

Contents
10 stay alive in
survival mode
Ten essential life-saving tips every
Discovery adventurer should know

SHADERS
20 HOme security
Made a beautiful house
you can be proud of? Now stop
those pesky mobs from ruining it

30 king of the castle

Build a mighty fortress to
help keep your enemies at bay

40 the hardest mods

Think you’re a Minecraft
expert? These punishing mods will
challenge even the best players…

18
Tumbleweed Town
52 mini-builds: panic
room & archery set
How to build one safe place, and one
not-so-safe place. Can you guess
10
which is which?

20

28
Rocky Retreat

54

86

38
Manor of Madness

50
Cyrodiil Calling 30

06 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 62
Majestic Mountains

72
Aerial Adventure

40
54 outwitting
an alien
Alien: Isolation, completely remade in
Minecraft. Ready to hide behind the sofa?

64 the worst ways to die

in minecraft
We run down the stickiest of ends, and
84
Among the Clouds
try to help you avoid them!

74 riddle me this…
How to create puzzle maps
that will stump and surprise the world!

82 mini-builds: Homing
beacon & shelter
Find your way home. Or just dig yourself a
brand new one

86 far lands or bust

YouTuber kurtjmac talks us
through his epic six-year quest to
92
Cast Adrift
Minecraft’s strangest places

74

94
Winter’s Grasp

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 07
 stunning
Shaders!
How to make
Minecraft look amazing

M
inecraft’s simple design shaders, which prove there’s more to the game
means it never feels than square suns and chunky skies. Best of all,
outdated. While other it’s easy to make it look this good. Over to the
games try to amaze us with right we have a simple, step-by-step guide on
photorealism and clattering how to make shaders work. You can only use
set-pieces, Minecraft has them on the PC and Pocket Edition versions of
remained blocky, simple and superb. It’s better Minecraft, though – if you’re playing on console
for it. We can smile at people spending their you’ll just have to look at these fabulous screens
pennies on PC upgrades, then smugly return to and use your imagination.
our cubic wonderland, safe in the knowledge A word of warning though. Some of the
that it doesn’t matter what Minecraft looks like. shaders require serious processing power to
But what if you were tempted by that dark path? run, so you may end up having to upgrade your
What if you wanted to keep digging, but in a PC, exactly like the people we were laughing at
world that looked incredible – surely, there’s a before. Another issue is that by default, Minecraft
limit to what you can do to a game that’s mainly on PC uses a paltry maximum 1GB of RAM. That’s
about boxy dirt? fine when it’s running in its lean, vanilla state, but
Prepare to be amazed. Shaders are a type you’ll need more oomph to make shaders work.
of mod that lets you tweak the appearance of That’s why we’ve also given you a guide on how
the game without altering the core structure to allocate more memory to Minecraft. Don’t
of Minecraft. By using them you can get worry if that sounds all technical and dry – it’s
photorealistic lighting, motion blur, or even just a dead easy.
lag-reducing boost to the standard game. You’ve Because this is a survival special, we’ve gone
probably had a sneaky look at the shots on the one step further and used some amazing, epic
right already, so you can see that with the right maps to make Minecraft’s harshest terrains look
shaders, Minecraft can become a completely extra impressive. You can find all the necessary
different-looking game. links on the pages scattered throughout this
Scattered throughout this volume you’ll find volume. Experiment yourself, and discover your
a selection of stunning shots using our favorite own world of daring adventures.

08 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
How to make
shaders work
1 Before you start grabbing every shader you can see, you’ll
need to download and install the following bits and pieces:

Minecraft Forge http://bit.ly/1iTpoDF

Optifine http://bit.ly/21hI29Y
GLSL Shaders Mod http://bit.ly/1wdaxqj

Read the install instructions for each one, as they all require
a slightly different process. Also remember that Minecraft
has recently updated, too, so always try to grab the most
recent patch wherever possible.

2 Once they’re all safely installed, you’re ready to go.

First grab yourself some shaders, and drop them in the
following location: %appdata%\.minecraft\shaderpacks
You won’t need to extract the files.

3 When you run the game, press the options button in the
menu, then select shaders. Then simply click on the shader
you want, and voila! A new world awaits you.

How to allocate
more memory
to Minecraft
Some of the shaders ask serious questions
of the measly 1GB RAM that Minecraft uses.
Don’t worry though – it’s easy to share the load.

• First off, find out how much RAM your PC has. However
much you have, remember that you’ll need some spare
for other functions, such as your operating system. For
example, if you have 20GB to play with, consider allocating
no more than 12GB to Minecraft.
• We’re assuming you’re running the most recent version
of the game, so you should have the Minecraft launcher.
This is where you tweak things. Right click on Minecraft and
choose to run it as an administrator. You have the power!
• At the bottom of the launcher you’ll see a dropdown menu
next to ‘Version’. Click the ‘edit profile’ button next to it.
• When the menu opens, go to the ‘Java Settings
(Advanced)’ section. Add a tick to the ‘JVM Arguments’ box.
This lets you modify the Minecraft program directly.
• It should say ‘-Xmx1G’ in the JVM Arguments box. This is
the thing you want to change. That means 1GB is allocated
to Minecraft. You need to change the number. So, if you
were allocating 4GB, you’d change it to ‘-Xmx4G’. If you were
changing it to 8GB, it’d be -Xmx8G’, and so on. Simple.
• Save your profile before exiting. This is important!
• Run Minecraft, knowing that your PC is now working
harder to make things look wonderful.
• If you want to check that it worked, press F3 while playing
to open the console. The ‘Allocated Memory’ message
should tell you how much Minecraft is using. That’s it!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 09
 Stay
alive
in Survival mode!
Want to become a master of Minecraft? Follow our tips
and you’ll go from novice to survival expert in no time…

C
reation might be a little scary
at first, but there are few things
as terrifying as trying to last the
first night in Survival mode. As
intimidating as it might be, this is way
Minecraft is meant to be played, so
learning how to survive is all part of
the fun. Whether it’s understanding the dangers of digging
too far down (or digging up at all), learning when to eat
certain foods, or creating an infinite source of water, there
are loads of ways to keep ahead of the horrible creatures
that come out when the sun goes down.
Whether you’re a seasoned Minecraft pro or a first-time
miner, we’ve got ten essential tips to help you dominate in
Minecraft’s Survival mode. So sit back, dust off your Ender
Chest, craft yourself a trusty pickaxe, and prepare to master
the art of block-based survival.

10 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 01

Dig the
right way
W
ithout the safety net of Creative mode’s
god-like powers, there are new rules
that need to be followed in order to
avoid death in Survival mode. Here’s a biggie that
most new players forget – be careful when digging
up or down. Digging straight down could lead
anywhere, including straight down into a chasm or
into lava. Digging down in a step-like pattern can
help, but it will ultimately make you hungrier.
Digging upwards can also be dangerous, mainly
because blocks have properties in Survival mode
that make them heavier. Since some blocks are
heavy enough to crush you (or suffocate you),
avoid it if you can to prevent nasty surprises.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 11
 02
Torches
stop
suffocation
W
hile it might be great for providing in light in the
darkest of places, the humble torch can actually save
your life if you have to dig up. The item works a bit
like a protective shell, since the game views it as a block.
So if you’re digging underneath something like stone or
sand, the falling bits and pieces won’t suffocate you like normal.
Torches can also be used to create temporary air bubbles when
placed against a wall in the event of releasing water from above!

03

know your
foods
O
ne of the biggest things to consider in Survival mode is food
and hunger. Surviving is a tough old business and you’re
going to need some chow in your belly to keep you going.
However, different foods refill your hearts with different amounts, so
eating something big to fill a single heart would be a total waste.
For instance, a Steak will net you eight points, while a piece of Raw
Salmon will refill only two. Don’t eat your bigger or more nutritious
snacks unless you’re down to your last heart of health or so.

12 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 beware of
04 getting
tired
S
taying alive in Survival mode means digging,
smelting, building and more – all that hard work is
going to require a lot of energy. However, working
hard means you’ll start to get a rumble in your belly. Since
there usually isn’t that much food in the first few hours of
your adventure, working yourself hungry is far too easy.
To avoid wasting energy, try building roads or paths with
Slabs or Stairs as this significantly reduces energy loss while
walking or running. The Stairs trick also works really well if
you’re trying to dig a stair mine, ensuring you don’t waste
away while digging deep.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 13
 infinite
water
source
O 05
ne of the best ways to survive in the
long term is growing your very own
crops, and while you don’t need water
to make them grow, water makes them grow
considerably faster. So dig a hole that’s one block
deep, one block wide and three blocks long.
Fill it with water and you can keep refilling your
bucket from the middle block. Every time you
do, the water on either side will refill the middle.

Water bucket
lifesaver
06 I
n Creative mode, you can fly and stop your fall with the tap of
a button or the click of an analog stick. But in Survival mode,
you won’t have that luxury. In fact, you’ll go splat if you fall from
anything higher than 23 blocks!
Jumping into a body of water, such as a lake or ocean, will be
enough to break your fall. However, since not every place you’re
exploring has such a thing, equip a bucket of water and throw it down
beneath you as you fall for a safe landing.

14 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 07
Zombie-
proof your
door
W
hen night falls in Survival mode, the monsters
come out to play. One of the most dangerous –
and the most aggressive – is the Zombie mob.
They’ll usually spawn near a house or village, and they’ll
immediately try to break in. Typical zombies!
To stop the undead ruining your Minecraft party, try this
little trick. Place your door on the side of the blocks that
make up your door frame, rather than at the front of back.
When it closes, the game will read the door as being open,
and the Zombie won’t try to break it down!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 15
 08
Cook
with fire
F
ood is really important when it comes to
staying alive in the more dangerous version of
Minecraft, and cooking your food will increase
the number of hearts it will replace when you eat it.
However, it can be hard to do this if you’re in a hurry or
just starting out.
Instead, why not try using fire to set animals such
as pigs or cows aflame? As long as the animal is still
burning when it dies, it will drop cooked meat instead of
raw chunks, which it a great time-saver.

09

Use an
Ender Chest
Y
our inventory isn’t the never-ending TARDIS it is in Creative mode, so you
need to get clever when trying to survive. Since your inventory can only
hold a limited number of resources, you’ll probably want to make use of a
special trick involving an Ender Chest.
Craft an Ender Chest, hit it with a Pickaxe that’s been treated with Silk Touch and
you’ll be able to fill it to your heart’s content. Now you can destroy it and carry on
with your game – when you craft another, all your items will be right there inside!

16 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
Stop lava 10
with
Ladders
W
hile it might not be obvious to new players,
lava can be a really big problem if you’re
starting to mine deep for resources.
It can also be a real issue if you’re building a base
underground to keep safe from mobs. That’s where
Signs and Ladders come in.
The game treats a Ladder and a Sign as a whole
block, so if placed correctly, you can create what’s
known as a ‘lava trap’. It’s also a great way to provide
lighting inside a cave or underground village. Just make
sure there are no gaps in the trap!

10

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 17
18 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 shaders

Tumbleweed
Town
Shader Sonic Ether’s Unbelievable Shaders (http://bit.ly/2lp3ort)
Map Wild West (http://bit.ly/2koX5o5)

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 19
 Protecting
Your Home
Made a killer home and want to keep away
uninvited guests? Here’s how to do it…

H
ow many times has a Creeper blown up your house? Too many? What
about other players coming and robbing your hard-earned loot? Fear no
more, as we’ll be showing you how to go about protecting your home
by covering everything from the most obvious things, all the way to the
most obscure ways possible.
One of the key factors when protecting a build is remembering to
do the obvious and think outside the box. Mobs can be contained by
sticking to what’s already tried and tested, but when it comes to real human players, you need
to get a bit crafty, simply because human players set on looting will likely know all the popular
traps and therefore can avoid them with ease. But what they haven’t planned on is you having
this guide. To victory!

20 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 01
light
it up
T
here is one sure-fire method to keep
mobs away: Light. Even though during the
day your only real threats are Creepers
and Endermen, when night falls, anything is fair
game in the unforgiving world of OMG-Why-Are-
There-So-Many-Mobs-In-My-World-Craft. To avoid
getting overrun while you’re working at night,
lighting up the inside of your home or home area
is the best way to keep mobs at bay. Torches are
arguably the best light source in the game due
to how easy they are to craft. Beacons have a
higher light output, but when it comes to finding a
beacon versus finding wood and coal, wood and
coal wins every time.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 21
 02

dig a moat
C
reepers are your biggest threat when it comes to keeping
your home in one piece. But what happens to Creepers
when they’re in water? Nothing. They explode, sure, but
you won’t take damage nor will any nearby blocks get blown to
smithereens. If you don’t fancy digging a moat all around your
house, you could always mine up a three-wide trench leading to
the house area with walls either side so mobs are forced to cross
into the water to get to you.

03

landmines
T
his might be the easiest trap in all of Minecraft. Simply place a
pressure plate on top of a block with TNT under it and that’s
your crude trap armed. Of course, don’t arm landmines near
your home area. Instead, place them sporadically around ten blocks
away from your home in every direction. This will result in lots and
lots of holes around where you live, but hey, at least there won’t be as
many mobs to bother you!
22 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 04

Obsidian
Insulation
H
ow do you get the better of an experienced
Minecraft player? That’s where obsidian insulation
comes into play. For this, create rows of obsidian
on the inside of your walls. Whenever another player mines
through your wall, they’ll need at least two blocks of height
to be able to get in, right? So by adding the obsidian in this
manner, it means that they will have to mine at least one
block of obsidian if they want to get in. And as obsidian
takes a whopping 13 seconds for you to mine with a
Diamond Pickaxe, that will be plenty of time for you to line
up some sweet headshots on the intruder.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 23
 05
falling
trap
door
P
icture this: You’re walking along and
see a chest. You open the chest, then
the floor gives way and the next thing
you know you’re eye-deep in lava! If you fancy
trying your hand at creating your very own
falling floor trap, or if you’d like to know how to
convince sand blocks they’re floating, be sure to
check out our fort-building guide on page 30 for
more detailed info regarding how to craft this
malicious monstrosity.

cobweb
06 doors
S
lowing a hostile player down opens up a few options – you
can hack them to pieces, or put a few arrows to their head.
Create a doorway without a door in. We know, we know, it’s
weird, but it works. Then, instead of a regular door, drop in some
cobwebs. When they attempt to go through the obvious entrance,
they’ll be slowed to a snail’s pace, leaving them open to attack. Soul
Sand also works well for this one.

24 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 The
Trapcraft
Mod
Designed by Stewiecraft and
ProPercivalalb, the Trapcraft mod
adds in a selection of useful home
protection devices, namely bear traps
and training dummies. The bear traps
can be used to stop mobs or animals
in their tracks, while the training
dummies act as decoys for most
mobs – they will attack the dummies
instead of going for the player. The
pack also includes a fan to blow away
items, a magnetic chest which pulls
items to it, spikes for a pit trap, and a
deadly fire-throwing machine. Pretty
handy stuff, right? Right.

07
Golem
Defense Force
I
ron Golems hit really, really hard, making them the strongest home
defense unit out there. In case you don’t know how to build them,
here’s a quick recap: Place four iron blocks in a ‘T’ shape, then
add a pumpkin as the head and presto change-o, an Iron Golem will
spring to life. The only thing to keep in mind with these hardy brutes is
they’re not the smartest bunch. So if you’ve got a wall surrounding your
homeland, be sure to spawn them inside it – spawn them outside and
they have a habit of wandering off or getting themselves killed!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 25
 animal
army
P
ets in Minecraft aren’t just good for swimming
in lava and shouting at when they sit on a

08
block that’s obviously going to end in their
demise. Why, Mr. Fluffles? Why did you have to dive into
lava when we repeatedly screamed at you to move?
Ahem. Wolves are great for general mob defense, so
that’s killing skeletons and spiders, while ocelots are
the perfect choice for chasing off Creepers. No more
random explosions!

dig down
09 slightly
Z
ombies can break through doors. Yes, it’s all very annoying, but what they
can’t do is break down doors if they’re not level with them. No, really, they’re
intelligent enough to break through doors with their fists but move them
down half a block and they’re utterly screwed. Keep this in mind next time you’re
building a house, and when you place the door, add in some half slabs below it and
it’s completely zombie-proof.
26 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
giving 10
them what
they want
O
kay, bear with us on this. Players attack because
they want something, probably loot. So why
not give it them, albeit with a dastardly twist? A
moving floor trap works in a similar way to our falling floor
trap. But instead of the floor falling into lava, the floor is
pulled left and right by sticky pistons when a player mines
up a specific block. In this case, use diamonds as the bait
and when they mine it, they break a hidden circuit and go
plummeting into, you guessed it, lava! Check out our Traps
tutorials on page 118 for how to build your own version.

10

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 27
 shaders

Rocky
Retreat
Shader MrMeepz’ Shaders (http://bit.ly/2cAzWtH)
Map Beyond the Dwarven Dark (http://bit.ly/2fVcU4w)

28 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 29
 The High-wall
Fortress
How to build an epic fort to keep your enemies at bay

30 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 01
find some
space
Start by finding yourself a big ol’ open space
– you’ll need it! Then, add stone bricks, stone
steps, spruce wood, and spruce wood fence
to your hotbar. Next create a three-wide door
frame from the stone bricks and lay down
steps in front to act as pillars. Make a five-long
wall on both sides of the door, then add
spruce wood at both ends. Add some more
pillars at the base of the spruce, before using
steps to design the windows.

02
the other
walls
Run a layer of spruce half-slabs on top of
the wall. Next up, lay stone half-slabs and
stone bricks along the top, one block out to
create a battlement formation. Now create
three more walls, this time by counting 13
blocks out, dropping down spruce wood so
you know where the corners will be. From
there, add in the pillars at the base of the
spruce then continue the castle formation
all around the newest three sides.

ho doesn’t love

W
building castles of epic
proportions? Everyone
loves building forts.
That’s a Minecraft fact.
Just like how everyone
gets jump-scared by
sneaky Creepers at some point in Survival. In
this guide, we’ll be showing you how to make
a killer fort, how to design walls and avoid
making a square fort, as well as showing off
some nifty lookout post designs that anyone
can build. For this build, we’ll be using the
Skyrim texture pack. If you don’t own the
Skyrim mash-up, never fear – the Fantasy
pack or even the base game pack can still
yield glorious results.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 31
 03
Finishing
the Walls
What we’ll be doing next is essentially copying the front face, only on the
other three sides. With the other corners in place, connect the spruce half-
slabs all around and back onto itself. From here, you can go ahead and use
stone bricks to fill in the bulk of the walls. For the corner turrets, just lay down
extra stone half-slabs so they tower over the smaller stone spikes.

04 the top
section
With the spruce half slabs around the
outside, grab some stone half-slabs
and run them around the inside in a
clockwork fashion. The reason for this
is that if you run it around the inside like
this, you should end up with a five-by-
five gap in the middle. In this gap, create
a small room with castle turrets on top,
then mine the corners out and replace
with spruce wood. You’ve now got
yourself a neat little room on top.

32 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 05
the next
lookout
Around 30 blocks away from the left of
the mini-fort is where we’ll be building
our next section. Don’t worry about
being exact here – just pick a nice flat
space to the left that’s far enough away
to fit a wall between the two. Next, create
this weird star-like shape (five blocks for
the longest sections, four for the smaller
bits). Build the walls up by ten, and add
fences for the windows.

06
front
and
sides
Look at the image. Are you looking?
Still looking? No, you’re reading
this. Go look. Back now? Cool. Add
in the spruce wood on the corners
as shown. From here, in between
the front two spruce, build up by
nine blocks with spruce planks.
Add in the fence on top and in the
windows every three blocks. Now
build up the walls around it and
add in the spruce planks and fence
combo on the two sides.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 33
07 The
first
roofs
This next part is all about building
the roofs. To the right of the large
wall from the last step, run stone
steps in a pyramid formation
angling upwards. In the middle of
the steps, or the corner section, use
spruce steps to break up the stone
a tad. Next, head to the jutting out
bit on the right and build it outward
by three blocks. Add in spruce and
fencing, then build a roof sitting
nicely on top.

08
The
highest
tower
Stretch the roof across the entire
structure from one side to the other.
On the back five-wide section, create
a roof on top and build it back so it
stops right before the roof stretching
across. Now go and build two flat
roofs on each of the two corners
sections. You should be able to
connect the two smaller sections into
the roof coming from the five-wide
section. Add a roof above the main
tower, fill in the back wall and this
part’s done!

34 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
falling floor
Make unwanted guests fall to their doooooooom!

1
Let’s kickstart this build by digging up a wide
hole. The measurements here don’t matter, so 1
as big or as small as you want. Just make sure
you leave a four-block gap at the top, and a two-
block gap below for the lava (seeing as a single layer of
lava will be covered when the blocks fall).

2
With the hole all mined out, count a few
blocks back, dig a hole heading straight
down, then curve it into the hole. This new
gap will allow us access to the underside later
on, which is crucial to this build. Afterwards, grab some
dirt and add a layer four blocks deep into the hole. And
now, count the space to make sure it’s definitely four
blocks lower than ground level.

3
This trap uses an exploit to trick the game,
so it’s imperative you follow the instructions
closely. Grab rose bushes and lay them on
every single block of dirt. Don’t use any other
flowers, and make sure the rose bushes are two blocks
high. Using tall grass, for example, will cause the blocks
to fall rather than float, and we don’t want that.

4
Lay sand on top of all the rose bushes. And
2 3
to keep nosey players out, add a chest
in the centre. Now here comes the other
important part. Follow your tunnel from Step
2 underground. First, smash all the rose bushes (but
not the sand or the blocks yet). Next, with all the rose
bushes gone, mine up the layer of dirt.

5
Your trap is now armed and ready! The game
doesn’t know the blocks are floating, so when
the chest opens, that updates the sand blocks
and causes the ground to give way. Go ahead
and cover up the hole, and if you want to change this
so the trap keeps unwanted mobs away, just switch the
chest for pressure plates (before you lay the sand on!).

4 5

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 35
09
The final
tower
Find a massive space to the right of the
first structure. Here, build a two-wide
door frame with inward-facing steps
at the top. To the right and left of the
frame, create two pillars, one block out,
surrounded by steps at the top and
bottom. Directly on top of the pillars, run
a row of cracked stone bricks. Head back
down to the doorframe and build the wall
around it. Now repeat this process twice
above to make a three-tiered front. With
that complete, repeat the process for the
other three walls.

10
top
of the
tower
For this part, we’ll be laying down the
groundwork for the top section. Follow
the pillars up and place a single stone
block in line with them on all four sides.
Next, drop a set of upside-down stone
steps on the block facing outward. Now
run a row of stone bricks on top of the
steps to create a floating square. Finally,
add in the blocks as shown before,
placing steps on top to finish off.

11 inside
out All that’s left now is to add a bit
of brick work from the inside. At
the top, don’t forget we’re inside
the tower now – lay in the floor.
Now pick a wall, any wall. Create
the diamond shape by using a
step formation heading upward
toward the center and then place
actual steps on the them. When
you view this from the outside,
you should be left with a nice
amount of both depth at texture
at the top of the final tower.

36 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 12
build the
walls up
We’re on the home stretch! This is the last of the
real building, and all we need to do is create walls
interlinking our towers. Start by building three sets
of steps coming off the right and left sides of our first
structure. The wall itself is three cobblestone blocks
surrounded by stone bricks. Here’s a tip: don’t have
straight walls or you’ll end up with a square. Using
straights and turns helps make it look more realistic.

Build bonus
Blacksmith
Forge
Blacksmith forges offer no useful gameplay
advantages, but boy do they look great!
This build, created by 04hockey in just 30
minutes, uses a mix of stone bricks, stone
half-slabs, and what appears to be spruce

13
wood and planks. The general idea here is
four corner posts with four, three-wide mini-
roofs on each of the different sides leading

light it up
into a small tower with a light at the top so
it’s nice and visible from a distance. As for the
That’s the main bulk of this build out of the way. All that’s left now is to fill the inside with useful continuous fire, all blocks will eventually go
survival fodder. Why not a decent sized house for storage? A barn for livestock? A mini-farm? out with the exception of Netherrack, which
A blacksmith forge? Just when you’re done, don’t forget to grab a load of torches and light stays lit forever.
the place up. After all, light blocks mobs from spawning. And the last thing you want any
unexpected night visitors!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 37
38 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 shaders

Manor of
Madness
Shader Sildur’s Vibrant Shaders Extreme (http://bit.ly/2ksoVQ7)
Map The Asylum (http://bit.ly/1oloOmu)

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 39
 Fight
To Survive!
A dozen killer PC mods which will make
Survival mode tougher. Let’s separate the
miners from the minors!

P
laying Minecraft on a PC? Then you’re in for a treat. While we love
mining on any platform, the ease of download and sheer range of
mods available to laptop or desktop players lends our gaming a
whole universe of new opportunities for innovation. Thanks to a
huge online community, a massive number of mods can be searched
out and investigated with no more than a couple of mouse clicks.
Of course, the internet is populated by malfunctioning, ineffective or simply
boring mods, so don’t just download anything that takes your fancy. Read some peer
reviews first, and expect some bugs every now and again. We like to refer to www.
minecraftforum.net, for example, because new mods posted there come with
screenshots and instructions. Check out this ultimate mods list for players who want their
Survival games to be even tougher than usual!

40 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 01
Orespawn
Shock and ore!

O
respawn is one of the ultimate Minecraft
mods if your objective is to engage in a battle
to the death with a range of truly heinous
monsters – and why else would you bother playing,
eh? Sometimes you’re just not in the mood for building
a pleasant home in a forest; you want to take on a
creature like Orespawn’s frankly terrifying Doom
Worm boss instead. Then there are dragons, krakens,
dungeons, and something called Mobzilla that we’re
too scared to even look at, let alone fight…

Download http://bit.ly/1dG0sa8
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 41
 02
Cubic Lucky
Block
Block rockin’ beats

T
he makers of Cubic Lucky Block have included some truly
amazing features in their mod, including a mighty range
of hostiles for you to defeat… or be killed by! How about
an entire army of Ghost Spiders, for starters? Or a platoon of
Runescape Demons? And whatever Allosaurus and Nastysaurus
had for breakfast, it’s certainly turned them into tough opponents
to beat. Never mind all that, though: the mod creators convinced
us when they asked, ‘Have you ever want to see a Tower of
Amethyst, Ruby, Uranium and Titanium fall from the sky?’

Download http://bit.ly/2xWUBTP

03

Godzilla
T-Rexstasy

T
he films, anime, novelisations and now the Minecraft
version of Japan’s favorite rogue kaiju have all been
based on one familiar vision: the massive foot of Godzilla
stamping on a building and smashing it to smithereens. Translate
that image to your favorite biome and you’ll appreciate the fun that
is to be had, as well as the sheer terror of trying to stay alive in this
mod. Let’s just put it like this – you won’t be able to kill Godzilla with
a bow and arrow.

Download http://bit.ly/2xWa3zL
42 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 Mythical
04 Creatures
Creature feature

S
words that extend way beyond the reach of your normal blade? Armor that
restores your health? Bows that shoot flaming arrows? Massive explosions
that will take out any mob within several blocks? Take us there! That said,
if your adversaries are the ones equipped with all this lethal kit, you might be
the one on the receiving end rather than the player dishing it out. Well, you’d just
better make sure you’re ready for combat – and that’s before we even get to the
actual monsters of the mod’s title . . .

Download http://bit.ly/2fEteTM
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 43
 05
Tough As
Nails
Hammer time

L
ike an Iron Man triathlon equivalent for
Minecraft, Tough As Nails earns its name
through the increased difficulty that
it offers the player, even in what might seem
like a routine mission. Essentially, the people
behind the mod have come up with ways to
make a campaign in Minecraft trickier, thanks
to innovations such as a thirst monitor (get to
water at regular intervals, or you’ll die) and a
body temperature gauge (don’t get too hot,
or cold, if you want to live). Other cool features
include regularly changing seasons, so make
sure you pack a woolly hat.

Download http://bit.ly/2xk3WnU

Techguns
06 Pistols at dawn

N
ot enough hostile mobs in your world? Grab the Techguns
mod and have yourself a proper war. The non-player
characters that will appear here won’t be slow to attack you,
so make sure you don’t enter their territory (in the form of military
bases) without a decent set of armor and some serious firepower. Note
that if you decide to wander into a base and steal the flag, this will be
regarded as a hostile action and NPCs will swarm over you in large
numbers. Add to this hot and cold biomes that will warm/chill you to
dangerous levels and there’s every reason to dive in.

Download http://bit.ly/2xmDAiH

44 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 Combat
07 Evolved
Fight time

T
his tribute to first-person-shooter games such
as Halo is a fully immersive survival experience,
requiring the player to contest various otherworldly
NPCs of serious strength. Fortunately, you’re also equipped
with super-cool weapons and armor, and you’ve also got
access to a sweet vehicle or two which will get you around
the map in style. New blocks include light emitters, and
there are new ores to explore. Oh, and be careful with those
nuclear weapons – they cause quite a bit of damage!

Download http://bit.ly/2yw8mpN

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 45
 Geomastery
08 Map it up

L
ike the real world, life in the Geomastery mod is
nowhere near as easy and safe as it is in vanilla
Minecraft campaigns. In real life, if you actually had to
lift massive stone blocks and dig huge holes, you’d be there
all week building a single wall. Now, what Geomastery does
that is so clever is make a crafting mission much tougher and
slower than it would be elsewhere, so don’t go in unless you’re
in for some hard work. Obviously the fun element is still there,
though – it’s not like you have to go down to Homebase and
buy a load of concrete or anything, right?

Download http://bit.ly/2hnSG3O

Demonized 09
Speak of the devil

W
hat the hey? Talk about a fight for survival. In the Demonized mod, you
and your adversaries are equipped with a ton of terrifying firepower
that would make an ordinary miner shudder. Take the Demonic
Destroyer, for example – a lightning weapon that will roast people like Emperor
Palpatine did, that time he gave Darth Vader the BBQ treatment. Then there’s a
sword called the Enchanted Scimitar, which burns targets as well as slicing them
into pieces. The equivalent pickaxe is called the Bloody Breaker and outperforms
its diamond counterpart, and then there’s Blood Gem Armor, which has a
ridiculous amount of strength. Add Blood Demons, Mutant Blood Demons and a
four-armed monster called a Squeamer and you’re in for a hell of a mission!

Download http://bit.ly/2hohN2J

46 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 Better
10 Than
Wolves
Howling mad

R
eady to play a really tough game? Try Better
Than Wolves, which looks at first glance like a
standard Minecraft game – until you try to sleep
on a bed (there aren’t any) or skip nighttime to get back
to the safety of daylight (you can’t). Those two factors
alone make survival in BTW rather difficult. Add the fact
that certain soft surfaces like grass or sand slow you down
when you try to traverse them, plus a nightmarish spawn
variation where your reborn character respawns a long
way away from the original point, and you’re in for a tough
time of it. You’re ready for that though, right? Good.

Download http://bit.ly/2jPXbVr

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 47
 11

Invasion
Monster mash

T
ired of building the ultimate fortress, ready to face attack by hordes of
murderous hostiles, only to find that none of them ever arrive? Bored with
preparing your structure for total warfare, only to find that the surrounding
biome is devoid of enemies? Well, all that is about to change with the Invasion
mod, where tons of evil mobs come out of the woodwork as time passes, forcing
you to take them down or have your precious home leveled. We especially like
the option to go away for a couple of days and then come back to face a massive
crowd of baddies.

Download http://bit.ly/2yvz8OI

48 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 12
TragicMC 2
Tough talk

N
ow this is how to make Survival tough. Introduce 40 new
hostile mobs and ten bosses, all of whom will happily
stomp you to death as soon as look at you. Introduce new
blocks and weapons. Add 15 new Potion effects, one of which is a
health-sapper called Cripple and another is called Disorientation,
which makes your field of vision tremble (aaagh!). Include a load of
terrifying Enchantments including vampirism (!) and the ability to
shoot multiple arrows at the same time. Finally, add a new energy
power-up called Doom, which you can use to wipe enemies out in a
variety of interesting ways. Ready for war? Let’s have it!

Download http://bit.ly/2xtJiBf

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 49
50 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 shaders

Cyrodiil
Calling
Shader Chocapic13’s Shaders (http://bit.ly/2cmca1i)
Map Imperial City (http://bit.ly/2xVLT7Y)

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 51
 mini
builds!
Build amazing things in ten minutes!
Construct
a shooting
range

make a target 2 safety first

1 We’ve gone for a tradit
ional pattern, To prevent mobs from cro
ssing your
ver you like. line of sight while you’re sho
but you can use whate oting, it’s worth
fencing in your range. Don’t
forget a gate!

3 mark distance
Set blocks into the ground
to act as
markers to shoot from. Pla
ce a few to help
measure accuracy at differe the supplies
4
nt distances.
Add a chest and stock it with a
few bows and plenty of arrows,
so you’ve always got practice materials
to hand. Then draw your bow, line up
and work on hitting that target.
52 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 Build a
panic
room

set the walls

1 Pick your location and
construct your
m a blast-resistant
panic room’s walls fro
. Don’t forget to
block such as obsidian
lls or ceilings, if
replace any external wa
doorway.
needed! Leave a small

motion sensor
2 Replace one floor-level blo
ck from your
walls with a redstone lamp,
and add pressure
plates around the outside
of your room. The
lamp will act as an alarm, wa
rning you if
anyone is standing outside.

fill it up
t your pressure

lay the redstone cir

4 Once you’ve tested tha
plates light up the lam
p, add some
food,
3 Start off facing the redstone
cuit
chests to your panic ro
om an fill them with
d
ck
lamp enough obsidian to blo
head-on, and lay a trail of red supplies, weapons and sa fe ye t?
stone along the d you. Feel
floor back to each pressure
plate. It’s up the doorway behin
important to start at a 90-de
gree angle to
the lamp to connect the po
wer.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 53
 viv
Sur aryal

Alien
Di

Adventure! We boldly go where few dare to tread – in search of

the most terrifying sci-fi creature of them all

54 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 I
t was only a matter
of time before some
adventurous Minecraft
world-builder paid
tribute to the Alien
movie universe. Eight
movies down the line since the original 1977
thriller, we gamers can’t get enough of the
monstrous extraterrestrials created by artist HR
Giger and director Ridley Scott – and since the
utterly spooky Alien: Isolation computer game
appeared in 2014, we’ve been waiting with
bated breath for a Minecraft map devoted to
the Alien to appear.
And here it is, in the form of Alien: A
Crafter’s Isolation, downloadable at http://bit.
ly/2hwoEqV. The map is less exhausting than
the game which inspired it: you should be able
to complete it in a couple of hours, maybe less.
We love the world design, which takes place on
board a spaceship and which – like the game – is
retro to the core, featuring walls made of lots of
squishy plastic cushions, androids with creepy
expressionless faces, and consoles covered in
flashing lights. The music and ambient effects
are spot-on, too, making the mission – where
you have to solve various puzzles in a bid to
defeat the invulnerable Alien – even more fun.
Be warned, though: there’s a jump scare around
every corner!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 55
 What’s behind
that door?
Help...
PART 1
We kick off our mission by entering the staff
quarters of our unnamed spacecraft. Notice
the space suits hanging in the cabinets
(they’ll come in handy later!), the very 1970s
design (even though we’re centuries into the
future) and oh yes, the feeling of sickening
fear that comes over you when you peer
around corners and those spooky corridors
open up in front of you. Oh, and is that a
motion tracker that we see there? That’ll
come in handy when hostile mobs, in the
form of synthetic humans and drooling hell-
beasts from another galaxy, start dropping on
our heads.

Can’t we just slip

into a space suit
and go home?

Our motion tracker’s

Useful for finding
rats, apparently,
and hopefully
Aliens too…

One of the
many air
shafts you’ll
need to
navigate to
stay alive
Restore power to the
comms system – with
a wrench. Yep, you
heard that right!

PART 2
Climb into this tiny vent and crawl for your
An exploding life! You never know what might be coming
electronics after you, after all. As well as trying to avoid
array! Just dissection by alien, you’ve also got jobs to
do. One of the first of these is to operate the
what we needed communications system. But be careful now,
it might explode if you flip that big red switch.
Oh – it really did explode! Now we’ll have to
fix it, using this wrench that we found down
one of those scary bleak corridors…
56 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
A creepy corridor –
this mission is full
of them!
PART 3
We were just walking down this
ominous-looking corridor, when we
heard the roar of some unearthly
adversary and the scrabble of demonic
claws as something stalked us. The
obvious thing to do was hide, so after
a quick look around, when it quickly
became obvious that there was no
other way of concealing ourselves,
we snuck under this table. It might
still leave us in full view, but it’s better
than nothing… wait, what’s the creepy
creature coming out of that door? It
looks strangely familiar.

Quick, hide under

the table...

Our first view of the Alien.

Why does it remind us of
the Grand National?

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 57
 The inside of a
cabinet. No, it isn’t
very safe…

The inside of an
elevator. No, it isn’t
very safe either…

A handy warning.
Thanks, we hadn’t
thought of that!

PART 4
Hide, hide, hide! This thing will kill you as
soon as look at you. We were just trying to
get away from the area where we first saw
the alien when it jumped on us. First it was
waiting around a corner. Then it fell on us out
of a panel in the ceiling. Then it leaped out of
a cupboard. Our solutions were as follows.
One: hide in a cabinet (it found us and killed
us). Two: hide in an elevator (it found us and
killed us). Three: start crying.

They just keep

on coming!

Come on, you

creepy flat-
faced rogues!
Finally, a
chance to fix fighting off pesky androids, all of whom

PART 5
the plumbing seemed to want us dead, just because we
were trying to close a broken coolant valve.
These blighters take a good dozen hits with
a wrench each before they lie down and
And we thought artificial intelligence was die – it really is rather inconvenient. How are
supposed to be beneficial for humanity? we supposed to complete this mission with
We’ve just spent the best part of 15 minutes C3P0’s mad cousins on our tail?
58 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
Get your space inside the ship, somehow the laughs aren’t
kit on – you’ll
need it! PART 6 quite as readily available as we thought
they’d be. Still, suit up, head on out (there’s
a lovely view of a second spaceship over
Space walks always used to seem like a fun there) and get those brain cells working:
thing to do, but when you’ve got cracks there are quite a few mechanical tasks to
in your space suit helmet and a chance of complete if you want to move onto the
almost certain death when you get back next stage.

Now there’s a view you

don’t see every day

Puzzles in space? Now

you’re talking!

Lovely wallpaper
these Aliens have! PART 7
Climb down this handy ladder and you’ll find yourself entering the
alien hive, perhaps the most unpleasant place we’ve ever seen in
Minecraft. The block textures are beautifully rendered, we admit,
but don’t spend too long admiring them or you’ll find yourself
served up to an alien for breakfast. The sense of impending doom
you get down here is compounded nicely by the presence of Face
Huggers, which – for those who don’t know – are the life stage of the
Xenomorph responsible for jumping on your face and depositing an
egg in your stomach. Lovely. Hand us that wrench!

A Face hugger,
coming to get you.
Hit it hard!

Hold tight now.

Fall off and it’s
all over
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 59
 Solve this, or
die trying!

PART 8
As if dealing with murderous aliens, homicidal
androids and Face Huggers whose aim in
life is to give you a fatal cuddle isn’t enough,
you are forced to complete even more
mechanical puzzles in order to complete your
mission. Flipping a switch isn’t too hard, at
least if you’ve killed all the nearby androids
first, but making sense of those weird graphs
and trying to navigate through a screen of
blurry lines is a nightmare. That TV doesn’t
even show Eastenders.

Don’t you wish you’d

worked harder in
GCSE Maths now?

No, we don’t
understand it either

60 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 The ship’s self-destruct
mechanism, ready to activate

PART 9
If you’ve come through all this stuff unscathed,
with only a few hundred alien-inflicted deaths
under your belt, you deserve a pat on the back.
All that remains to do now is set the spaceship to
explode – how else are you going to ensure that
the inhabitants of the alien hive don’t make it to
Earth? While you’re at it, let’s blow the alien out of
the airlock. Got it trapped nicely? Good – let’s have
a look at it through the window before we press the
goodbye button. Wait... what is this? The Alien looks
exactly like a horse skeleton!
Now we’re ready
for the big bang!

What the hey?

Is the Alien called Dobbin?

Our buddy Charlie,

waiting for us to
come through the
door and say hi Help! We’re doomed!

PART 10
Bye bye, alien – we can relax now. Let’s head Maybe our next mission
down to the bridge to meet our chum Charlie, will take us somewhere
who has been giving us instructions the less stressful…
whole time. Maybe we’ll have tea and biscuits
when we get there. And here we are, just
outside the door. Let’s open up and say hi…
Charlie? Charlie? What’s that creature falling
out of the ceiling and onto the table? Charlie?
Why has everything suddenly gone dark?
Aaaaaaaaaaaggghhhhhh!
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 61
 shaders

Majestic
Mountains
Shader KUDA-Shaders (http://bit.ly/2rYaGRz)
Map Seed 3657966

62 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 63
6
64
Worst
Ways
To Die In
Minecraft“‘O death, where is thy sting?” Getting killed in Minecraft
can be embarrassing! Here’s eight totally cringeworthy
ways for your player to shuffle off…

PRESENTS MINECRAFT
N
obody’s perfect, are they? No matter how many hours of crafting you’ve
put into Minecraft at the expense of sleep and sanity, it’s all too easy for
your character to die in ridiculously silly circumstances. If you’ve ever
wasted a few minutes trolling a hostile mob in Creative mode, before
accidentally switching to Survival and having it instantly kill you, you
know what we’re talking about. Then there’s forgetting that you’re down
to a single heart of health and bumping your head as you ride a minecart;
running out of armor and weapons durability while traversing the
Nether… Minecraft sure is great at making you look stupid.
The eight outstandingly foolish deaths which we’ve listed have all happened to real players in
actual gaming scenarios, and if you’re anything like us, you might have experienced a few of them
yourself! Never mind. If no-one was watching, no-one can prove it ever happened…
 01
Animal
attack!
Step this way…

S
tand next to a cliff and admire the view.
Ah yes – the sea, the sky, the lovely
mountains… wait. What’s this that
has suddenly spawned next to you? Oh, it’s
a friendly, non-hostile pig or cow. How nice.
Hang on, it’s suddenly pushed us off the cliff.
Aaaaaagh! Yes folks, this has actually happened
in Minecraft to players unwary enough to stand
too close to the edge of a cliff. An animal can
magically appear out of thin air and knock
you into the abyss. It’s enough to turn any
vegetarian into a bacon-munching meat freak.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 65
 02
Perilous
parkour
Might as well jump!

P
eople attempting impossible leaps across
car parks, rivers, canyons and whatnot – and
failing miserably – are everyone’s favorite
thing to watch on Youtube. It’s no different in
Minecraft, where we all think from time to time that
we can jump like a Olympic pole-vaulter. So why do
we keep on doing it? There’s no way you can make
that 200-meter leap from the top of that tower, to
the roof of that Woodland Mansion… is there? Only
one way to find out! Down you go, admiring the
view in between multiple facepalms and cries of
‘But I thought I could make it!’ before you go splat
on the rocks below. Time to respawn!

03
trade
off
Buy and die…

N
ewbies to Minecraft might well be
aware that hostile mobs will react
aggressively if you attack them, but
most of them won’t realize – until it’s far too
late – that even if you only try to trade with
a hostile mob, it will probably fly into a rage
and administer an instant beatdown on your
player. We know, it’s not fair. All you were
trying to do was get that friendly-looking
witch to sell you some dinner. How were you
supposed to know that she’d go batpoop-
crazy on you? Anyway, it’s too late now: next
time you see a lady with a pointy hat, just
keep on walking.

66 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 04
Mode
no you
don’t!
Switch it up

W
e’ve all been there. You’re in
Creative mode, zipping around
your world with the greatest of
ease. Is that a mountain in front of you? No
problem, just fly over it. Is that an interesting-
looking cloud formation over there? Why not
float up and have a look? Fancy seeing the
beautiful cityscape you spent all last week
crafting from a mile up in the air? Well, why
not? Just don’t switch to Survival mode while
you’re up there. Ha ha, you’d never do that,
would you? Oh… that’s exactly what you did.
Bye bye, then – see you at the bottom!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 67
 05
dig it!
Deep and distastrous

C
ome on, admit it. When you first
started playing Minecraft and
discovered that you could knock a
block-sized hole out of the ground with a
single click of a mouse, your first thought was
‘How deep can I go?’ Smacking blocks out
of the ground like a player possessed, you
kept digging, deeper and deeper and deeper,
until all you could see was the occasional
soil-colored feature in the darkness. ‘Will I
suddenly pop out into space… or, whoa, Hell?’
you thought excitedly – just before Minecraft
automatically killed you for exceeding its
permitted maximum depth. D’oh!

68 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 06
boom
time
Stand well clear

S
o you’re delighted because you’ve just
crafted the most evil trap in Minecraft
history. The slime block, activated by
the redstone trigger, will unleash a flood of
lava on your buddy from behind the stone
wall you’ve just built, as soon as he steps on
the detonator block. “What could possibly go
wrong?’ you ask yourself, as you take a few
steps forward to check out your handiwork.
Just one thing, perhaps – you accidentally
trigger your own trap, effectively committing
Minecraft suicide. Ouch. That’s got to hurt.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 69
 07
stepping
out
Mind the gap

B
uild a house on the edge of a cliff, you
say? Of course. What a fantastic idea…
if you’ve read this far, you’ll know what
we’re driving at, but for anyone who hasn’t
grasped what’s about to happen, picture the
scene. Your nice new house has been built
near – or even better, directly facing – a cliff
edge. Why not? The view is great. You open
your front door after a good night’s sleep, step
outside to admire the view, and – whoops.
Suddenly you’re falling at terminal velocity
towards the ground 500 metres below.
You’ve just got time to wonder if your buddy
removed the ground while you were asleep.

70 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 08
nether
regions
The booming bed!

A
h, the Nether. What an exhausting
place to be, eh? All that fire and
smoke, not to mention the hostiles
roaming the sky, trying to shoot you. What
you need is a nice nap. Build yourself a bed,
lie down… and be suddenly annihilated as
your bed explodes. Hardly a good night’s
sleep, is it? Yes, for some reason best known
to the boffins at Mojang, beds are designed
to blow themselves and their occupants to
pieces down there in the Nether. Like the
rest of the Minecraft universe, nothing in the
Nether is as you’d expect – even your nightly
resting place – so keep your eyes open, and
try not to die while anyone’s watching!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 71
72 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 shaders

Aerial
Adventure
Shader MrMeepz’ Shaders (http://bit.ly/2cAzWtH)
Map Kingdom of the Sky (http://bit.ly/2xWGI7L)

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 73
 Design a
Puzzle Map
Perplexing puzzles to keep your friends guessing

edstone is a pain. If you’ve ever looked at an image or a video of a finished redstone build, your response

R
is probably ‘HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE?!?!?!?!’ That’s why for this guide, we’ll be walking you through
how to build redstone mechanisms that aren’t nightmarishly difficult. Every redstone artist needs to start
somewhere, so why not here? We’ll also be showing you step-by-step how to go about building puzzle
chambers, including a moving block parkour puzzle, a lock combo puzzle, and a move-the-block mini-game.
And if you’re ever wondered how to cover up redstone, we’ve got that sorted, too!

74 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 01
redstone
101
Before we jump into the main bulk of
the building, let’s go over some redstone
basics. Arm yourself with redstone dust,
a redstone repeater, a sticky piston, as
well as quartz blocks, red wool, and a
lever. Now create two four-wide walls
with a four-wide floor and add in the
red wool as shown with inward-facing
sticky pistons behind them. Next add a
lever on the left wall. For our next trick,
we’ll be linking all this up so the red wool
pops out.

02
redtone
202
Whack a redstone torch behind the
block with the lever on. Now what
you want to do is trail redstone
dust from the torch to the other
red wool blocks. To do this, just
make steps coming from the torch
and loop them underneath. If your
redstone crosses over to other
redstone, drop down a repeater
to break the single wire in two.
Likewise, if the torch’s power isn’t
reaching, drop a repeater where
the red line dims slightly.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 75
 03
the first
room
For our first parkour puzzle, add in the floor,
the East and West walls, the back wall, and
the door frame leading out. Now go on and
drop in the different colored wools blocks as
shown, and the lever-wool blocks on the left. To
complete this room, the player has to work out
which blocks are needed to parkour up and
out. The green blocks here are a trick, and stop
you completing the room, meaning trial and
error is the name of the game.

04
redstone
wiring
You’re about to put your redstone
knowledge to the test. Remember
how you built steps coming from the
lever in Step 1? And how you ran them
underneath? Well, do exactly the same
here, only mine down into the dirt. You
can even run the redstone from the
lever block and around the backside of
the room. Just remember what we said
about repeaters. You’ll need them to
power the signal over long distances.

76 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 05
the
second
room
Head to the door frame and if you’ve
got redstone behind it, cover it up with
quartz blocks. Next, create a small drop.
If you want to change the flooring to
polished andesite and polished diorite,
go right ahead. Next build up both walls,
along with the wool blocks, and create a
door frame with steps leading out at the
back. Add levers to the colored blocks
on both walls, and finally, run where the
quartz half-slab is poking out across from
wall-to-wall.

06
redstone
for
room 2
Take a look at the redstone, but do not
try to copy it because you’ll be making
your job much harder! Instead, apply
the same logic we’ve used previously.
So that’s redstone torches on the back
of the lever blocks, repeaters to keep
signals powered and straight when
multiple dusts sit next to one another,
and a mix of steps, underground lines,
and rows of quartz to make sure the
redstone reaches its target. And don’t
worry if it’s messy. Everyone’s redstone
is messy!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 77
07 the
room
third
Next is our lock puzzle. Guess the combination
and the door opens. You may also be pleased
to know this is the world’s easiest redstone
contraption. Great, right? Build a room, then
add different colored wool blocks with levers on
next to each other. We went with six block-lever
combos, but it’s probably best to start with three
so you can test it out yourself to see if it works.
Also, for this one, we’re going to be using a steel
door in the door frame.

08 Trapped
more in a House
Redstone! Created by Chamion, House
Escape tasks the user to escape the
building. It sounds simple enough,
Head round the back of where the lever- but this breed of puzzles are never
blocks are. Now, whichever levers you as straightforward as the names
want to be the combination when pulled suggest. Lever combos, hidden
buttons behind paintings, fences
down, place a redstone torch behind
that are just too tall to jump over…
the corresponding blocks. Make a small
this genre has people pulling their
platform below, and dust all of it with hair out! While some escapes pit the
redstone. Add a torch at the end of the player against unexpected mobs,
platform nearest the door then create a House Escape ditches monsters in
lip one block below the torch connecting favor of a laid back approach. The
to the block below the door. Add dust and only thing to keep in mind if you are
it all should be all ready for testing. planning on creating an escape map,
rules are important otherwise no one
knows how to play (and may just mine
straight out of the map!).

78 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 09
The Fourth
Room
Don’t worry about the redstone for now and
instead place down the sticky pistons and
regular piston in the way that the image shows.
This puzzle will be about pushing a block from
the start all the way to the end, which then
opens an escape door. After placing the pistons,
count around five blocks and back place three
black wool blocks with buttons on. Feel free to
add in the main wall and the glass after you’ve
completed the next two parts.

A B
10
Redstone
Goes
Where?
For this part, we’ve mined up our control
panel and replaced it with torches to show
you which pistons need to be wired to which C
buttons. Look at the first image. See how
some pistons are extended? Those pistons
all need wiring to the left button. Once that’s
done take a look at the next image, for the
middle button, and hook all that up. Do the
same for the third image, then place a block
next to the furthest-left piston and test it out.
Confused? Read on…

11 the
redstone
This is a rough idea of how your
redstone for the fourth room should
look, although it won’t be exactly
the same. Wire up each button at
a time, and just like all our other
redstone wiring, use a mixture of
step formations and repeaters to get
each of the buttons controlling the
puzzle. Because of the tightness of this
redstone, you’ll need to keep an eye on
the wiring crossing over. Repeaters can
fix that, though.

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 79
Make a Laboratory
Change your puzzle building into a massive testing area
1 2

1
First, build walls around everything. Where the 3 4
walls don’t meet, use a diagonal pattern. When
you build the walls up, it’ll look intentional and
add a modern look to the building. After that’s
complete, with black wool, draw numbers on each of the
rooms. And don’t forget, if you ever struggle with 8-Bit
text or numbers, Textcraft.net is a great resource to
make letters and numbers be as crisp as possible.

2
Sometimes the smallest of details can help to
bring a project to life. With that in mind, grab
some quartz half-slabs and wherever you find
a corner, or a diagonal wall, place them down.
This helps to add some shape to an otherwise boring
area, and as it’s on ground level, it’ll stand out much more.

3
How do we get into the puzzles? We need a
door, of course! Who on earth would forget to
add a door? Not us, that’s for sure! Build a black 5
door frame with a steel door in the middle and
a weighted pressure plate in front so whoever enters is
trapped inside until they complete the puzzles. Equip
quartz blocks and half-slabs and you’re good to build the
staircase leading up..

4
Ceiling windows! Because even though we’re
tidying up our redstone, having a peek every
now and then is needed to remind us of our
greatness. For this, hack a rectangular hole
above the rooms with puzzles in and above the rooms
with redstone in. Then, run a row of quartz surrounded
by two rows of glass. It’s simple, but it works. Flat white
space begone!

5
Continue your ceiling windows so they cover
every room. Next, in case anything with the
redstone goes wrong, head round the back and
place some wooden doors for quick access.
This is completely optional, of course, but it’s easy to have
redstone go wrong after you’ve built it (it’s probably that
a wall is too close and cutting off the signal), so having
access to the inside will save you having to mine up the
wall to get inside.

80 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 12
The Cake
Isn’t a
Lie
For our final room, we need a
prize. And what better prize in all
of Minecraft is there than cake?
(Excluding diamonds, iron, golden
apples, and… well, all the other things
more useful than cake) Create a nice
dark room and lay cake in the centre.
Drop in some double doors at the
back and a nice staircase heading
down. Anyone who completes this
will be glad to see the sunlight after
besting your dastardly puzzles.

13 All the
Redstone,
Ever
Take a step back and admire your
handiwork. Although all the redstone
will look messy, there’s a certain beauty
when seeing it and taking in all your hard
work. Your options now are leave it as
it is, because all that work looks kind of
cool, right? Or you can entomb the entire
building in quartz so it’s a giant box. Or, if
you want to turn it into a laboratory like
we did, that’s cool too!

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 81
 mini builds Build amazing things in minutes!
Build a
homing
beacon

Build a tower
2 add a ladder
When your tower reaches
1 Make a seriously tall pil
lar out of a height, stand on that fifth
the desired
g (we went with grass, stack of blocks,
block of your choosin and delete the block bene
blocks is wide enough ath you. Add a
for convenience). 4x4 ladder to the side of the ma
t make sure you lay in tower, then
for the beacon itself, bu repeat this until you reach
the ground.
er alongside this.
a fifth block in each lay

get some distance

3 It’s time to check your work
isn’t
going to be vain. In dayligh
t, head off a
decent distance from your light it up
beacon, and
check that the tower is vis
ible above any 4 Happy with the height
of your beacon?
trees or obstacles around er back up to the
it. Use the ladder to clamb
glowstone – these
top. Add a few layers of
atop your beacon.
will serve as the light

bound
homeward
u’re off
5 Whenever yo
exploring and
need to
back, all you’ll
need
find your way r ur
yo
the horizon fo
to do is scan nd, as
lighthouse. A
own personal can
dder means it
a bonus, the la er!
a lookout tow
also double as

82 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 Build a
speedy
shelter

dig a small pit

1 Going underground me
ans you don’t
we heading
’re
need to make walls, so pit-ception
downwards for this sh
elter. To start off with, 2 Excavate down a further two
a 4x4 block crater blocks in
find a clear area and dig centre of your crater. This
is as deep as
one block deep. you’ll need to go, and the sha
llower edges
will mean you can get a roo
f over your head
as quickly as possible.

3 get in the hole

Hop down into the deepest
part of
your shelter and add a roo
f above your
head, working inwards fro
m the corners.
We’ve used stone here, bu
t almost any block
will do in a pinch. let there be light
4 Place a torch or two in the
corner to
the n dig one block
brighten things up, and You’ll now
the wa lls.
outwards from each of
u originally laid
have the 4x4 floorplan yo
for a one-night
out – just enough space
er need one.
hideaway, should you ev

spend the night

5 for the night ,
Once you’re holed up
the most of it.
you might as well make
and a bed — you
Place a crafting table
before hunkering
can get in a few chores
til morning.
down for a snooze un
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 83
 shaders

Among
the Clouds
Shader KUDA-Shaders (http://bit.ly/2rYaGRz)
Map Skylands (http://bit.ly/25EHTUC)

84 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 85
86 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 Journey to
the edge
of Minecraft
Far Lands Or Bust YouTube star kurtjmac takes us
along for the ultimate Survival mode adventure

I
n early versions of Minecraft with semi- Three days after I posted my first Minecraft Let’s Play video
finite worlds, moving too far from the (which at the time had nothing to do with the current journey),
start point would cause the game to Notch made a post on his blog called ‘Terrain Generation, Part 1’.
behave oddly. In the so-called “Far He explained some of the computations that go into randomly
Lands” at the game’s furthest reaches, generating the infinite Minecraft map, including the floating-
blocks stop fitting together properly, point rounding errors and the bugs that cause strange terrain
objects judder weirdly, and strange landscapes and block generation at extreme distances, which he unknowingly coined
formations are common sights. While you could cheat and fly as the “Far Lands.”
or teleport to this strange place, YouTuber kurtjmac decided to Almost immediately after reading Notch’s post, I knew the
get there on his own two feet. He’s been walking for six years, Far Lands would be an interesting place to experience in the
as documented with his video series, Far Lands Or Bust – here’s game. For the year I had been playing Minecraft prior to
the adventure so far in his own words! starting a Let’s Play, I found myself more prone to exploring
and adventuring through the game world instead of the
What was it about seeking out the Far Lands that compelled building or creative aspects of it. Within the first few episodes
you to set out on this unique adventure? of what was then my ‘Minecraft Adventures’ series, I realized

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 87
that it was going to be a struggle to come up moments or memorable milestones. I have a
with unique content to keep what few viewers I Golden Clock that I crafted in episode 50 and a
had. Traveling to the Far Lands seemed like one Golden Apple that I found in a dungeon chest in
of the only true ‘goals’ or ‘destinations’ one episode 311. Golden Apples are the rarest of
could have in this sandbox game, and it fit items to find in Minecraft Beta 1.7.3 since apples
perfectly with my desire to explore. didn’t fall from trees in this version and were
impossible to craft.
What kind of tools have you crafted for your
Survival adventure? You’ve already spent six years on this journey,
I do have a particular set of items that I keep with and clocked over 650 episodes on YouTube so
me to make my journey safe and smooth. A full far. Is that sense of seeking the unknown still
set of tools and armor is necessary to make sure as alluring as it was in 2011?
that I’m safe for whatever I encounter, as well as I certainly think it is, and even perhaps more so
food to heal in the event that things go wrong. now that I’ve further honed and become more
The oldest item in my inventory is a compass confident in my Let’s Play ‘commentary’ voice
that I created before I started walking, and it and have a solidly dedicated fan base following
always points back to the original spawn point so me along the journey. It is very interesting to be
I know that as long as it points backwards I’m playing such an old version of the game as well,
traveling in the right direction. there is a lot of nostalgic feelings that viewers
Some items I’m keeping in my inventory for and myself feel when compared to the latest
nostalgic reasons that signify interesting updates to Minecraft. Even though we

“I’ve further honed and

become more confident in
my Let’s play voice”

conceptually know that the Far Lands themselves are a

long way away, there are still surprises and amazing
random landscapes that we find ourselves in almost
every episode that keep the question, “What’s over the
next horizon?” alive.

Finally, what advice would you give to new Minecraft

players hoping to embark on their own journey in
Survival mode?
Create your own goals! With an open-world game like
Minecraft, it takes a lot of self-motivation to keep it
interesting, and in some cases that requires you put fun
restrictions on yourself that match your play style.
Playing the game in permadeath hardcore mode,
playing vegan mode and not killing animals, travel on
foot and never use boats, and so on.
I like to think of Minecraft as a stage and we, as the
player, have the freedom to act out whatever
adventures we want.

Follow the Far Lands Or Bust adventures yourself

here: http://bit.ly/1M1RomV

Above: Wolfie has been Kurt’s companion for over six

years on his journey.
Right: Kurt has also been building special monuments
to mark his progress.

88 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 “with minecraft,
it takes a lot
of self-motivation
to keep it
interesting”

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 89
 KurtJMac’s
favorite Far
Lands moments
1 The journey begins
Back in 2011 in the very first episode of Far Lands Or Bust,
YouTuber Kurt sets on out his biggest adventure yet to find
the very edge of the Minecraft world. The further he gets
from his original spawn point, the more unusual bugs and
glitches he’ll find.

2 Finding
Wolfie
During episode 32, Kurt attempts to lure
a randomly placed wolf into following
him on his adventure to find the Far
Lands. He uses a bone in his inventory
and successfully convinces the wild
pooch, who he names ‘Wolfie’ to join
him on his Survival mode expedition.

90 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
3 Hidey hole paradox
Four episodes after finding Wolfie, Kurt and his doggy friend encounter
one of the first and biggest bugs on his journey. While climbing up a
mountain, Kurt encounters another copy of Wolfie, and a ‘hidey hole’
he’d saved and left behind previously.

4 5 6

Into the Nether The Golden Apple The Floating Point

In the 200th episode of the Far Lands Or Bust In episode 311, Kurt sets down a Monster Spawner Now in episode 471, just before Kurt presses F3 and
project, Kurt takes the huge risk of entering the and happens to find a chest. Inside that chest, checks just how far he’s travelled, he conducts an
Nether to collect some Glowstone. Randomly placed he discovers one of the rarest items in the entire experiment to see the point where he the ‘jitteryness’
at the top of a chasm, with lava all around the Ghasts game – a Golden Apple. Finding this item was so between blocks goes from one point to two. This will
closing in fast, Kurt was almost spawned right back rare, Kurt only had a 0.8 per cent chance, but he only get even more jittery as he heads further towards
to the beginning! still managed to get it. the Far Lands…

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 91
92 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
 shaders

Cast
Adrift
Shader Sonic Ether’s Unbelievable Shaders (http://bit.ly/2lp3ort)
Map Stranded Raft (http://bit.ly/1dCI9u7)

PRESENTS MINECRAFT 93
 shaders

Winter’s
Grasp
Shader Chocapic13’s Shaders (http://bit.ly/2cmca1i)
Map Arctic (http://bit.ly/1Kfndbw)

94 PRESENTS MINECRAFT
PRESENTS MINECRAFT 95
SUBSCRIBE AND SAVE UP TO 74%
Every issue of your subscription, delivered direct to
your door. Print & digital editions available.

NEAT StoRAGE
Store up to 13 issues of your magazine subscription in a coordinating slip case or ring binder.

myfavouritemagazines.co.uk
 Discover more great guides & Specials
From photography to music and technology to field sports,
there’s something for everyone.

Our magazines and binders make perfect gifts

too. And don’t worry if you’re not quite sure which
titles they’ll enjoy the most because we have a
great choice of gift vouchers available to buy.

No hidden costs Shipping included in all prices We deliver to over 100 countries Secure online payment

myfavouritemagazines.co.uk
Discover another of our great bookazines
From science and history to technology and crafts, there
are dozens of Future bookazines to suit all tastes
 ultimate survival guide! massive builds

tips and tricks build a fortress

Guard yourself create your own

home security with an animal army Emergency bunker puzzle maps

expand your game! minecraft masterclassES!

train your brain take on aliens!

Devious mods that Survive the perils

far lands or bust! will test your skill how to cheat death of the Nether

stunning
Shaders!
How to make
Minecraft look incredible

PLUS: in-depth tutorials, game-changing mods and more!

9000