Minecraft

Where do I even start with Minecraft. I vividly remember the first video I saw from the game back in 2010. I opened Youtube like any other day after coming back from school and having lunch. Back in the day, I had just one hour of tablet usage per day, and I had to decide whether I wanted to use it to play games (very specifically, Angry Birds Space), or watch something.

And that day, I guess I was bored enough to want something to watch. I remember seeing a thumbnail of very colorful blocks in still a beta version, and crabs. Yes, crabs, I thought they were part of the game, it was my first impression of it anyways. Turns out I discovered it was a mod a long time after. I even found the designer showing it off on another video which you can watch here.

The thing is that by watching that video, I got recommended another: "Proyecto Minecraft - Episodio Piloto" (my mother tongue is Spanish, so yes, this was a Spanish series. The title is translated to "Minecraft Project - Pilot Episode"). This video was as raw and simple as you could imagine. Minecraft beta 1.2, and a guy explaining that he would be making a series. He showed off a bit of the world around him and started gathering materials. Just a 10 minute video, a not so good microphone and a screen recorder of questionable quality.

I thought it was cool, but didn't really become obsessed with it or anything. That was until "Episode 1" appeared on my suggestions tab the very next day. I think you know where this is going. I started to watch this guy play beta daily, seeing him advance and learning the core mechanics of the game alongside him. I even remember he started a video all happy because he had found diamonds (it was lapis lazuli).

He also would update the game and show us the cool stuff added while using it to improve his current world. I remember him telling the audience about the implementation of beds in beta 1.3. He also built an entire railway system, and in general, his videos were short (around 10 minutes), simple, and very soothing.

So there's a personal love I hold for old Minecraft. My childhood memories are based on it. There was something so... specific about it, how it was mostly silent, save from the times where C418 would start playing. That fog that was so dense back in beta it felt like you were playing silent hill. I even remember when bedrock had particles that made it feel dangerous to be around.

Old Minecraft knew how to play around the fact it had little content. It made the entire thing an eerie, yet very colorful experience. There was always this feeling of not being alone. I guess it makes sense, given the fog. You don't know what's happening behind that fog. That's why Herobrine, or at least the story of another player in your singleplayer world, was inevitable.

I think you can decipher why I love this aesthetic so much. It combines a core memory of my childhood with a silence that speaks volumes. I see these images and I don't fear. That time where I was afraid of entering caves (true story) is over. Now I know there was never really anything there. So all I am left is an eerie scenery which I could look at for days on end. It's very nostalgic to me, it reminds me of simpler days.

Now I walk through these worlds, once full of life and now left for time to dissolve. How many dogs are sitting in houses in abandoned worlds waiting for their owner? How many crops need to be harvested? What happened to that one village? These images feel like they are memories, not images. They are not colorful anymore, because they're tainted by the struggles of the present. They turn gray, but not threatening. They are somehow inviting. They still remind you that, if you need them, they're there for you.

Notice how I didn't add any images from Wonderland.jar or any of its successors. I have played plenty of liminal minecraft mods and they are all great for the most part, but I feel like showing a recreation instead of the real thing is not the correct move for the museum. I wanted to show real pictures from real worlds once inhabited by maybe one person or them and their friends. Because there's something about seeing a world that used to be full of life, rather than a world trying to mimic having had it.

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