This isn’t really about Minecraft

I've been out of work for a little while. I’m doing a little freelance thing, but it isn’t really game related. Recently I found myself playing Minecraft again. I haven’t played in ages and ages, but my friend Eric’s son was playing, then I got to reading about all the new stuff that was added since the last time I played. I wound up starting a LAN server for the three of us.

Now I am going to spend a few paragraphs talking about Minecraft, but remember, this isn’t really about Minecraft.

I built a giant tower fortress. It is surrounded by a moat, has a little barnyard area off the back and an automatic melon farm. It has a secret vault, and hidden alchemy lab with a nether root garden. It also has a bedroom, workshop, library, nether portal room,enchanting room and a tunnel that leads down into the earth where I have a massive underground subway system that connects to some of my other projects. I fortified a village that was wedged between a massive gorge and a small river.  I built a sky-high, rotating lighthouse that sticks up out of the jungle, a Foreign Legion style fort out in the desert and temple of fire whole halls drip with blood (actually lava, but it looks like blood) next to a frozen lake.  

Recently, a challenge was issued that ended with me building a large, pirate gallon in the bay. It has multiple decks, captains room, galley, crew quarters, cannons and another secret room. Note to self, next time build over dry land and dig out the water later. There a hidden cove nearby that has a secret area behind the waterfall that also has a secret door that leads back to the entrance to my fortress.  Yes, as a matter of fact I did go a bit overboard with all the secret rooms and tunnels and I'd like to point out that it is really hard to hide those levers. And you don't have to say it, I know I should have built a skull rock thing in the cove, but I used up all the wool I farmed for the sailcloth. Anyway, those are just the bigger projects. I didn’t even mention the railway I built across the Nether so I could farm the Nether Fortress. Suffice to say I built a lot of stuff.

Then I found myself farming some Ender Pearls. These are items you get from killing Ender Men. Because of the way they teleport around, its best to fight them at night. The day/night cycle is about 20 minutes long and during the day I found myself fixing the landscape. At first it was just the holes the stupid Creepers were making when they blew up. But then I was smoothing out things, taking dirt or sand from one area to build up another area. I spent real life HOURS fixing up the world to make it look more interesting.  I realized that everything I made, even the secret tunnels/area, I was making for somebody to find.  Things always had to be perfect, work correctly and look just right. I put up signs with directions on them. I knew where each staircase lead, why was I putting up signs?  Why was I taking so much time to make sure the moat around my tower looked good? Why was I spending so much time on the landscaping and planting all those trees?

I realized that I don’t play these types of games for myself. I build world for others to play in. I think it’s time to get a job and get back to work.