Amidst criticisms of Mojang's development cycle for Minecraft, I address some of these concerns and propose a way survival players can find renewed purpose with hardcore SMP. With the new BHC gamemode, players can experience survival with a whole new set of goals and challenges, including a reason to actually fear death in the game. #minecraft #hardcore
Mixer:
Bastion Discord:
Clips used:
Xisuma:
Grian:
Technoblade:
Ilmango:
Jschlatt:
Town Hall:
Script:
Survival Minecraft.
There’s been a lot of videos talking about ways the developers can improve the game, some criticizing the consistent focus on adding ‘conquest’ elements. I think these players make good points, but these criticisms are -- in part -- the result of a lost sense of purpose in the game. A dialogue about the future of the game is important for making sure it fulfills its potential, but ultimately, game development takes time and it might take years for some features to be implemented. For now, I believe a solution may lie in a new survival multiplayer genre.
The interactivity of SMP will always add more for players to do, even in a pure vanilla setting. But there are a few glaring flaws with survival that could still be addressed, without the need to wait years for new updates. After the first few hours of playing, dying in this ‘survival’ game isn’t too big a deal, and the biggest threat is losing a few items. What if the threat of death meant something? Multiplayer hardcore survival sounds interesting -- after all, think about how intense near-death experiences would be if death meant losing all your progress -- but some tweaks have to be made because the majority of players might just die to a skeleton within the first hour, and the select few who never die would end up bored like usual...
Imagine a safezone at spawn where players can interact without the fear of death. No damage, no mobs, no griefing. The world border is big enough to include Woodland Mansions, but small enough to contain the players. That’s great and all, but players need a reason to leave the safezone. So, bases and farms must be built outside the zone. Outside the safezone, builds are 100% unprotected so finding clever ways to hide them is a good idea. Players can build shops and buy and sell between others within the safezone, but the bulk of their resource gathering must be done outside the zone. There’s also a one week grace-period without permadeath where everyone has a fair chance to prepare. That’s where competition comes in. After that week, everyone continues on playing until there is only one player (or small team) left, and the winners are considered the champions. Prize pools and special tags could be awarded, although players are only eligible to win if they log in often enough. (Can’t win if you’ve only logged in once). With a competitive element of course, everything must be done to 100% avoid cheats and hacked clients, as well as pay-to-win ranks. Players who die after week one can’t come back until the next season. But what’s stopping players from hiding in the corner of the map? People need a reason to travel back to the safezone. Here’s where the final element comes in: the Exchange Hall.
Players can enter the Exchange Hall at spawn to buy and sell exclusive items. You can still make or spend cash in player shops, but the Exchange Hall is a guaranteed customer and merchant. Sell things in whatever amount you’d like to the Exchange Hall from a list that changes every week. Buy valuable loot, including items that can’t be found anywhere else. Custom potions, powerful tools, unbreakable gear, etc, adding a new layer of progression to the game only accessible within the safezone.
With this system, nearly every type of survival player is taken into account. As Whitelight pointed out, there are two main groups:
In other words, those who want the game to entertain them, and those who want to create their own fun. Builders can build intricate shops and bases, PVP players can hunt each other down, redstone engineers can find the most efficient way to farm resources, and business men can make deals.
My friend and I have been growing a server called Bastion Hardcore implementing this gamemode for a while now, and there's been a lot of positive feedback from our players. The server has gone beyond the typical survival experience and become a story of alliances and betrayals, economic growth and development, and new levels of progression. I think there’s a lot of potential for other servers to experiment with the formula. Factions at war with each other, a city full of NPCs within the safezone, jobs and quests to complete, etc. Moving forward I suggest the genre be named BHC.
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