Ten tips for Minecraft

Barry Collins Read more February 14, 2014

Your first time in Minecraft can be surprisingly daunting. Here’s how to get to grips with the blocky game and how to survive your first “night” in Minecraft.

1) Read up first

Minecraft isn’t an easy game to pick up as you go along, and there’s no in-game tutorial. There are several excellent online resources that show you how to get going, harvest resources and build tools, but the best is the comprehensive Minecraft Wiki at www.pcpro.co.uk/links/233min2.

2) Get to cover!

If you’re playing Survival mode for the first time, the most important thing is to create yourself an enclosed shelter to survive the first night’s zombie attacks. You have ten minutes.

3) Find your way

Once you’ve established a home base in Survival mode, the biggest danger is getting lost and not being able to find it again. Create waypoints back to base when you go exploring. Build a tall tower with torches at the top next to your base, so you can always spot home from a distance.

4) Start the easy way

Creative mode, in which you can’t be killed, have unlimited resources, and can fly around maps, is a far gentler introduction to the game, especially for children.

5) Get keyed up

Change the default “drop item” key from Q. Minecraft uses the standard W/A/S/D keyboard controls, and it’s all too easy to accidentally strike Q and drop your sword mid-melee.

6) Try everything

“There’s so much to do within Minecraft I’d suggest you try a little bit of everything,” says Minecraft devotee, Simon White. “From single-player worlds to player-versus-player (PVPing) with friends.”

7) Keep it all

Don’t discard tools that are close to wearing out (each tool has an energy bar). They can be fixed by placing two tools of the same type next to one another on a crafting table.

8) Storage

Build a chest in your base as quickly as possible, and use this to store a selection of essentials, such as weapons, food and resources. That way, if you’re killed and can’t quickly return to the death scene to pick up your dropped goods, all is not lost.

9) Make like a lumberjack

Trees aren’t only sources of wood. Hack away at the leaves and they might drop an apple, which should provide enough food to keep you alive for the first few days.

10) Start free

Don’t pay for access to a multiplayer server right away. Check out if you enjoy the experience first by playing on a free server. Enter “play.gotpvp.com” into the server address field to experience a free multiplayer server that hosts games in a variety of modes, and gives you your own island space to build in Creative mode.