This week, instead of a weeknote focused on #BigFriedChickenCompany and the work my comrades Marie Christine, Sean and Saeed have been contributing to, I’d like to devote some thought to a greater picture with regards to Minecraft. Minecraft is somewhat singular. It’s a computer program which can be run individually by one person, or on a Read More
With construction on the BFC coming to a close, an eerie silence has fallen over the construction site, punctuated only by the chirping of tiny modded crickets intent on permeating the perimeter. We’ve got a prime location, ease of access thanks to the server’s teleportation system, and enough fried chicken to cause a significant spike Read More
When I built my hen house, I had two objectives in mind. Build a chicken coop that doesn’t look like a utilitarian box of death (see above) Elegantly figure out some sort of wheat harvesting production to more easily hatch lots of chicks In Minecraft, feeding wheat seeds to two chickens standing near each other will Read More
A month has passed since we started construction in Minecraft, and now, at the end of the line – our project reach it’s end, I find myself going back through my week notes. With the BFC practically completed, and the major mechanisms functions, I am starting to ask myself what I have learned through this Read More
Note: this isn’t an “official” blog entry but the idea came to me and I wanted to put it down regardless Yesterday, right after completing the previous blog entry an idea came to me for vanilla Minecraft and the inclusion of multiple BFCs across the server. It has been brought up by myself and the Read More
Ah the BFC is nearly complete. All that is missing is some minor aesthetically touches, such as another row of marble and some clay patches. Due to school starting up again and the fact that the BFC is nearly done, server activity seems to have gone down a bit as well as logging into the Read More
What happens when you take the “fun” out of a game? What is “fun” and can it become work? In Homo Ludens, Huizinga explains that, “all play is a voluntary activity” (7) “it is never imposed by physical necessity or moral duty. It is never a task. It is done at leisure, during “free time”, Read More
Well after a lot of trial and error and a lot of time on the modded server (almost 3 days worth at this point), the team are almost done working on the construction of the second BFC. Wow that sounded like a line from Star Wars talking about the second Death Star. But I digress. Read More
Over the last week and some, I have explored the idea of play-labour, of social-investment, and how these might affect the amount of “fun” a player perceives they are having. The term itself comes from Juliam Kucklich, a video-game theorist, and applies to any form of activity that someone may profit from – Gold Farming Read More
Well, I’ve been active on the modded server a while now. Long enough to have learnt a lot of the ins and outs of the new systems. Basically, I had to re-learn Minecraft on the modded server as there was so much new content. As I was exploring however on one of the many new Read More