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If you're one of those people who quite likes computer games, but finds the endless mayhem and slaughter a bit unseemly, there is another option: putting imaginary things on top of other imaginary things. There are no scores, no obvious goals to aim for, no point at which you can punch the air and say that you've triumphed; you simply move around a randomly and dynamically generated world, collecting objects and building things. All at your leisure. Does that sound sufficiently exciting?
Well, Minecraft allows you to do just that; it may have been billed as the "coolest game you've never heard of", says Senior Emily Marchese, but it has about as much in common with Call Of Duty or Angry Birds as hopscotch or basket weaving. It's created by Markus "Notch" Persson, developed by a very small team, but has had more than 12 million people buy the 20 dollar game.
But what exactly do you accomplish playing Minecraft? Head over to YouTube, where home-produced videos of Minecraft creations litter the top 10 most popular videos each month, and you'll find such delights as a 1:1 scale model of the USS Enterprise, roller-coasters, reconstructions of the Titanic and much else. FHS Alumni, Soham Roy gives us a few examples of what he thinks are his greatest accomplishments in Minecraft: “I have created a pyramid out of water, pushed Haroon Ahmad into a pit of lava, and tamed a gigantic pack of wolves to rip into the flesh of my enemi...I mean, to cuddle and play fetch.”
How you make these structures is much like how you make things in real life. You need tools and resources. You use the wood from trees to make tools and then you mine underground and start looking through caves for resources. As you go deeper you’ll find rarer resources which you can upgrade your tools with or make structures with. And when you have the resources you need, like Legos, you start putting them all together and start making anything your heart desires. You