Dinnerbone Modifies Spawners in Minecraft - Ideas for Custom Map Applications

Okay, for those of you who don't know, Dinnerbone, one of the developers of Minecraft, recently watched Vechs' video on Silverfish Apocalypse & contacted Vechs to discuss with him certain things about Minecraft.

Whatever they talked about in this meeting resulted in the modification of the Monster Spawner block in Minecraft in the Week 26 snapshot.

The Monster Spawners in this snapshot have been RADICALLY modified to include many MANY fields which can be tweaked using external programs/tools like MCedit, NBTedit etc. to directly spawn mobs with specific attributes.

For example: Superjumping Spiders, Fire-resistance Skeletons, Invincible ElectriCreepers, Angry Wolves, Particular profession of villagers, baby animals, Pigs with saddles, Angry Zombie Pigmen, Waterbreathing Zombies, Regenerating Endermen, Poison damaged Silverfish calling out more Silverfish by the tick & causing Vechs' Silverfish Apocalypse & many MANY MANY more.

To quote Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry (a movie I really should watch someday), "You've got to ask yourself one question: "Do I feel lucky?"" ;)


Here's the thing, this is the very first time a Minecraft developer went out of his way to discuss with a mapmaker (& not to mention one of the very BEST mapmaker) for the benefit of the game & the whole mapping community.
This modification adds nothing, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING of value, to the vanilla game but changes the whole Mapping community irreversibly in ways I don't think anyone can fully comprehend.

I myself, being a map player, have already come up with some potential applications of this modification which I mention below & let's just say, things are about to get ridiculously awesome in the mapping community :D


So let's begin.

Oh BTW, I made a podcast-ish video regarding this whole shindig so if you want to watch it instead of reading this wall of text, here's the link. Also here's my post on reddit if you want to leave some feedback there instead :D

1. Mob variety
The biggest (& the most obvious) thing this change adds is the ability to have a huge variety of mobs in custom maps. Some of which I already mentioned above & I'm pretty sure you can already think of more.

We can now have packs of wolves roaming in forests, attacking players as they come close, very similar to real life. We can also have Enemy Villages or bandit camps with Angry Zombie Pigmen who attack on sight.

Using the many potion effects we can have Invincible Mobs, Fire-resistance (a.k.a. not burning in daylight) mobs, water-breathing, super-jumping & so much more.

This changes the game at a basic gameplay level which is, the addition of a

2. New Gameplay Mechanic - Avoidance

So far, every mob in Minecraft is killable, no matter how strong. However now we can now have an invincible mob using the Resistance 4 Potion Effect which gives 100% damage resistance. So, now we have a mobspawner, from which the mobs that spawn are unkillable & undamageable, which gives rise to a completely new gameplay mechanic: Avoidance.

Think of the enemies in Amnesia. You can't hurt them, all you can do is run & trap them. & that's the only way to stop these enemies. In my recent Let's Play of Test Subject Blue, the mines are one such enemy. You can't hurt them so you have to go around them.

Now imagine a custom map where there's a whole hoard of invincible zombies attacking you. You have to run & find ways to trap them in order to win. Using this you can have many puzzle maps where your goal is to trap the unkillable enemies in many ingenious devices & traps.

Imagine a castle that you have to storm. But this castle has invincible skeletons on the top shooting at you. So you have to run from cover to cover to advance while trying to figure out ways to outsmart these juggernauts.

This is a true gamechanger of an addition. A true 'This changes everything' moment O_O

3. Remote Spawning

Soon after the release of this snapshot, Sethbling released not 1 but 3 MCedit Filters to edit the spawners. & one of the fields in the filters is a saving position field. What this basically does is when the mob is spawned, it will be teleported to this particular position, always. So the spawner can be hundreds of blocks away, but as soon as the spawner is activated, the mob will spawn & instantly be teleported to this particular location.

Now this may not seem that important an addition but I assure you, it most certainly is.
Using this, we can have the mob set off a redstone signal EVERY time by making it teleport to a tripwire or a pressure plate, making Spawner-based Player Detectors much more reliable. Here is a design of a Silent Player Sensor using this trick.

However using this in a cleverer manner we can also have

4. Unstoppable Spawners

Previously, mapmakers would put spawners behind bedrock to ensure that the player cannot destroy them. However all a player had to do was light up the area nearby & the spawner would be disabled.

Now if we put a spawner in a small bedrock box (say 3x3x3), the monster will spawn in that dark box & be teleported outside using the above modification. As this spawner will always have dark space to spawn mobs, the player will be incapable of stopping this spawner & will just have to avoid this area or trap the monsters at the place they get teleported to, which, let's be honest, is much more difficult than lighting up or breaking a spawner.

Also we can have a redstone lamp under the spawner inside the bedrock box which is powered from outside through the bedrock to disable the spawner. When the player breaks the power source either unknowingly or via Player sensors, the spawner would start spawning mobs & hallelujah ;D

So, as we can see, even an amateur like myself can so easily come up with SO many incredible ways to improve custom maps. So imagine what the awesome mapmakers will do. One thing's for certain, Beta 1.8 may have been the Adventure Update but 1.3 will be the Adventure Map Update :D

So Dinnerbone, on behalf of the map-making & map-playing community, I sincerely thank you for this wonderful addition to Minecraft. Thank you so SO much. Keep on being awesome :D

& to all the non-existence readers of my blog, till next time, Bye :)

Test Subject Blue - Solve Tests as an Enzyme

Hello again, crickets. How's it hanging yo'?

So anyways, I just recorded another Let's Play (seriously, what is up with me recording Let's Plays all the time?) of Test Subject Blue, a game from the awesome people at Nitrome.
In this game you play as an enzyme in a robotic suit, solving teleporter puzzles, platforming while under attack & shooting with a proton cannon at multiple enemies! Need I say more?

It's an incredibly fun & enjoyable game. So much so that I ended up recording the whole game in one session. I definitely recommend you to play this awesome game for yourself :)

So, here's a link to my Let's Play Test Subject Blue Playlist.

& Here's a link to the game, Test Subject Blue.

Well, Bye for now, crickets. Till my next LP :)

Interlocked - Really Cool Puzzle Game

Hey there crickets.

I just started an Let's Play on a game I wanted to play for a long time now, Interlocked by We Create Stuff.

It's a really cool interlocking puzzle game where you have to untangle a number of weirdly shaped blocks locked together. Do check it out if you enjoy uncommon types of puzzle games :)

So, here's a link to my Let's Play Interlocked Playlist.

& Here's a link to the game Interlocked.

Well, Bye for now. Hope to hear from you soon :)

Ani's Stuffs - A Brand New Series :D

Hey there everyone.

I just started a brand new podcast-ish series called Ani's Stuffs.

Yes I'm finally using the completely obvious play on my username on this new series wherein I talk about pretty much anything & everything, but mostly rambling like the crazy person that I am ;)

So why don't you check it out? Here's the playlist.

Don't forget to give me some feedback & Thanks for listening. See ya later :)

Electric Box 2 - The Electrifying Sequel

Hey everyone. 
[Cricket noises]
Oh hey Crickets. Long time no see. How's everything going. 
[Cricket noises continue]
Good for you. Hey remember this little post I made almost 2 years ago which successfully slunk away into the vastness of the Internet, as I predicted?
[Cricket noises continue]
Yes, that one. So guess what, I finally got around to playing the Epic Sequel (which was also released in 2010)


So I've started the Let's Play series of Electric Box 2 by Twinkle Star Games Studios.

The game is ridiculously awesome & I ended up recording 2 sessions in one day just because I couldn't stop playing :)

So, here's a link to my Let's Play Electric Box 2 Playlist.

Here's a link to the game Electric Box 2 on Newgrounds.

Oh & do check out Twinkle Star Games Studios. They're a Bangladesh based videogame studio run by my fellow Bangalis across the border. Suffice to say, I am very happy for them to have made such awesome games. Go give them some epic support, will you Crickets?

Anyways, Bye for now. Hope to hear from you soon :D

Awesomized - That was my reaction O_O

Yes, that was my reaction. That & WTF ??????

So here's what happened. I've been saving up to buy Portal 2 since last year & at the start of this year, I went to the shop & asked for it. As it turns out, it was out of stock :'(
Expecting a new stock coming at the first fiscal quarter, I placed a request. & then I waited impatiently.

This Wednesday (25th April, 2012) I got the call (no, not The Call. Sadly, that only happens in my imaginations)

So today on the 28th of April, 2012 I headed out to the store (imagine epic music playing).

I got there, got the game. But then I noticed that the store was having a bumper offer where you buy 1 game & get 1 free. Unfortunately Portal 2 wasn't part of the offer but the Fallout white label collection was :O

For those of you who don't know, the white label collection is the original 3 Fallout games: Fallout, Fallout 2 & Fallout Tactics.

Having enjoyed Fallout 3 greatly, I decided to get it. Then after depositing those at the counter, I began my epic quest to find another semi-decent game that was part of the offer.

There were mostly NFS games in the offer. Me not being a racing fan did not approve. Eventually I spotted 2 contenders: Penumbra Overture & Dark Sector.

However, neither was my particular fancy since I've already seen an awesome LP of Dark Sector so wasn't too thrilled at playing that & Penumbra Overture being a horror game will scare the ever-loving crap out of me without even trying too hard (although that may make for a fun LP).

So I couldn't decide which one to pick over the other as neither of them were particularly high on my games list.

So eventually I was almost making up my mind when all of a sudden I decided to look at the back row of one particular rack, for no reason in particular. & the very last game that was completely hidden behind 3 more games, was the incredibly spectacular Machinarium.

Ever since I played the demo, I wanted this game so bad. I never knew this had a retail release, let alone one in a place like India, in that particular store even. & it was the last copy too 8O

I pleaded that to be part of the deal (even if it wasn't I'd have bought it anyways) & to my extreme surprise it was O_O

[Here's where you play that epic victory music BTW]

[Oh & just in case your wondering the offer price of that buy 1 get 1 deal was (wait for it) 99 INR. For those wondering the exchange rate, it's less than 2 USD. That's right, I got Fallout 1, 2, Tactics & Machinarium at less than 2 bucks]

So moral of the story: This Summer (read that in the epic trailer narrator voice) expect a Machinarium LP, followed by Portal 2 during which Minecraft will take the sidelines (sorry, guys, you know how it is) & then I'll alternate between the Fallout original series with more Minecraft 8D

This Summer, meet Anistuffs at his happiest XD

Playing Minecraft Multiplayer with Rsmalec O_O

Seriously, WHAT ???

Okay, for those of you (non-existent readers of my blog) that don't know, Rsmalec is THE best Minecraft mapmaker & reviewer & an all around awesome dude to hang out with :)
& he invited me (yes, me, the guy who makes the incredibly bad LPs) to play a custom map with him in multiplayer while both of us LPing. WHAT ???
& did I mention we had an awesome time? No? Well, we did. It was about 3 hours of glorious fun :D

Anyways, to the main topic, both of us are uploading LPs of the map (called The Temple of Trials made by Ravioli_Rick) so you can see from both angles how we messed about :)

Here's my viewpoint:

& a Link to my playlist.

& here's Rsmalec's viewpoint:


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On another unrelated news, I played a map that was requested in my LP thread on the Minecraft forums, called Levels by Kinglau3 & enjoyed it greatly :)

Here's the first episode:

& here's the full playlist.
Enjoy :)