Minecraft Creations: Lanslide and Respawn Comp Roundup, Mesa Mario Kart, "Apple" Trees and Golden statues

I’ve done a few builds for Minecraft comps at lans over the past few months so I thought I’d sum them up in the one strip starting with the ones from Lanslide.

Mesa Biome Minecraft Mario Kart track

This was quite an interesting theme for a Minecraft comp as what was announced was basically create a Mario Kart track in Minecraft, though it doesn’t have to be an existing track in the Mario universe you can create a new one and also it doesn’t have to be flat. So I immediately thought, “how would we do hills and grades?” but of course I if remember the only Mario Kart I really play anymore is the SNES version and every track is completely flat so what the hell I’ll just use stairs. Funnily enough my though after that was “how would we do corners?” but I suppose I just had to deal with it and started thinking.

Basically I thought everyone else would do a Mario Kart track so I decide to pick a biome and do a track designed to the style of that particular biome. Finding one of the new Mesa Biomes I decided it’d be perfect with its flat topped mountains. I then had to work out what kind of materials the track was made out of, I missed around with various types of clay but then remembered that clay had no stairs equivalent so I went with smooth sandstone and sandstone stairs for the main body of the track with brown stained clay around the edges. I spose my intention was that you'd "run" through this track not drive a car as it's more suited to Minecraft and gives the hazards more meaning.

First shot of finished track

I didn’t really have a track layout or design in mind I just decided to build as I went (as I usually do with my Minecraft creations), I decided to make all the turns right-angled and zig-zaging with the blocks would be too time consuming and as it was becoming night I decided to light up the track with lightstone light poles. So I set the starting line on a relatively empty strip on one of the mesas then continued creating a rather elevated track for the first zigzag and left turn across the divide and onto the next mesa.

Zig-zagy!

As there was a lava pit on the next mesa I decided to run a bridge right over it and remove some blocks for a pit hazard which worked well. I contined on with a sort of elevated skybridge style until I though instead of just going above the canyon divide I’ll create some sort of underground section, and yes that meant that I needed to run the track downward and TNT a hole through the canyon wall and up through to the top of the mesa, was a bit messy but I cleaned it up and even put some lava raining down to act as another hazard.

Running smack into a lava flow, yeeeowch

The track then went through tunnel then up through to the top of the Mesa where it zig-zagged through the trees.

Oddly this was one of my favorite sections of the track, I must just like skimming through trees.

I then had to make one hell of a drop down the edge of the mesa to the red sand below. I decided to make this part of the track offroad, not that it made any difference when running of course, then wheeled it round the side of the mesa back towards the start of the track.

That's quite a drop

At that point it was suggested to me that I should make an alternate route. So at the first corner down to the sand I cut a tunnel through the opposite direction which went under the mesa and back out the south side just after the sand, had to add some lighting to the tunnel obviously.

From then on the track got a bit zigzaggy as I went round the mesa and down onto the beach for a small water hazard then right up to the start line again via this giant staircase.

Well it was a pretty good effort but unfortunately The team of people that partially created Royal Raceway ended up taking first prize with me in second, and yes the team of people, I don’t know how I was supposed to compete a team of 5 people but anyway, was a job well done and I didn’t need that new mouse.

Shot of finished track

Nightmode! and may I point out that unlike the winning team my track was usable during the night.

The Lanslide Apple tree and Logo

The category for this months comp was “Apple” and not specifically the Macintosh Apple that we know, just Apple in general so after thinking for a while I thought, what am I good at? trees, so I decided to make an Apple tree. I was determined this time to make a proper tree not a boxy thing with other trees stacked onto it like I did before, I contracted the trunk like a usual square Minecraft trunk but then added some other logs around it so it wasn’t a square mass, I also added some slight kinks to the trunk so it looked a bit more realistic to the photos of apple trees I had searched for online (yes I actually used photos for reference)

For the branches I found the best way of doing this was just flying backwards and holding down the right mouse button to place block creating a sort of jagged line and I dipped a bit to create a slight curve when making the branch. I used dark oak wood for the trunk and branches for a difference and had to do a bit of adding and pruning of the logs to look correct, also used Dark oak leaves in keeping with the dark oak theme, they ended up looking pretty good even though I just “sprayed” them on really by moving around and holding down right mouse.

Once I thought I’d made enough branches it was then time for the apples which was a bit of a dilemma. I first tried just throwing actual apples all over the tree, but they were too small to see and ended up disappearing anyway, so then I tried using red stained clay but that didn’t look any good either. So after some advice from others I decided to use redstone blocks as they were the most red thing I could use, I also tried creating apples out of pixel art but they ended up being too big. So I just made these square things that I could pass off as apples. Once I’d finished the tree I looked at it and though it needed something more, plus I hadn’t put the Lanslide name in there at all so I had to come up with something else. The only other thing about apple I could come up with was the Apple logo, specifically the 1980’s Apple Logo, so I reproduced it as best I could in the game along with the correct colours, and put the Lanslide  title around it matching the colours. Logo took a damn while to get right I can tell you.

Once the judging began the only other entrant was this guy who had made a man holding an apple, which was pretty good and when Nuke announced the entrants he didn’t even mention my tree just the logo above lol. In the end I took out the first prize and won a mousepad, oh joyous day, hah!

The Respawn “Fantasy” Trophy(s)

Before I start here I must mention that this was my first time at Respawn lan and it was pretty cool, biggest lan I’ve ever been to with over 400 people. I was even setting next to some guys who were fans of Minecraft.

ZOMG so many people!

The theme was quite interesting, and hard Your Respawn Fantasy. Man I was stumped for awhile before I though well I’d really like to win the Minecraft comp and I’d really like a big trophy for it, so I decided to make my own Respawn Minecraft Comp trophy. My first attempt was pretty weak but I got the design all right, a raised box down the bottom a stem and then a golden man with a pick and torch up the top. I added a plaque containing the winners name and details too.

Admins made a railroad through the super flat world

 I soon realised that to win this thing I was gone need something better than this. So with taking the advice of someone else I made it bigger MUCH bigger. When I’d finished the new version it stood almost 2 and a half times as tall and much bigger with the golden man on top reminiscent of my earlier statue of myself. 

Tah-dah! I named the smaller one the 2nd place trophy

Goddamn did they take awhile to get to the results of the competition, I was waiting around well after 12:30 waiting. Ended up taking out 2^nd place and a new mouse for my efforts, the kids from another clan next to me ended up taking out first with their Respawn fantasy “garden” which looked pretty cool I guess I didn’t need a new set of headphones anyway, I also didn’t need a new mouse and gave it to my brother lol.

All in all was a good event and glad I went for the first time.

Ahh a beautiful flatworld sunset

Minecraft Creations: The Lan Slide V5.0 Melbourne PC Minecraft Competition

I’ve been attending Lanslide since its second iteration and have a had a great time in the events I’ve been to. The last time I went I managed to win the Minecraft competition with my Jungle Greenhouse though at that time I only had one opponent and this most recently I had no competition which makes it kind of easy to win. Saying I really don’t have a problem with winning by default and I’m no stranger to it, especially with Minecraft. I went to 3 Minecraft competitions at the now closed Melbourne Mana Bar in which the first was a big turnout with my Tribalfield buddies and us having some quite serious competition, then the second and third times I was the only person who showed up for the competition.

Anyway, at Lanslide 5 the admins made a theme for this events Minecraft Competition and that was Melbourne PC yes the business that hosts the landslide events and I immediately wondered what the hell I was going to make and the only two things I could think of was a giant computer or the building itself so I decided to create the latter and ducked out to take some photos of the front of the building. I think it came out pretty well apart from the meddling with the Pokeball and the explosions from my interfering colleagues, I also had to stop-and-go with the tournaments I was in but I had enough time to make something decent.

Early shot, I did this in the default texture pack as that would be what everyone would see it as.

I added the Melb PC test up the top for extra effect

Was taking screenshots every minute with fear that those idiots blowing up their Pokeball that they had built right near my building.

Some night shots

Google Maps view of the actual Melbourne PC building

So that was that I won a creeper headrest hat and a set of coke glasses which is as good a prize as any I guess. I played in the League of Legends, Flatout2 and Armagetronad comps, was going to go in Starcraft II but that didn't end up happening. Anyway, fun times and looking forward to the next and possibly having some competition for the next Minecraft competition.

JD

Creeper Hood!

The unchallenged will always conquer

Minecraft Creations: The Jungle Greenhouse

The Jungle Greenhouse I am proud of as it won me the Lanslide 4.0 Minecraft Competition and even then it was only half finished, of course I must admit I was only competing against one person as we didn’t quite get the number we had last time but even so this time I was determined to make something, and make something good. To be honest that did mean I spent a lot of time in Minecraft but I didn’t really have a problem with that, just glad I won something to the chagrin of my colleagues who were trying to win at least something the whole night, I do remember last Lan I was trying my hardest to win the Armagetronad comp but ended up coming second by a very small margin but anyway, all’s good. The screenshot below I took with the default texture pack, the rest were with the Faerielight 256x256 “Resource” pack as they are now called.

Where I got up to at the comp

 For the competition I had an idea in my mind about a Jungle Treehouse, just what kind is all, I did originally want to Make a sort of series of houses along platforms that connected with bridges, but when I saw a group of jungle trees on a high hill I just knew it was going to be something similar to what I usually do lol, so I made various platforms of jungle wood planks on different tops of trees as I usually do but instead of making all of the individual rooms I ended up buildings frames out of jungle logs making all of the platforms apart from the tallest one into one large open room, I also built around one of the trees so that it would be inside. I made the roof in a similar design to what I usually do, I was going to try something else, the topmost level I made into a sort of penthouse with a balcony intending it to be my bedroom and that’s basically where I got up to for the competition, I reckon I did pretty well for the time limit. After I got home I decided to work on it some more where I then got the idea of it not actually being a house but being some sort of greenhouse a jungle greenhouse. 

Front and back view of the completed Greenhouse

 

My usual layered rooftop

And thus I fashioned huge windows and  grew more jungle trees in every square space in the big room that I could find, I also worked out how to make the taller jungle trees (4 jungle saplings placed together then add 2-5 bone meal) I turned the upstairs “penthouse” into a sort of wilderness Herb/Alchemy lab similar to Dr Earnhardt’s lab from Farcry 3, except mine is purely for research purposes and not for creation or hallucinogenic drugs (well mostly) I included a sapling/flower garden plus a covered mycelium mushroom garden and an alchemy section with 3 cauldrons and Alchemy tables with an additional garden bed outside. 

Indoor jungle trees!

My drug Alchemy lab

Sapling/Flower and Mushroom garden

The next problem I had to deal with was how the hell you get up to the Greenhouse/Lab as in case you didn’t know Minecraft jungles (and jungles) in general are notoriously difficult to navigate as they are very dense with bushes and are hilly so creating a decent looking entrance on the ground would not be that easy, so I had a look around the general area down below the house and found a nice secluded spot where the Jungle biome meets the forest/plains biome which was nice and clear and had some stone showing through, I decided this would be a great place for a (semi) secret entrance and began to dynamite a tunnel upwards towards the bottom of the greenhouse where I eventually came up right under it, of course the place was still a fair way up so I made a downwards extension from the bottom of the house to connect the with the tunnel and built a narrow staircase up. I made a stone staircase from the entrance up through the tunnel as well as some iron doors for the entrance and decorated (and hid) everything I could with vines.

The shady entrance

Stairway up to the... well other stairway

The stairway up from the tunnel into the house.

I then got a fantastic idea for making the whole place blend in a bit more with the rest of the jungle, yes that’s right I covered the place in vines which looked good coming down the walls both on the inside and outside of the greenhouse. I also added them to the upper tiers of the roof (as you can only hang them in edges or corners not hanging from the bottom of a block itself) and this made a great “hanging vines” effect, I might have put a bit too many around but meh it’s supposed to be jungely and wilderness isn’t it?

Vines

More vines!

Even more vines! (may have gone a bit overboard)

 So when I finished that the place was looking pretty good, but I needed to fill it with a few more things, I decided to continue the greenhouse/natural alchemy lab theme down below and put logs of various tree types with bushes on top for collecting ‘samples’ as well as tables and chests around the lower area for examination and storing. I created another alchemy lab in a corner and made another plant and mushroom garden with examination table at the bottom of the stairs up to the main lab, and that was pretty much it.

Logs and bushes for sample and chests and tables for storing and examination.

The "corner" alchemy lab

The lower sapling, flower and mushroom garden.

 I was in a bit of a hurry to get this thing done so didn’t spend too much time on every little detail and did forget a few things like more glowstone for the plant gardens and alchemy labs and I did actually forget crafting tables but I guess crafting tables really aren’t needed in retrospect as this was a Greenhouse and also one of the very few things that I’ve made which isn’t supposed to be a proper Minecraft house.

So I’m happy with it in that regard and I’m glad that I did end up finishing it, stay tuned for more Minecraft shenanigans on Angrathar’s Amarthine Minecraft server that he very nicely set up and paid for us all to come on and play on a server to ourselves.

JD

You call that house?

Minecraft Creations: The Hunter's Hall

Hi all, As explained in my previous Minecraft Creations post,  I agreed to create a building (a house of course as I always do) for my friend Richard’s Town/World of Ralgon, I was designated a spot right on the edge of town and I decided to challenge myself to do a house in a sort of L-shape. I quickly got the idea for it to be a sort of a long hallway which reminded me of the Jarl’s Longhouses of Skyrim so I decided to name it the Hunter’s Hall.

The hall inside Ralgon

 I decided to create the house using Spruce wood and logs as we were using Misa’s 64x64 realism texture pack and the spruce wood worked remarkably well for a “Woodland Hunter’s Hall” style. I designed the house to be a fairly long straight hallway with an entrance at the front which opens into a larger room which juts off to the left, I made the corners and the lower trim with spruce wood logs and put the planks in the middle. I made the ceiling using spruce wood stairs as the levels effect is now much easier to pull off with the stairs now joining at the edges. I also made the it quite high as I wanted it to look like a hall more than a house though I then got an idea to do a second level balcony.

Side andd rear exteriror of the hall

 I carved out some windows on the lower level and made the doorway which was a bit close to the building next to it but meh couldn’t really do anything about it. I did the carpet in brown wool with stone slabs for the alchemy and furnace/anvil areas and laid out all the items inc chests, a workbench and furnaces along the walls. I did a 2 block high wall and fence on top around a corner for my room and fit most of the usual stuff in there and made the bit next to it the Alchemy corner.

Front door

Inside from front (NPC heads!)

My room entrance and Alchemy Corner

Ceiling view of my room

I built a ladder up to the top level and fenced off the balcony, this was going to be a sort of library level with the enchanting table, bookshelves and seat for reading, I did try to put windows up there but unfortunately they would have been right up against the roof on the outside and didn’t look very good.

Balcony and Enchanting space

 After that I began decorating the walls with item pictures, I was originally just going to do pictures of the weapons and armour but then decided to do all the tools as well items from wood to diamond, I also made a display of the armour sets in the blacksmithing corner and some npc heads on the other side of the furnaces.

Tools and Weapon item portraits

Armor item portraits

I reckon it came out pretty well, I hope my contribution was adequate for the town, It may not be as big or spectacular as some of Richard’s creations but hey at least it’s well furnished.

JD

Quite a nice shot of the hall with the sunrise (I think) over Ralgon.

There is always wood.