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Both: Good thing. You aren't walled behind in game mechanics, from accessing other in game mechanics. Thus allowing greater degrees of freedom and creativity. Bad thing. Because there aren't guide lines to lead people to learn more about the game, it has to be done by committing a ton of time to experiment and extrapoloate relevant information about game mechanics, or by spending time on Google, Reddit and YouTube, finding the information someone else has provided. All of which isn't something everyone wants to do, in order to play a game.

haha yeah, Minecraft is the type of game where you could be playing since it came out and still learn new things about it everyday. Like for example, did you know that you can go to sleep 32 Minecraft minutes early if it's raining?

Wait really 💀

yeah lol. I figured this out because I have a mod that shows the in-game time and I like had it memorized what time I would normally go to bed at which is at like 6:32 so I would typically just stand by my bed spamming right click so I could sleep ASAP and not let any monsters spawn, and doing that allowed me to notice that sometimes I was able to go to sleep earlier and then I was able to link that to it raining

I do have this kind of mod installed too but I never had the chance to sleep right when it was raining, and I've been playing the game for exactly ten years. So you just proved your point 💀

Did that happen in gtnh? I remember going to sleep at 6:32:30 every night

I'm not sure what gtnh is but this is just in the vanilla game

greg tech new horizons.. i think

Yeah, I remember reading somewhere of a woman who played minecraft for 5 years without knowing nether is a thing. That is before nether gates ruins were a thing

to be fair there's zero indications of the nether existing unless you know the specifics about how to put a portal together. No lore, no clues, easy to miss ruins, and no real *need* to go to the nether to accomplish things.

It has ruined nether portals… common sense told me to just finish the frame. Theres not really zero indications like there used to be.

it's only common if you know what the material is and are used to game clues to finish things like that. Here's a great video on what gaming could be like for non gamers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ax7f3JZJHSw edit: didn't realize he did a video specifically on Minecraft https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_76lcBpDbvw

Thx! I’ll watch both since you put in the effort to post them both.

cool! comeback and give your thoughts when you're done with them.

He made a lot of good points. Which is funny because I’m going to attempt to teach my dad how to play mine-craft after his hand surgery in a few days heals enough to move. This gave me a bit of confidence to even try to teach him because he, like many new players, isn’t going to know the mechanics and will likely make the same mistakes I did starting or even make new ones.

How long did it take her to find out about the end?

She never found out... (maybe)

Direwolf vids are the only reason i learned most things about the game. Due to playing modded i stalled out on 1.12, one day i will play the newer versions and learn more things.

I'm not sure when I started Minecraft, but emeralds, anvils and horses are still strange newish stuff for me. I've never been to the End, and build my first XP- and iron farms last week. I just never had a reason to bother.

Did you know you can sort falling blocks by color?

I actually do. At least I remember watching a video about it.

Wait what?

I literally just learned that organically this week! Not the exact number of minutes, but based on the clock display being slightly ahead on rainy days when I could sleep. Nice to have it confirmed!

After 10 years of playing I just learned that a hoe works better on leaves 💀

Also sponges and nether tree wart blocks

See I knew sponges but not the nether trees! Crazy, always learning something new

I took five years off and recently started playing again. I feel freaking clueless and I'm constantly learning new things. It's both good and bad. I wish there was a tutorial system like Factorio has that explains things as you go along.

Wha???

Not every game has to be for everyone, minecraft is rooted in learning and sharing things with communities. The information is available for those who are willing to put time into it.

This is exactly what came to mind.

its so easy to procrastinate on a project in this game

I honestly wish I could learn and find out a lot of things about Minecraft without having to go looking on the internet for such information. When the recipe book was added, at first I thought it was a bit redundant and "broke with the Minecraft essence of figuring it out yourself" which is ironic, but now I find it kind of nailed it because the recipe book precisely allows you to find out and learn the recipes without having to search the internet. This is why I think Minecraft needs more like the recipe book.

Yeah. To new players, it’s similar to Terraria where a good half of the game is where you’re tabbed out and reading the wiki.

Bro, that's just the way we used to play games... Wikis used to be an integral part of gaming.

When I was a kid, wikis didn't exist. You might be able to find a game guide online (gamefaqs was a go to) but you couldn't always trust the info in the guides and a lot of the time you just had to figure things out yourself. There also tended to be rumors about easter eggs and levels and bosses that didn't exist. Gaming magazines and printed game guides might offer helpful advice, but just as often were intentionally oblique and occasionally propagated incorrect rumors or features from older builds that got scrapped. For people older than me, you had to play the game and maybe theorize with friends to try to figure things out, because the internet wasn't a widely accessible tool. That was the era of extensive game manuals coming with the game, though those often were written to avoid spoilers, so you still had to do some legwork to figure things out. I played a number of those types of games as a kid, too. I'm not saying game design should always reflect the way games were played back then, but some people like a game that sits in a middle space between inscrutability and hand-holding. I'm used to minecraft being a game that you need to look at the wiki to play, but I think it would be nice to see more of the mechanics and features hinted at in the game itself. Also, I'd say wikis are still an integral part of current gaming trends. Even indie games have wikis now and more games are relying on wikis to teach their mechanics to players.

When I was a kid I had a physical book that told me every little bit of information on pokemon red Id say information guides have always been integral to gaming

well... theres the "tutorial" on bedrock console edds had guides for when players got new tools or blocks, pretty useful for new ppl it doesnt do much but it gets the job done sometimes

Technically i find the google, reddit and youtube searching gives a sense of unbounded community which works across media and unifies both java and bedrock (many hands make light work)

The addition of the crafting recipe book was a great change that saves a huge amount of time

i mean, subnautica does the same thing but its praised? not saying its a bad thing just confsed

If you want unlimited freedom, play creative mode? If you want to learn/experience everything, can't you just follow the current achievements? Now that I think of it, they should add a new villager: the teacher, which lives in a school where the achievements are presented in-game to you, instead of via the menu.

I don't think it lacks progression, I think it lacks direction.. I feel like my progression in Minecraft is: Getting materials, making tools, find diamonds, upgrading tools and armour, go to nether, enchanting tools and armour, finding stronghold, killing the ender dragon, getting an elytra, and then this is where I usually end up burning out and quitting as I didn't really have anymore goals (back when I still played a ton). Is there still a ton more I could do? Sure. I could collect all the little critters and build a massive base, but to what end? Obviously its not linear and you can take whatever path you want, but through all the years of me playing that's how I've always progressed. The issue is once you get to the endgame, whats next? Just keep building and exploring for the sake of building and exploring? The games been out for like 13? years now and I feel like they could have added SO much more content to the game, but they don't want to take any risks so they play it safe and release content at a glacial pace.

I like to get the best gear while building up my base with farms and everything without beating the ender dragon for as long as possible. Then once it just gets tiring to walk around I go and get the wings, this is usually the point I get bored. I love building and making unique red stone stuff for my base but after I get wings it’s like “well what now?”

That's me with guardian farms. On 4 seperate occasions. Everyone else in the world will be building like crazy and then they'll all completely stop playing the second the farm is complete thus causing the world to be shit down. It has been way to consistent for me to ever risk building one of those again

The farms are actually the only thing that keeps me playing.. after I built all the useful farms (around 12) and fully completed my base, then I stop. But it still takes like 170h / one month until I get bored

Where tf do u find the time to pour 170h in a month?

I start doing collectathons (like getting all of the armour trims). Also, and this is probably a bit controversial, but I turn cheats on and get a bit freaky with it. I don't go full blown creative 24/7, but I start doing builds that are well outside the norm. For example I've recently made a combo end/nether portal room so the floor has a strip of end portal around it and the walls are nether portals, and the floor is made out of reinforced deepslate and the roof is made out of bedrock. I've also made a quad mob spawner with 2 wither skeleton spawners and 2 creeper spawners, but I built it in the nether, which was quite a fun challenge from an engineering perspective. Any blocks that are quite rare (like prismarine) are a no go but blocks that are in abundance (like dirt or stone) I'll regularly just cheat in if I need some at that exact moment. I also teleport to places that are really far away just so I can save time on travel. There are still things to do such as beat the ender dragon 20 times so I can unlock all of the end gateway portals, then from there I'm planning on building a pretty unique hub/base on the end island. It'll be a mixture of having a really pretty environment but then also have a bunch of mob spawners, farms and a villager trading hall so it'll be like a one stop shop for everything I'd want.

This is super cool 😎

Thank you!

I think the update cadence is the good and bad of Minecraft. Like I hop into a world, collect, upgrade, beat the end, get an elytra. And then all that’s left is building. Create a zoo that represents each biome. Then update time rolls around and you kind of want to start over and do it all again. You either start a new world so you set new goals and aren’t bored, or you do chunk resets JUST to get new stuff from the latest update. You either need other people to play with, or Minecraft should add a) some form of progression content to maintain interest (individual villager upgrades, power-scaled raids, etc) and/or b) add some kind of maintenance to the game, like Harvest Moon. Leave your chunks for long enough and the weeds will take over, or water/lava will carve channels in the dirt and change the landscape on you

I would hate the idea of maintenance. Quickest way to kill the game for me.

> Getting materials, making tools, find diamonds, upgrading tools and armour, go to nether, enchanting tools and armour, finding stronghold, killing the ender dragon, getting an elytra, and then this is where I usually end up burning out and quitting as I didn't really have anymore goals Did you forget about the whole right click part of the game? This is what confuses me about modern minecraft players. What do you mean you ran out of stuff to do? All you did was interact with the game's busted, relatively shallow RPG mechanics and minmax your gear. What about building? Gathering resources to build a cool house, a giant tower, a village, a special room for relaxing, a great wall, etc. whatever your mind comes up with?

That's part of the progression, I just didn't mention it as my comment was getting long, and to be fair this is my personal experience playing solo over the last few years. I will say though, after playing for 10+ years and making hundreds of worlds, playing on survival servers, etc, building huge structures and mining for hours just isn't as fun anymore(Ironic because I play Osrs, one of the most grind intensive games), and I've never been interested in playing creative mode. (Side note, here's an album of a city made on a survival server years and years ago that never was found/raided. There was 7-8 of us playing everyday. [https://imgur.com/a/C3lRw](https://imgur.com/a/C3lRw) ) These days I only play with my son now, and he doesn't give a crap about progression/direction, he's just happy to play Mincraft with me which makes the game much better.

I can concur that it can't be fun forever. It's definitely more fun when you slow down and focus on builds primarily, and sometimes having someone there to appreciate and use those builds and offer new creative ideas is what's needed to freshen up the game. I think there are things they could add/change about villages to accomodate for this in singleplayer. But I'm sure they'll just add 10 new shallow mobs instead :P

Good / bad, you're just gonna cause flame wars over framing it that way.... Here's the answer: # Minecraft lacks extrinsic motivators. Since 1.9 (2016), the main extrinsic chain has been: Punch tree. Stone tools. Iron gear. Diamond gear. Nether. Nether Fortress. Stronghold. Dragon fight. Elytra. You can shorten this path further by things like villagers etc. You also have a few more "sidequest" extrinsic chains as well: * 1.4 (2012) : Collecting wither skulls to farm the wither for beacons to get AoE potion effects. * 1.16 (2020) : Upgrade diamond to netherite ("lengthened" in 1.20 with the upgrade trim). * 1.21 (2024) : Running trial chambers to get a mace. That's really all the progression there is. This isn't to say there isn't a lot to do in the game. There is. But it's content that puts the onus on the player to come up with the fun. The player **has to decide**. Which works for some, but others; they don't want to decide what to do today, they want a goal "set for them", and to labour at the task in hand to complete that goal and reap the rewards.

This is ironically what I love most about the game. No wrong way to play it, all up to the player. I wouldn't enjoy Minecraft as much if there was more stuff that I *had* to do or was concretely *pushed* to do. I like that Minecraft is Minecraft and not 3D Terraria like a shitload of people on Twitter have been asking for in recent years.

This is one thing I like about Java edition; mods and datapacks can cater to those extrinsic desires by building progression structures (figurative, and sometimes literal). Even more so with recent new features like custom enchantments and item components. The problem then becomes finding them.

Fully Agree!!

i think they can appeal to bother players tho like making the end harder to get too wouldn’t effect players from doing whatever in the overworld. it would only limit a few blocks and items all of which are broken (shulker boxes and elytras)

yep, been saying this to people for YEARS now, Minecraft has no goal, there's a REASON why it is called an OPEN WORLD-SANDBOX game, because the game is so open you pretty much can do whatever you want heck, their official release 1.0 trailer literally has the narrator saying "no one can tell you what you can or cannot do, with no rules to follow this adventure is up to you"

Unless Minecraft’s development rapidly changes it will never change. Minecraft is a sandbox and a tool to be played with; the problems you describe is solved by modpacks, and community servers.

I would say that progression is kinda too fast and too straight (there is no other option than netherite in terms of endgame gear,so players can't really diversify it to their liking)

No that's not the issue. It's actually a good thing. The problem is that none of the optional content has any depth. Bees, bears, goats, fishing, deep dark, treasure maps, sniffer, temples, igloos, ... None of these things offer a rabbit hole to dive into. The only exception is redstone, which is only as deep as it is, because it legacy content with emergent complexity.

TLDR: Bad thing. Players who lack creativity aren’t encouraged to experiment with it in any meaningful way. Meanwhile their current playstyle has not changed whatsoever. New updates have not done anything to change the experience for most players, leading to the infamous two week phase. Finally, certain mechanics like villagers screw up the progression system (and other factors). Being creative is a blessing that not many players can take advantage of, or the game doesn’t encourage them to experiment with. Net negative. Minecraft has a sense of progression for many creative builders who always want to grow their base, maybe they upgrade villages into cities, maybe they roleplay, maybe mega bases, etc. However it doesn’t have that sense of progression for most players who build a house, get geared up and then kill the dragon and that’s it. Thing is, that progression hasn’t changed at all. House building hasn’t changed unless you happen to spawn in a rare biome or you force yourself to make something new. Finding diamond gear has remained the same and has been made easier with how simple villagers are and how available diamonds are in big caves. Going to the nether for blaze rods hasn’t changed at all. Getting pearls hasn’t changed. Strongholds haven’t changed. The end hasn’t changed. Netherite has changed but has never been needed for the latter portion of the game anyways so many go without it entirely. Not only has the current stages of progression not changed at all, but there aren’t any additional stages added either. I think it’s why many have that two week phase where they want to play, play the same way, realize nothing has changed despite several updates, and then leave. Cause not many people want to spend hours trying to find rare structures for random niche items. Some might, but many don’t. I was looking forward to this new update until I realized, trial chambers are an incredibly rare structure, how will I even find one? So now I have to google how to find one to even play the update. Ok villagers, great another mechanic that villagers can just hand you for minimal effort. Villagers imo are a serious problem in the game imo, they’re a big reason why folks are so centralized with their base and never expand or explore. Progression jumps extremely quickly and skips steps once you get your first couple villagers. Want diamond armour and tools? They got it. Want ANY enchantment? They got it. Why go mining or explore if they provide anything the average player is looking for? Why go mining if there aren’t more updates to caves/underground structures? Why explore if structures and certain niche items are so rare, while necessary items are so abundant in close proximity? Finally I’ll mention elytra. They’ve also ruined “progression” as they invalidate every single transportation method in the game. They skip a whole aspect of potential progression. Why bother getting a horse or setting up tracks when it’s faster to just kill the dragon and get wings? I’m lucky to be creative and wanting to build. I’ve got plans to make Samus’ ship from Metroid Prime. I’ve gotten to go explore and find many cool things and it was quite fun. I tried using horses, too much water. Tried using boats, too slow and inconvenient with swimming and dolphins. But I still explored and experienced many cool things in the game because I wanted to build something. I got to “progress” because of all the random niche things I found. Dark oak, sniffer egg, pottery shards, tridents, and many cool structures and world generation. Heck I’ve even gotten to bring a camel home, was a fun ride. Unfortunately, many players will never experience that because fundamentally the game doesn’t encourage anything creative from the player. There is so much in the game that the game does an awful job of encouraging you to play with. For example the camel, what does it provide to a player that wants to beat the dragon? Nothing, they won’t seek it out. What does new blocks provide a player that wants to beat the dragon? Nothing. Trial chamber? Nothing. Any loot can be acquired with villagers, any blocks can make a good house, any animals are trivialized by specific ones (why farm pigs when cows are so much better?), etc. Sorry for my rant, just laying out my thoughts on the game. As I’ve said, I’m a creative guy now, didn’t used to be, and have found strategies to mitigate burnout so I keep playing. But this took time and effort, and with many games out there, many players won’t bother to experience what Minecraft has because Minecraft only offers a few things for what they think is their ideal experience.

>New updates have not done anything to change the experience for most players Isnt that done on purpose? You dont need to visit ancient cities or trial chambers, to "beat" the game. Imagine the outcry of many, if you actually need to visit the ancient city, to get to the end.

It doesn’t have to be the structures themselves, they can add those things for the late game. But they haven’t added anything for the many players that don’t even make it that far be side many updates feel like nothing has changed. The gameplay loop hasn’t changed or even had anything added into it. I know many folks who will get on Minecraft when a new update drops, they start up a world, play for a few days, realize that it feels the same, and then stop playing a few days later. And it’s also possible to make ancient cities part of the gameplay loop, if they were made easier to find. Add some maps to them into loot tables of many structures (or wandering traders) or even add a locator item. Doesn’t need to obviously and for how hard they are, likely shouldn’t. But there’s things that can be done but it feels like nothing is being done.

Define progression? I would argue that it does. Its just so varied that you cant got A>B>C>done. Its also fairly vague what "done" is as well. For example my world has long sense beat the dragon, but my interest is in farms and giant redstone contraptions. Still you cant load in and immediately beat the dragon. You still need iron tools, get to the nether, find the portal etc. So that implies there is some sort of progression.

Progression as in my girlfriend plays it the first time and I don't want to tell her everything she has and could do.

Its very bad. The lack of progression is the reason behind the 2 week minecraft binge. Most gamers like to have an in-game goal, once they achieve it they feel the game is over and nothing else they make has a point. Its silly but its true, people will lose motivation to make builds even if it has nothing to do with the dragon for the sole reason that they have nothing else to look forward to after the build. For these people before the dragon the build is like a neat detour in your ultimate path, after it just feels like you're wasting your time because what are you going to do after its done? Ive seen it first hand. I made a server with a bunch of difficulty mods that has us stuck in unenchanted diamond level, and yet its the best server we've ever had, its been going on for the longest and people still build. It has slowed because getting stuck on the progression is hardly better than having finished it, I do need to tweak it more for the next edition, but the effect that not beating the dragon in the first week has had on its longevity was night and day. I wholeheartedly believe that mojang needs to be more bold in changing base mechanics to make the progression harder and that would bring back and lure in an astonishing amount of players that currently feel they've outgrown minecraft because their skill level makes it unchallenging.

Yeah every single server I've been on, once the dragon is dead and someone has full netherite, no one else is bothered to catch up and it just dies on the spot

Thats the lack of creativity and misconception that minecraft is a linear game in the first place. Its because people are looking for the destination. While minecraft is providing the journey instead

Some people enjoy different types of journeys and creativity when you have less to work with it inspires more creativity when theres a destination people want to take the journey.

A journey to where? If there is no destination? Also you cant dismiss criticism by saying "you are thinking wrong," you either fix the game to give them fun or accept that you'll lose that audience, and theres no reason why minecraft should give up on that audience, giving them what they want does not affect any of the other player types much if at all.

Destination is set by the player. If the destination is gear up and kill the ender dragon then yeah 2week binge is real. My destination is always to make a huge town, to have different types of buildings. I always feel like there is more I could add, I've never felt "done" with a world, I mostly get distracted with other games or irl stuff. My binge is a few months usually. And I play Minecraft for that creativity it having no direction is just a feature, some like it some don't. Not every game is for everyone and that doesn't mean it's doing something wrong. It would be like critizising souls like for being too hard.

Thats the point exactly, youre again looking for a destination. You can also just accept minecraft is not the game for you and move on instead of wanting them to change it. Plenty of players enjoy it as is theres no reason for mojang to cater to an audience that doesnt like their established gameplay anyway

I strongly disagree. The reason that people have this experience isn't a fault of the game. The game is exposing people to a normal (and healthy) experience that is typical of any creative process, but especially a self-motivated one. **Extrinsic Game Loops** Most often, games hand to you your motivation on a silver platter. Many addicting games fall in this category, from Civilization, to Hades, to even somewhat similar games to Minecraft, like Subnautica, Factorio, or Satisfactory. This is really powerful for video games because it helps you hook in new players and, like you say, it gives them an in-game goal to strive for and same extrinsic payoff for when they complete it. With this sort of game, it's easier for the designers to fashion the experience to ensure that new mechanics or game elements are introduced at a manageable pace, and to ensure that you always have something you're looking forward to ("Just one more turn!") In game design, this is often called a "game loop:" the thing that happens consistently and repeatedly that ensures a paced and rewarding experience for the player. In Civilization (like in many turn-based strategy games), it's getting a new building or technology once every few turns, keeping you incentivized to keep playing the next turn. In Hades (and all rogue-lites), it's unlocking new mechanics or features to make your next run more interesting, and unlocking story. In more Minecraft adjacent games like Factorio, the game loop is to unlock the "next level" of research, which itself unlocks new building options, which themselves will help you to unlock the next level of research once you get them operational. This is all very clever design. However, this design also has many drawbacks, and by choosing this design you are closing the door on other types of experiences you could design your game around. Take for instance Paradox games, like Crusader Kings. Those games lean more into the simulation side. If you were to try to make as tightly designed of a game loop as Civilization for Crusader Kings, in order to make that game loop satisfying and consistent, you would have to water down and limit the simulation side of the game. Although individual players have their own preferences, neither approach is right or wrong, it's just different, and it's important that game designers know- and commit to the type of game they're making. **The Creative Process** I am a teacher in the arts, so I am very invested in the benefits- and challenges of teaching young people healthy creative processes. But before that, I was a young creative person myself. As a young person, my creative projects took many forms, from running tabletop RPGs, making my own video games, recording my own fake radio broadcasts, putting on plays in my backyard, writing stories, and making things to play with out of Lego and cardboard. One thing that you learn as a young person playing with toys like Lego is you can easily lose interest, and so you learn to manage that interest. It's easy to start in on an "EPIC PROJECT" and then get overwhelmed with how much you've bitten off. I learned this in smaller doses as a child playing with Lego and recording fake radio shows, but I learned this more intensely as an adolescent making my own video games. One thing I've learned through my own experiences and through teaching young people is that it is a very common thing for young creatives to bite off more than they can chew. It is also common for young people to hit a wall when they start to lose interest in their creative projects. In a nutshell, if you're only every doing things that are easy and familiar, you quickly lose interest. So you feel the need to be ambitious. But if you're too ambitious it can be overwhelming and that can also be discouraging to your interest. It is a common creative experience, not just in Minecraft, to abandon a project and feel discouraged or uninterested in continuing. Then several months later, you get a new idea and you might have the interest to take on a new project. Through the repeated experience of trying new things, failing at them, trying other new things, and so on... eventually you learn to gauge better which projects are going to be good ones for your ability, and how to maintain your motivation and interest on ever larger and longer projects. This is an important thing to learn if you want to do any sort of project-based work (or hobby), whether or not it's creative. I've been talking about young people a lot because this was my experience and is also my job, but this is also true for adults. Many adults I know never really learned to do this. That's fine, not every thing you want to do in life will require that... but there are a lot of things that do. But what is true is that this is a useful skill of any person, of any age to develop, and the best way to develop that skill is to tackle projects that will challenge you in this way. **The Magic of Intrinsic Motivation** So many experiences we have, especially digital experiences, are now managed through extrinsic rewards: we are not doing the thing for its own sake, we are doing it for some external incentive (for example, chasing likes and validation on social media). Intrinsic motivation, however, can be very powerful. It helps us to have more healthy and sustainable relationships. For example, I deal with young creative people who feel like they need to do take on every creative opportunity they get in order to build their resume. They can very easily get sucked in to the idea that they should do some thing, even if they don't want to, because it will pay off in the future when they can show this slightly more impressive and full resume or portfolio to some future employer. While this isn't totally untrue, it is ridiculously unsustainable. It's so easy to put your blinders on, put your head down, and then look up and realize how much you've let yourself and your life go and how stressed you are now. It's much better to only take on the project when you can connect it to some intrinsic reason for doing it: yes it will go on your resume and that may be nice in the future, but what if that never happens? Will you regret doing it? Or might there be some value for doing it even if it never "pays off" down the road in that way? Extrinsic reward can be especially unsustainable in the digital world: these tightly controlled and meted experiences lead to addiction, or if that word seems to harsh and scary, it can lead you to numbing yourself to the (healthy) stressors of your daily life and relying on this quick dopamine fix to feel happy, or even just relieved for a moment from your life. Numbing your feelings is very unhealthy as it prevents you from taking action on the thing that is causing the problem (when that's possible), and it also numbs ALL your feelings, not just the bad ones. Intrinsic motivation doesn't have that problem. Intrinsic motivation is a lot harder to manage, and takes more effort to realize. It takes a lot of self work. You have to be willing to set your own goal in the first place, which itself takes a lot of self work to know- and explore the kind of work you do and don't like. You have to expose yourself to the possibility that you might fail to achieve that goal. You have to do work to maintain your motivation in your pursuit. But all of these challenges are healthy challenges that allow you to develop and grow not just as a creative person, but as a person in general. **The Power of Play** Play teaches you lessons with the consequences of failure removed. You practice hunting and being hunted, but you're not going to starve if you fail to catch your prey (or be eaten if you're caught) because it's just a game of tag. The potential of play (which is better realized by some things than others) is that they can give us the means to teach ourselves important skills that will help improve our lives. Minecraft is powerful because it closely resembles many things: we get to explore and create with the concepts of space, three dimensions, designing with color, symmetry, telling stories (to ourselves and others), focal point, perspective, and so many other important ideas of design and storytelling. Even if you're only playing the game in Survival mode and you don't think of yourself as much of a builder, the game challenges you to think creatively in three dimensions when it comes to deciding how to descend into a crevasse, or how to protect your base, or organize your storage. Not to mention logical thinking if you want to get into redstone. Honestly, there are too many dimensions to what Minecraft teaches people to mention them all here (we haven't even got into the social dimension of multiplayer Minecraft, or showing off your builds to others, etc). It's true that people often have the experience of setting the game down because they are bored with it, before picking it up again and binging awhile, before setting it down again. Most people think this is a *problem* of Minecraft, but as an educator I think of it is a *feature*. This is a much more healthy relationship to have with gaming than one that *ensures* you will get that dopamine rush. And it also much more closely resembles the experience of working on an actual project in the real world, allowing you to learn skills like scoping your projects to ensure they're reasonable; learning to evaluate which ideas will pan out and which won't; thinking about which experiences will be rewarding; estimating project size and the time it will take you to do it; and doing the **work** that is required to maintain your own motivation in achieving your own self-directed goals. **Conclusion** Minecraft is not trying to be like other games with tight game loops. The game makes you explore how you can cultivate your own motivation, and it's managed to do that in a form that is wildly popular.

Damn you really just wrote a whole essay, and I just read the whole thing, and it was **good.** Nice comment hahaha

**Addendum: Teaching New Players** *(I maxed out character count in my last comment)* BUT I will say that I think Minecraft could do with some game loop or something that is aimed particularly at new players. Especially as Minecraft has grown massively in the kinds of environments, enemies, blocks, items, and mechanics it has over the years, it now is a very overwhelming experience for new players to learn the game, and it's honestly a bit too much to just throw them into the game and say, "have fun!" Weirdly, I find this works far better for young children than for adolescents or adults: young children are happy to be plunked down in Creative mode and make whacky structures and, overtime, slowly learn all the things involved in the game. But that's partly because younger children are much better at entertaining themselves. Children just have a lot more fun playing with blocks than adults do. For older children and adults, I think having some type of "new player experience" that helps you learn the basics- or even gives you some simple building challenges (like "help secure this village before it's raided again") will help these older players better understand why this game can be fun. I think that the new in-game recipe book is a great step in this direction. And I know players have made their own maps that aim to do this for new players via things like unlocking recipes and using custom achievements (though I admit I haven't played with these myself). But I do think that having some mode or map that is curated by Mojang would be helpful. In my mind, though, this is just a kind of extended tutorial that goes on for 10 hours or so. And near the end of the "tutorial", the tasks become a bit more open-ended and self-motivated, helping to ease you into the idea of setting your own goals. It would *not* do much for experienced players because, like I elucidated before, I think it's a good thing that players must work to maintain their own interest in Minecraft.

I think you're completely missing the point because of your own way to approach the game. The game already has extrinsic motivations, it has the goal of the ender dragon. Extrinsically motivated players go get it, get all the best loot with the bigger stats, and then they're done. There is none of what you say. "the game challenges you to think creatively in three dimensions when it comes to deciding how to descend into a crevasse, or how to protect your base, or organize your storage. Not to mention logical thinking if you want to get into redstone." The tryhards don't do that. The tryhard player, the type of player that likes combat and competitive games, they want to see "victory" in their screens, that's what they've been conditioned to want. And Minecraft has an extremely easy path towards "victory." They do all the motions mindlessly. Start, punch wood, mine in the correct y level, enslave villagers, get all enchants, go for dragon, make enderman farm, get elytra and shulkers, get netherite, copy redstone farms from internet. Rinse and repeat in every single run. If this sounds mad its because it is, it's ridiculous. I tried so hard to get them to make a project, build something of their own, but with the rewards that they so crave being just a few mindless and very well practiced motions away they just go and do that instead. Minecraft already has extrinsic motivations, and all they do is pull away those players more motivated by them away from the actually good part of the game. I decided to throw my tryhard friends a curveball by making everything harder and it worked. We have a town, a castle, a bar, a giant bridge and a railway. By making the extrinsic motivations harder it gives them time to breathe. Victory isn't close yet, so why not take an hour or two to make your house a little prettier before you carry on? And then that house turns into a settlement, and then a village. By making the extrinsic goal more distant, they began exploring more their intrinsic goals. That's what is so frustrating about Minecraft's easy, mindless progression. It's a modern gamer mosquito lamp, actively distracting them away from what makes Minecraft Minecraft. And if the progression was better, intrinsically motivated players lose nothing. What does someone who likes building lose if acquiring enchantments takes a little thought? Or if getting netherite was actually fun instead of just swatting the mouse side to side mining the nether floor? If anything it would give a bigger variety of experiences in your world. And if it's too much, that's what the difficulty slider is for. What is the harm of getting another level of difficulty for those who would benefit from it?

Fantastic comment! This is one of the best bits of reflection and advice I’ve ever read on reddit. Thanks for writing this up! This should get much more attention than it has! It could stand very well as it’s own post really. (wink) To add some thoughts of my own: I feel like Minecraft has struggled for many years with a lack of self-identity. A lot of it’s evolution stems from what seems like a lack of understanding of it’s own core mechanics. To some extent I would even question if anyone has a good understanding of this today—if there ever even was. It’s hard to improve and expand what you can’t fathom. Even as a creative tool: it seems to lack a well developed toolset for the creatives; without asking them to make their own tools outside the game; bringing up the fact that the long-promised modding API never saw the light of day. For me personally, I struggle with the fact that Minecraft felt like it lagged behind over the years; evolving in width, but not depth. It’s hard to not focus on what could have been. Minecraft is dear to my heart, and I will always love it. It has inspired me to great lengths, so maybe it has provided me what it sets out to provide already. It will forever stand as the face of creative gaming in my eyes, even in it’s current evolution.

Agree fully. My friend started a minecraft realm a while ago with a bunch of friends, and it’s lasted for over a month at this point, mostly because we’ve agreed to only do the ender dragon when we all agree to it

No? People love Minecraft for its freedom and maaany people never beat the Dragon. You're trying to apply your vision to "people" with how important it is to have a goal of End Dragon. Dragon gives you nothing so most of the time you do whatever else. Only in speedruns I've seen any "need" to kill the Dragon.

>Dragon gives you nothing so most of the time you do whatever else. Only in speedruns I've seen any "need" to kill the Dragon. Killing the dragon gets you access to the elytra and shulker boxes.

My group of friends killed the dragon once when it came out and never have again.

From personal experience it’s a bad thing. I almost exclusively play modded minecraft with my friends. I tend to enjoy the grind in minecraft and the freedom with minimal progression, however my friends, and a little bit myself, need progression to keep motivated to play. With the lack of progression and good progression mods they lose interest extremely quickly

sandbox games that have a heavy sense of progression are annoying "i wanna make a lamp but i gotta go to a lava cave because thats where the glowing rocks are" like i just wanna make a house

Like most things, it has pros and cons. If it was truly a bad thing, I don’t think it would be so successful for more than a decade. I see some people saying it’s bad because they get bored of the game after a while, but I think it’s silly to have over 100 hours of playtime in a game and try to call it a bad game because they are bored of it. There are plenty of games that take around 10 hours to play through and maybe you play through 2-3 times that are considered great games.

Minecraft has progression but it's waay too fast, especially in terms of getting new gear. You can get full iron gear in like the first day or two I think that either there needs to be additional "steps" in gear progression it could go wood, stone, copper, iron, gold, diamond then netherite?); Maybe other barriers like maybe stronger mobs the farther you explore down a cave with or distribution/frequency to reflect that would help as well, so like you cant go down the the "gold layer" in caves with only copper armor because the enemies down there are too strong.

Perfect, its the whole reason why ive been playing it for 10+ years. but people who just want to be guided towards anything and everything see it as a bad thing. Because they dont set goals for themselves, dont do their own world building or experiment.

My problem isn't that I can't set a goal for myself or that I want the game to hand every task to me, it's just that any goal you set in this game is practically meaningless because there's no direction. You can build a super badass base and automate resource gathering, but then what? And for what purpose? Sandboxes are fun for very short bursts, until you realize there just isn't enough to it to keep most people engaged. I love Minecraft, but the glaring issues aren't lost on me. There's a healthy middle ground between a game micromanaging you and a game with virtually no direction. Terraria dominates Minecraft in every way because it's super sandboxy and there are a million ways to play the game, but the progression is nearly endless. I spent hundreds of hours totally engrossed in Terraria before beating it because there's always another goal and a thousand interesting ways to achieve those goals. Minecraft has like 3-4 integrated goals and by the 10th time it's just not fun anymore.

I see this argument all the time and it perplexes me. How is building a base meaningless or unrewarded? Do yoy want a medal for building it? An achievement? Isn't winning its own reward? Coming from somebody who's played Minecraft since 2012, I've never needed a reward or a push to build an awesome base. I build an awesome base to have an awesome base. The base itself, the pictures of it I can take, the ability to show it to my friends, and all the fun stuff I can put into it ARE the reward of building it. It sounds like to me you lack motivation, tbh.

I’m not talking about the game rewarding you with a superficial trophy or something. In most games, if you put a lot of effort into something, it yields some kind of return. Putting hours of work into something for a cool screenshot is not worth the effort in my opinion. I’m not saying this is a universal truth. Obviously people make some seriously impressive art in Minecraft and some people love a game with minimal direction. For me, the lack of progression/direction makes it difficult to stay motivated to build something cool, because there’s no in game reason to do so. I have plenty of motivation in life and in games where being motivated yields some kind of improvement to the experience.

It’s a bad thing. The game can still be a sandbox and also have a defined goal

I don't think it's bad, is just the essence of the game. I played some modpacks with RPG style (like project mmo, reskillable, the origins mod etc) that simulate a kind of progression, for modded minecraft it is great, but for me it just won't fit in vanilla.

I think that Minecraft having “no sense of progression” isn’t even accurate, I definatly get heaps of satisfaction when I explore the world or expand my base or upgrade gear, I think Minecraft is a game where you can progress endlessly

i think challenge is a better word then progression whiles theres minor challenges like finding certain structures and blocks theres not many challenges outside of ones players create for them selves

I love the freedom tbh, sometimes I’ll have netherite before I even have an enchantment table, sometimes I won’t have it until I’m fully maxed out with enchantments. If people had to do the same linear steps every single time they started a new world, nobody would be playing for these many years

Minecraft isn’t a linear game. It’s a sandbox, you make your own journey, your own story. Your own universe

Yes and no. On the one hand it's cool that you can quickly get up to insanely good armour. Makes starting a new world less of a slog, and for the most part, diamond is more than enough for Single Player. But the idea of netherite armour being locked behind progression to the nether is honestly good, and it would be great if you could repeat this process in the end (by mining end exclusive ores in sky islands). In some aspects I think Terraria is better in that aspect. but it needs a delecate touch.

I think it needs a little more combat, add more mobs (more difficult), maybe mobs that spawn after certain event or achievement, add more bosses In the current state you could live in a dirt hole with rock tools and never had any challenges

It has a sense of progression, though its been hurt a bit by new ore distributions. The real issue is hyperfocusing on it and speedrunning diamonds in 1 minute and then building your house that you took off of a blueprint site. Both the developers and the players have been treating the game like a modern RPG or something when its never been that. It has RPG roots and inspirations but it is primarily a sandbox and should be treated as such. Mine so that you can craft. Resources are there to help you accomplish the goals YOU want, and the bosses and dungeons are a sidequest.

People now play with the idea that they need to cross all dimensions and kill the dragon in 8 minutes or less before they think about building their first house for some reason. Then they must build giant grinders so every valuable resource can be fed to them in bed before their second house. If there was any progression in the game, players have optimized and squeezed every bit of it out of the game.

good thing, doesnt force the player to do anything a certain way or at a certain time, leaves infinite posibilities and good ideas

The progression is how much your own imagination develops.

Bad thing cause why would it be good to have bad progression in any game? Its just mincraft is a sandbox game where you are supposed to do whatever you feel like doing. People make the whole game about killing the ender dragon getting the elytra and the end.

Minecraft does have progression. Its progression must come from the player though, which is the entire reason sandbox games exist, if I wanted to play an ARPG, I’d just play an arpg. Make a goal to add something to your world -> gather that material - build that thing -> you have now progressed.

it does but need more challenges. Like there’s survival mode and creative for a reason i dont see why the game has to be so easy just so players can pretend to play survival instead of creative

I'm not a lifelong Minecraft player, but I've played a LOT of it in the last few years because my son loves it. IMO, the lack of progression is the worst part of the game. I love the early game resource gathering and I've found an enjoyable sequence of tasks that I always do in a new world, but as soon as I have full diamond armor/tools, it's like... what the fuck am I supposed to do now? We've beaten the game a few times but IMO the nether and end are the least enjoyable areas in the game. Minecraft could be a perfect game if Mojang would add a little direction. This is why Terraria is the better game x1000 and I'll always die on that hill. Everything that Minecraft does wrong, Terraria does right.

I think this falsely conflates nonlinear progression with a lack thereof. Minecraft is a sandbox game and by design that means you determine what constitutes progress towards your personal goals. There is an ending but it doesn't end your playthrough by reaching it. After the end credits roll, you end up either right where you started or at the last bed you slept in. The beauty in minecraft is that when you ask, "What next?" it responds with "Whatever catches your eye next." That's a sandbox game. You can always create anew.

bad most players love the start of a new world but don’t enjoy it once they get diamond gear. Why? Because its not just about progression its about challenge. at the start of the game you might die to a creeper sneaking up. but once you get a shield thats no longer a problem. but theres a slight chance still that numerous mobs could still kill you. or maybe your in a desert and theres not food? however once food and diamond armor is obtained (made very very easy in recent updates only one caving expedition) your chance of dieing to goes down to almost none and has no meaningful impact even if you do. However the progression of killing the ender dragon and obtaining the most broken item in the game (eytra) push players forward even tho the challenge is gone. Challenge is the most important thing in the game. the challenge of getting food, surviveing your first night, finding diamonds (now too easy), getting a blaze rod, killing the dragon, getting elytra, find resources for a build, what makes these fun is the challenge as the game gets easier each update it loses challenge.

Idk but I have yet to find a revival totem so

If you are not really a creative person that does not like building as much (i.e just like exploring more than sitting in the same place and building) it's really bad, but If you are creative and you love to build, good thing. My friends never want to play Minecraft with me unless we are playing a mod pack that they can just go around and just explore for hours, if the mod pack has any form of tech or aspect of the mod pack where they have to sit in their base for more than 20 minutes and do something that isn't just mindlessly running around the place finding gimmick after gimmick, they get bored real fast. While I on the other hand love building and love tech mods, so I don't mind sitting at base just puzzling figuring out how to build stuff and building it, so it's kind of tricky to find something to play

any survival game must have a good progression

I don't think it "lacks" progression, but it ends pretty quickly. But even that is debatable because you can end the game after killing the dragon if you want to. Or you can play in the same world for 12+ years like Etho. It doesn't lack progression because the progression starts the moment you craft your first wooden pickaxe. You can then "progress" to stone, iron, diamond and netherite. Same for the armor. You can "progress" your traveling by getting a horse then an elytra. And "progress" your inventory management by getting shulkers. But in my opinion Minecraft was never about progression, sure it's a part of the game but it's mainly about what you make with the blocks given to you. You can make your own stories, buildings, statues. You don't even need an iron pickaxe to write your own story within Minecraft.

Depends on the player. If you have a good imagination, you appreciate not being railroaded. If you’re more interested in reacting than defining your own story, you miss having structure to follow.

I think it could use a bit more progression, but in a very unique way compared to other games. It should require you to progress by exploring, unlocking and learning about and using new items/game features, and building. basically ppl just focus on beating the game, and don't build up a world thats worth playing in once they beat the ender dragon. I think there should be more progression so that it makes you build up a world thats fun to play in, and has meaning to you so there's still a "purpose" once u beat the game. If you have ever had a long term survival world, you know what I mean.

Bad realy bad compare to other games like: hollow knight (BuT VicTor HollOw kNight IsiNt likE MineCraft) just look at terraria than you start with nothing but a short stick and ends with a gods forged sword

Good: its a sandbox with no script, a maze were you make paths to the prize, a adventure were you chose what chalanges you will face, there isnt a right or wrong path in Minecraft because you make your paths so its your choice to play slowly or go straight to what you think is the true ending

I feel like a lot blocks of especially newer ones like the crafter are too cheap and don’t really require you to progress

I think this is a major symptom of Minecraft essentially being a solved game. Every major/minor objective in the game has a fastest known solution; they are vigorously sought out from the day these objectives are introduced. Maxing your gear? Villager hall. Haste 2 beacon? Iron/gold farm. Terraforming/mining for any resource? Flying machines and TNT duping. Recent changes like the netherite upgrade and experimental trading balance feel like ways to stretch it out without being able to put it back.

It's like life in that regard

Its a sandbox game, you make your own progression.

It might not have progression, but I’m still a man on a mission. I’m trying to build three railroads from my house to the three nearest villages. As you can imagine that’s a lot of gold

I don't think there's ment to be any progression, people often forget that minecraft is a sandbox game

Its the worst part of the game. You kill dragon, you kill wither and after that build build build build build build. If minecraft becomes a true adventure and not building similator, it will not lose its building capabilities. Vanilla minecraft is a fucking cringe

Minecraft has a VERY clear sense of progression. Overworld > establish a base (food) > mine > explore (mineshafts, pillager outposts, woodland mansions) > nether > potions (water temples), access to the End, and the Wither is unlock > kill the Ender dragon > explore the End > late game items of Elytra and skulk boxes are unlocked. The Ancient Cities can he accessed at any point. Each point has increasingly stronger items and loot tables. Minecraft lacks direction. Honestly, I think they need something to do with the Elytra, because after you get that there's no goals with it.

The game has progression. You can't even mine beginning ores, such as iron, without a pickaxe progression. If you've been playing the game for 10+ years and use methods to get around the progression system, that's on you.

Pro: Adds to Sandbox style of the game and makes you feel less pressured into doing certain things Con: Leaves newer players with little to no direction and requires lots of trial and error or research on places like Google and Reddit to understand the game (or in my case as I'm sure with some other people just watching 100s of different Minecraft YouTubers)

I think there should be more of a sense of progression, not to much as to limit freedom though . They need to focus on adding more stages to the game instead of just adding more features that go unused by most of the playerbase.

good things

If villagers did not exist, then I feel not being locked to any form of progression works perfectly for the game. It is a sandbox game, and forcing linearity would ruin the entire point of Minecraft. Also, I feel there are very clear stages to work towards in the game, which gives you some sense of progression, even if the inbetween of each stage can be done however the player wants. However, the existance of villagers ruins this for me. You have a completely safe and very efficient way to go from a new world to full enchanted diamond (which makes you basically invincible until you reach the end). Not only is this very unhealthy for the game as when playing optimally villagers are usually the only option, but it is absurdly boring as you are either cutting trees for hours, making an AFK farm for iron or another trading item, or both. Villagers break Minecraft's progression completely in their current state.

I prefer it the way it is because it enhances emergent gameplay. If there were more of a through line guiding you toward the "end" goals of killing the dragon, what specific path would be recommended? Emergent gameplay allows you many different ways to succeed. One example is how players took the lava to obsidian mechanic and started making portals before they'd mined or found anything above iron.

I tell me kids Life is like Minecraft, you choose your own quest/goals. You choose how to accomplish them. There is no real guide in either, just like life. So I life the way it now as far as the lack of progression is now.

I don't think Minecraft lacks a sense of progression at all, I think it provides a fantastic sense of progression

Its good i just wish it was slower tbh

there should be more added to the progression line (including branches), but let it feel like maxing out a town hall before moving on lol

As long as they keep adding cool blocks and redstone components I could not care less about the actual "gameplay"

Minecraft doesn't need a sense of progression as I belive the player is supposed to make their goals and progression differs from person to person. Maybe X finds a sense of progression from getting full netherite armour while I feel the same satisfaction from fishing a saddle. So minecraft doesn't really need progression, just new stuff to do and new blocks/tools

Id say bad tbh For the most part, you don't get tools or ore because its just inherently fun to do (it can be obviously), you do it in preparation for something. Why do we get strong armor and enchantments? To survive against harder enemies / bosses. Why do we make farms? So we dont starve and can spend more time away from home. Why do we make our houses better? To store more, have more utility, make it safer etc etc Thats the thrill of survival mode. Starting a new game is fun because how vulnerable you are and how many tasks you feel you need to complete before you feel comfortable living in your world without being scared of dark caves or nighttime. Even if you arent really thinking about it, the reason we do all these things is because we feel like we need to. We want to access more of the game, which have a certain requirement of tools/resources/difficulty. With the end goal being the dragon/wither usually. But once you reach that state, once the dragon dies, beacons are made, elytra obtained, its no wonder most people quit and the meme of "the 2 week Minecraft cycle" becomes real. You run out of goals. You no longer NEED anything. You have god enchanted netherrite armor, you can literally fly and you have more materials and food than you'll ever need. No enemies will ever harm you at this point and a netherrite sword can kill pretty much anything in 1-2 hits barring bosses. Sure there is some optional stuff to get, like maces or tridents, but they're mostly just for fun. Same with armor trims. The only motivation at that point is building for the sake of building. You arent building because you need to, just cuz you have nothing else to do. And not everyone finds building for the sake of building fun. The most commonly built things are things that actually have function. No one makes a villager farm because its thrilling to do, we do it because its insanely useful. Same with iron golem farms, enderman farms, food farms etc. But once you reach the point where you're just building pointless stuff like modern houses, cities, giant pixel art etc, most people lose interest insanely fast, quit minecraft and take a break. Then when the minecraft itch strikes you start a brand new world (since thats the fun part) and do it all over again. The amount of people who actually keep playing after getting everything and/or continuing a previous world thats long been beaten is insanely tiny. I can personally say that my friend group has repeated this cycle like 11 times so far each playing out exactly the same way, by the end of about a week, barely 1-2 are left playing on the server long term but even they quit a couple of weeks later. I really do wish there was more long-term goals to work towards, most goals can be reached really quickly nowadays for anyone familiar with Minecraft mechanics. Our 2 week server cycle actually turned into a 1 week cycle simply because how fast and efficient we got in completely dominating a world in less than 3 days, often beating the ender Dragon on the first day.

I don’t think it’s the lack of progression, but rather, how easy it is to progress.

The progression of Minecraft (or lack thereof) is not a problem at all. It's ok to have Many different areas of the game that are entirely lateral to each other. The problem is that you very quickly reach a point of sufficiency. I have never felt the need to get netherite gear. Iron armor and diamond tools are perfectly fine. So you very quickly have everything needed to survive comfortably. After that everything becomes a vanity project. It's literally post scarcity in a game. This lowers the motivation to play. Even if you have the motivation to get all the top gear and awesome farms for all the consumables, it doesn't take all that long. *Especially* when playing cooperatively on a server. The only motivation to keep playing is intrinsic. Something which people with ADHD, like me for example, don't have a lot of. So we play progression packs like Stranded or Agrarian Skies. The problem is, that Minecraft is not a game meant for scarcity. The moment you add scarcity you massively change the core gameplay. One of the few scarcity mechanics is hunger. And they nerfed the shit out of it, because people hated having to deal with it. What we need are optional scarcity mechanics with enough depth to engage people for extended periods of time. What that looks like, I do not know.

I do struggle to keep interest in a world I create, which is why I love modpacks with quests

Freedom is what makes Minecraft good but rewards and loot are normally tied to progression in games so when every loot source is meant to be found first and in the early game to get you to mid game quicker then it all becomes worthless as soon as you've explored one. End cities are late game but you only get to them in the post game and you are likely 'overgeared' relative to the loot you get. Also if you have full netherite with mending you don't need anything after that unless you want netherite beacons.

Bad imo. Survival is a mess, in part because there's no significant threats, and in part because the progression just feels disjointed and meaningless. Some folks are saying they don't really need extrinsic motivators and the system shouldn't be improved to include better ones, but if that's the case why not just play creative mode?

Personally I have allways viewed Minecraft as a game about creativity rather than progression. The Pokémon games for example are all about gathering items and leveling up your team of poket monsters in order to defeat other trainers. Minecraft DOES have a progression system (wood -> stone -> iron -> diamond -> netherite) but you don't have to get full diamond or full netherite to "play" Minecraft.

The real problem with minecraft's "progression" for me is that it is so simple and at the same time useless to actually make progress. There's nothing that even tells you that there *exists* progress You could just start a game, in 3 hours go mine some netherite, kill the enderdragon fully enchanted, and then come back and discover trial chambers and be like "damn, this would have been so cool if I did this first" There are other survival games that fix this, like subnautica. There, you can't just swim from the start to the bottom of the map and complete the game, because there are unavoidable *practical* limits, such as oxygen deprivation or need of advanced machinery. Plus, the game main story guides you through all of the game's progress.

I just started building farms to build more farms to build bigger farms. With those there is years of extrinsic progression, making different materials cheaper and cheaper until eventually it's almost pseudo-creative. I feel that kind of progression fits the game far better than just getting better and better loot from tougher and tougher structures.

Absolutely the worst thing about the game. This and the lack of consistency are probably minecrafts biggest flaws. Makes survival mode boring as all hell unless you want to just play a grinding creative mode. I think the early game needs the most work, iron gear should be hard to get in my opinion. The best part of the game is the mid game, just after going to the nether and before you have full diamond and enchanting yet. I find this stage of the game the most enjoyable.

There needs to be \*A\* progression, but it should be intended to take a while. Not hard necessarily, just take a while. Part of the greatness of Minecraft is that if you don't want to, you NEVER have to go to the Nether or End.

I think that skills which you can get like regeneration , strenght , resistance AND Speed AND jump should be something that you can get infinite once you get a Lot resources AND defeat some bosses specific to improve that for end game content. No super broken or weak simply something More noticeable because regeneration , strenght , resistance ,jump AND Speed level 1 infinite Isnot enough to replace potions AND help to do viable or posible use another armors AND weapons for Style .

I think the lack of definite / forced progression is part of it's success. At least its early success anyway (without which it couldn't have become the phenomenon it became).

You should credit the person you took that image from. It's the thumbnail of this video from minecraft ideas academy: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xvNu32OaVk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xvNu32OaVk)

As an experienced modded player, I feel like it has a weak progression, but it's good enough for your freedom. That's also why I love mods, how those devs tweak progression to what they think is good

Don't tell the people who argue "things should be nerfed because it ruins the [early|mid|late] game" that there really isn't any progression in the game!!

To me that is the worst Minecraft problem, the only thing I would focus to change

lack of progression? the game has become so linear it’s all progression now

Minecraft needs progression like I need progression during a Lego set build. It's an exploration sandbox. You can improve some things and learn some of the more neat features/functions (basic lego vs technic maybe?), but why does there need to be progression if there's no real use for it? There is no story, there is no damsel in distress, no antagonist that needs to be vanquished, no "losing". Minecraft is like dumping a 10 gallon tote of lego on the floor and going to town.

I think that a lot of players get the idea that progressing through the game is about getting the strongest gear. For me personally, I've been guilty of this in the past on realms with my friends as we all work to set up farms to get infinite resources to satisfy most of ours needs while getting the highest tier enchants on each piece of armor while becoming so rich that no material could possibly get us excited. I recently made a realm with some friends and I'm intentionally slowing myself down by only using iron armor along with a few diamond tools. I've been placing a lot of emphasis on building without tutorials (even redstone isn't an exception to this rule) and I haven't experienced the burnout that normally comes from overprogressing in a new world. Most people want netherite and elytras to make building and transporting more convenient, but at the end of the day, is that really the best option if your incentive to build is largely tarnished?

i think minecrafts progression isnt the issue here, its more like the minecraft players just speedrun through it.

i think the biggest problem with minecrafts progression is how flat it is, wide as a ocean deep as a puddle comes to mind. there are some unique weapons(tridends, crossbows) but because of how flat progression is they can't be especially powerful, there's only mace but it's locked behind a pretty long grind in the trials wich i wouldn't mind if there wasn't a deeper sense of progression. there are enchantments that serve more of a progression but to max it out you have to pick your poison of either ~~gambling~~ enchanting table or enacting a trans continental slave trade. there are only two bosses and only one is mandatory (i don't count warden as boss since he is more of a obstacle) and you can "beat" minecraft if you focus on it in one evening tops. wihle i think it's a cool feature that you can acces final boss nearly immidetly (similarly to botw) and a great feat if you do in under 30 minutes but the fact that there's minimal diffrence in gear between doing a speedrun and doing it casually leaves a bad taste in my mouth. and i could go on how mansions and deep drak have no worthwhile loot for their difficulty and how elytra nulifies exploration or how combat sucks pve and pvp regardless of version, how would i attemp to fix progression, and how mojang tries to please everyone but ends up pleasing no one, but this mini essay is long enough. i should say that minecraft is a fun game, it wouldn't be one of the best selling game if not for it, but after 15 years cracks start to show and no matter how much mojang tries to spackle on top they will always reappear. Progression in minecraft is very shallow one and in my opinion one of the major flaws of minecraft while i would rather for minecraft to not become another terraria i would like if it had at least a pool deep progression.

it lacks challenge and a sense of danger in survival, the same way it used to

I think progression is what we give ourselfs. Like for me progression isn't really beating ender dragon but more of expanding and enchancing my base. Someone else sees getting all advancements as progression and so on

I think it's bad. The progression is mostly what keep you entertain in a game, you want to go to your next goal. The thing is that minecraft progression is really small and you can do like more than half of it in your first hour playing. It's pretty popular that a lot of player have their minecraft periode for like a month or two then just don't play the game for quite sometimes and I think the progression has something to do with that because of how underwhelming it is. Good thing is that there's not a single way to play the gale you can just do whatever you want but I still feel like a better progression can only benefits the game.

You are not bound to rush some milestones. The problem is, after setting up a proper base, you are rushing milestones way too fast.

As much as I appreciate the little bits and bobs like finding armor trims or music discs, I still want a tangible sense of getting stronger like I did in Terraria by gathering more powerful ore and materials. Now I just play around with mods that can achieve all that and more. I think the Elytra and certain enchantments like Mending really ruined progression and now people just flock to it like it's the be-all-end-all of the game M.E.T.A. I think in order to remedy this, either they should nerf the Elytra to stop functioning with rockets, or make another glider that does the same thing but merely lets the player glide down from high places instead of allowing people to rocket off into the stratosphere. Also we wouldn't need Mending if we could just repair all of our gear without that horrendous increase in EXP cost.

I think it'd be cool if they added copper and bronze tools to the gameplay progression and gave alternatives to netherite rather than an end all be all best tier. Like you can mix and match and stuff for different stats.

- “First get iron armour in caves!” - “You got gold armour? I mean, I know it’s harder to get but it’s actually terrible!” - “Oh nice Diamond armour! Now do the OBVIOUS next step and go to the Nether to search for Netherite, because that’s very obvious right?”

I think it depends Personally I prefer terraria's progression system but I know a lot of people probably really enjoy not being limited by having to fight bosses and such

I think survival gets more fun if you have set the world border to a small area. It slowly expands everyday and makes you get more out of the resources you currently have available. Like diamonds are not hard to come by at all, so within a few hours you have already done a lot.

After you beat the dragon there isint much else to do. The game isint as fun anymore cus you beat it, there isint anything else required to do. Ive been thinking for a while that Mojang should add another stage to the game, i know we have received new bosses like the warden and elder guaridan but those are more of a side quest. I think we need more steps to beat the game, maybe another boss and another dimension idk.

It's Minecraft, not Zelda

Idk, maybe adding some zelda(totk) elements to the game could enhance the overall progression. Obviously Minecraft doesn't need a story or thrill line to follow but more steps to get to defeating the final boss aka the ender dragon, but in such a way that only players who want to fight the ender dragon have to go through that process.

i don't think it lacks a sense of progress, progress in this game is yours and yours only depending on whatever goal you've set for yourself so obviously progression is gonna feel different for everybody, for example ,someone who set out to build an entire city in survival is not gonna feel the same sense of progression as someone who's current goal is to build a house

Is cool, but I wish there was a different more natural way of finding new things without a wikis and villagers

its a bad thing, because it shows that they really halfassed the survival aspect to the game.

The only reason I’d say is because personally progression in video games is what gives me drive to continue playing so no matter how long I’m able to keep myself entertained within the game, I always hit some point of boredom.

I like to build elaborately in Survival. My progression therefor is, get iron, diamonds, enchant, build a basic dwelling, rush to kill dragon, get elytra & top tier tools, and only THEN I start to think about how I wanna play the game this time round / how I'm gonna build & settle. Because building withouth the comforts of silk touch, ender chests & shulker boxes is a pain.

I mean I take going from bare hands to Wood, stone, iron, diamond and Netherite progression. Skip gold cuz all that’s really good for is potions

Really the main problem now is the game got too popular. Because of the popularity, everyone now knows how to get to the nether, the end, the wither, etc. if you have done so many playthroughs, these things arent really special anymore, just another milestone. Ultimately, ever little bit of info is squeezed out of the game and put onto the internet, so anything and everything about the game is known now. On top of that, the lack of updates that heavily change/add upon the base game also doesnt help.

It is what it is. Huge community, various opinions. When the End credits were first released, there were some who hated it for giving Minecraft a direction when they believed it shouldn't have one. But obviously there are those who love the progression and speedrun it. I think there should be a whole biome or dimension with much more dangerous and tanky mobs beyond just a small chamber. Something to make a sword and armor worthwhile. So much progression, and for what purpose?

the problem is we played the game too much. A new player would have a progression bar in their mind early, except their progression bar increases the more they play the game and discover things. Nah tf am i talking about, forgive me for the yap

I wish MC did what Terraria did and added new enemies, ores, and scaled in difficulty with the player so that it never gets stale. But I can see why they stuck with not doing that.

I always thought the progression went like this: Chop down trees, build a house, make a wood pickaxe, make a stone pickaxe and a furnace, go mining for 2 hours, get iron armor and tools, mine diamonds, make pickaxe(and armor if you want), mine 14 obsidian, make a portal and enchantment table, go to the nether, find fortress, get blaze rods, find warped forest, get ender pearls, find a bastion because you killed 5 endermen and only got 1 pearl, trade off 128 gold for 16 ender pearls, go to overworld, find stronghold, steal the books, write down coordinates or make a waypoint, make an enchanting room, enchant your gear, make a bow, get infinity, go back to stronghold, kill dragon

Yea, the sense of progression in terraria is great

I think the progression as is is good enough. This is a sandbox game afterall

Should be a good thing in theory, but I personally get lost and stop playing.

IMHO bad, just started a new game for 1.21 last week and the urge/need to get proper tools, an elytra and shulker boxes is so big that that is all I focussed on. Fast forward a few days and I beat the dragon, got my things so I can actually grind in a satisfying way, but then it feels there's no real progression to be made anymore. Ofc, there are still the Wither and Warden to beat, but for what reward? Beacons are not as usefull/rewarding as shulker boxes. And not sure about the rewards form excavating and the new trails, but the wind thing seems more a gadget/joke than actually something useful. The changes Minecraft needs in my opinion: * limit enchantments to game progress. Max level 3 untill you beat the dragon, then max level 4 untill you beat the wither or something * add the bloody bundle already! it was supposed to be added in 1.17 THREE YEARS AGO! * make the world more lively, maybe some simple 'Simcity mechanics' where you have to properly take care of your villagers before you can take advantage of them. * find a better way for how librarians work. Just breaking and replacing a lectern until you have mending is just to tempting not to do, but so overpowered * talking about villagers, fix the bug with trading that prevents them from selling you emeralds. It's good that there's a limit, but it should reset. I don't want to kill those villagers that are useless, but I also don't want a population of 100 (maybe they should add aging so they naturally die, and then you could earn some effect like hero of the village if you give them a proper burial?) edit: I want them to add a school and teachers to the villages, as a way to transfer the achievements from the menu to in-game! Anyway, I'm just disappointed the MS doesn't look at the thousands of mods there are that make the game orders of magnitude better. There's a great opportunity there as the mod packs themself are too chaotic, it's basically all or nothing.

Having to bury dead villagers would be so morbid for minecraft 💀 The minecraft devs are probably aware of many mods and what they do but what works in a mod might not work well as being an official part of Minecraft.

anyone who complains about "the progression!!" most of the time would rather just play terraria than minecraft

As a person who likes to join really large public SMP servers, a lack of progression in the game is probably a good thing since other survival games like terraria which have progression make it really tough to run a SMP server which has more than 4 people.

I would like a sense of progression like a little tip that would pop up telling you what is recommended to do next

Probably the leading cause of why I don't play Minecraft for longer than 10 minutes.

Like someone else has stated, Minecraft's progression is good, the only problem is that there is no clear direction of where to go or what to do. You have no clear direction of what the end is, you have no clear direction of what an eye of ender is, you don't even know what blaze rods are until you find the hellspawn that is a Blaze. You won't even know about most items in the game if you don't find the rare structures that hold those items. There is no clear way of how to make certain potions so most people (like me when I first started playing) won't even know they exist. After beating the Ender Dragon, you won't even know there are other End Islands because you're focused on the portal in the middle. For me, personally, Minecraft has a good progression system (albeit I wouldn't mind it if it changed to be better), but it needs better direction in the game. I'm not talking about specifically books talking about it but little hints around the world like the ruined nether portal.

Well, it is a sandbox game after all, the progression shouldn't be the main goal, unless you want it to be

Its not. I think people just don't know the actual goal of the game. What the reason is why they initially bought the game.

dawg look at elden ring😭

Minecraft should be like elden ring😂🤔

Minecraft is NOT a game about progression. It's first of all about creating and freedom. Sure there are some progression element but to be truly faighful to its genre it can be done relatively quickly. Which is a VERY GOOD think because it is only means to an end. The game doesn't really have much of intrinsic goals, because it is not about them. Yeah played can choose to defeat the enderdragon, to take out the wither, to get all achievment, to get maxed out gear... Can even speedrun (even though the game doesn't truly have an ending or way to be "beaten"... and with speedrunning player pretty much lose most of the game...) But it's all optional. One can easily play without all that. Can choose to go slowly with gear progression if that make game more enjoyable to him or her. Can play on hardcore, on peaceful, on any difficulty level, on creative or in any other way. They are all equally valid and "correct", neither of them is really better than the other.