Minecraft: a sense of direction

Symbolism to a story, names to symbolise and a story with important names; it is as if one cannot live without the other, a triangular paradox with each factor relying on the other; the three most important factors needed for self identity, or just identity in general. Symbolism helps us define things and place stimuli into categories in the real world, names help us give a recognisable title to these things and story helps us understand why and how these things have come about. However, how do we incorporate real life values, such as these three just mentioned, into a basic sandbox based virtual reality?

To even survive your first night in the unforgiving darkness of Minecraft you need a sense of symbolism, and understanding of your surroundings. Once an understanding is made, a definition of what is dangerous Vs what is safe is made the next challenge players find themselves facing is sense of direction. “A principal reason for the neglect of speech is that geographers and landscape historians tend to see place almost exclusively as the result of material transformation of nature” (Yi-Fu Tuan, P.1, 1991) Drawing on Tuan’s view of stereotypical geographers, to see the world of Minecraft as a simple map of different materials would be a mistake; to know what biomes surrounded a player would indeed be helpful, however to be as simple minded as Tuan states geographers are would lead players to a certain death. 

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“what they do not see and hear are the discussions and commands crucial to the process of making anything” (Yi-Fu Tuan, P.1, 1991) Different regions withhold different creatures, various factions and certain resources, to not know these things would withhold crucial information from a player, rendering the game to be less enjoyable.

Yi-Fu Tuan portrait - http://paradigmmagazine.com/2014/10/09/paradigm-yi-fu-tuan-interview/

To link Minecraft to the real world it is seen that without and understanding of the symbolism, language or story people are often led into a dead end or have to start all over again to gain an understanding. This is why Minecraft indeed has such a large fan base, because no matter how far we look into the similarities the award winning game mirrors society today

Referencing:

*, A. B. (2014, October 9). Interview with Yi-Fu Tuan. Retrieved August 31, 2016, from paradigmmagazine, http://paradigmmagazine.com/2014/10/09/paradigm-yi-fu-tuan-interview/