This week one of the topics that we talked about was user generated content and one of the main examples we used was Minecraft. As it stands, Minecraft is one of the biggest and well known games in the world right now spawning endless content from its massive fanbase. The content is not limited to creations in-game either. “Countless online video channels offer advanced building tutorials, tours, and explanations of expert creations. Meanwhile, other video series forgo discussions of construction technique in favor of using Minecraft as a virtual stage for the performance of ongoing stories. Such is the centrality of UGC to Minecraft’s very existence that it might be more accurate to think of it not as a game about “placing blocks” but as a platform for storytelling and game-making” (Newman, 278). Newman also speaks about how Minecraft is different from other games with an emphasis on creativity and community creation like Super Mario Maker and Little Big Planet. He states that unlike these games, Minecraft doesn’t ship with premade levels and challenges. Instead, “it is a game where, without the creative labor of making, there is nothing to play. Playing is making. Playing is content generation” (Newman, 279). In Minecraft, when you start your very first game, you are literally thrown into a completely new generated world with nothing but freedom to do and build whatever you want. That is the main appeal to the game that has kept it popular for so long. This has resulted in communities being made where like-minded people can come together and create. “When the members of these subcultures are connected in some way – perhaps through events that they attend off-line or through playing and discussing games online – they can be called a community” (Ruberg, 119).

Personally, I have had a long history with the game, discovering it in 2010 when I was in middle school right around when they introduced the survival gamemode. I was a part of a creative server that a group of friends had made at the time where we would create whatever we wanted and just play Minecraft together. Eventually, word got around the school and kids from other classes who played Minecraft wanted to join the server and it sort of became a community within our school. One of the fondest memories I have with the game is during this time where a bunch of us would get together every night and build random things together, our greatest creation being a giant wool pig shooting lasers out of its eyes into our spleef arena (I wish I had pictures it was amazing trust me). Interacting with others and being a part of a community was definitely what made the game for me. It allowed me to connect with others who liked the same things I did and make friends with kids I’ve never met before, some even being in different grades. The community aspect is a big part of any game and is one of the main reasons that some players look for when playing a game.