Brand New World

I spawned in a pretty place. This is a new world in more ways than one. There have been a lot of updates since I last started and here they all are: gray and black sheep, different kinds of trees and a ginormous pumpkin patch. Cool! I dutifully punch a couple of trees, make myself a wood pick, harvest some pumpkins and take off, looking for coal before it gets dark.

I don’t take enough pictures but trust me, this is an attractive, if not particularly dramatic, world. There are some floating islands that look enticing but they’re waaay up there and I don’t feel like dealing with it. What there isn’t much of, is coal. At last I find some – near a lava pit – and dig in for the evening. It’s weird to have stone tools again and be constantly looking for coal. I am spoiled.

I wander for a couple of days. I think I am probably going in circles – not having a compass or a watch is tough – but it’s okay. I pick up a variety of useful objects and then I come across one of the biggest clay beds I’ve ever seen. Well, that’s that then: I am fated to build a brick, or mostly brick, house right here. I choose a likely island, nicely situated on a sort of boundary between three biomes and begin construction.

One thing I’d forgotten about starting over again is that you have to kill a lot of cows. I’ve gotten used to leaving cows the hell alone unless they are seriously annoying – trying to push me off a cliff or refusing to get out of the kitchen, that sort of thing – so having to actively hunt them again is sort of a blow. They scream and make me feel guilty. Still, you do what you have to do to get armor and I kill cows. A lot of cows, because leather armor, while it looks cool, actually sucks. Don’t tell the road warrior. A skeleton nearly kills me in the water. A creeper nearly kills me outside the house. A spider nearly kills me – you get the idea. I need iron and I need it bad. Well, hmmm. Where do you find iron? In caves.

There are no caves.

This is unheard of. There are always caves. Minecraft is all about the caves. I run around my island, looking. No cave. I run through the woods to the north. Cave free. I check out the prairie to the west. Nope, no caves here. I head east into the desert. I find two caves. Two small, empty caves, not offering so much as a block of coal. I’m getting desperate so I go home and dig through my floor. Sure enough, there’s a cave full of zombies! Yay! Except. . except. .. there’s nothing in it but the two zombies and it dead ends after one smallish, dishearteningly empty cavern.

Well, this sucks and I’m not sure what to do about it. I can keep on looking but then I run the risk of losing my new house forever. I can’t build a road from this house to spawn without a compass and for a compass I need iron and redstone dust which I can find. . . in a cave. I could mine, yes, I could dig a giant hole and then I would eventually find some stuff but that is so, so boring I can’t stand it. I am at a loss.