The world is about to get a whole lot bigger for Minecraft players on Switch and Xbox One.
One of Microsoft's show-stealing announcements at E3 amounts to a significant milestone in the video games industry: for the firstsecond time, people on different consoleswill be able to play the same game together, at the same time.
It'll happen later this summer as part of Minecraft's next major update, playfully dubbed "Better Together." Cross-platform play is definitely the headline -- it's bigger than two consoles, as you'll see in a moment -- but there are actually lots of elements at play here.
The cross-play capabilities are only possible because Better Together converts the Switch and Xbox One versions of Minecraftover to the Bedrock Engine. It's the same software foundation that powers the Windows 10, virtual reality, and Pocket Edition releases.
You're probably asking the one question we did when we first learned this news: What about PlayStation 4?
"Our goal is to connect everyone together and, spiritually, that's what we're moving toward," executive producer Jesse Merriam said. "We don't have anything to announce on Sony today, but we start off trying to connect all Minecraftplayers together. And that's our principle moving forward."
Credit: MicrosoftThe Bedrock shift means console players will see another significant change: infinite worlds. The original PC version of the game procedurally generates a world without borders, but all of the console releases to date feature constrained play spaces.
"As console players come to Bedrock, they will gain a lot of things that already exist [there]," Merriam said. "They have worlds today that are 5,120 blocks by 5,120 blocks -- or, really, three [square] miles."
When you're just starting a new Minecraftworld, that's a huge amount of space to work with. But when you're continually adding to the world, bit by bit over a period of years, borders can eventually become a problem.
"As [the console games] come to Bedrock, they'll be able to generate right past the edge of the world they've had before. They'll be able to continue expanding."
Don't overlook the additional revelation here: your existing worlds are safe. If you've been working on an Xbox One (or Switch) Minecraftsave since launch, you'll still be able to play there -- and extend out further than you were able to previously -- once Better Together launches.
Credit: nintendoThe Bedrock shift also means that console players will have access to MinecraftRealms. The service provides monthly subscribers with an always-online server to host their worlds. This works both ways, too; if you're already a Realms subscriber on some other platform, you'll be able to access it from Switch and Xbox One after Better Together.
Console players are also likely to wonder what this means for skin packs and other downloadable items they've paid for. It's included. If you bought some add-on, or received it as part of a retail release -- the Switch version, for example, includes a bunch of skin and texture packs -- you'll have access to it in all versions of the game that you own.
This applies to the newly launched Minecraft Marketplace, as well, a Bedrock-exclusive feature. It's an in-game online store from which players can purchase content created by both the Minecraftteam and by approved community creators. That said, some add-ons -- it's not yet clear exactly which ones -- won't be sold in the online store.
"Everything except platform-exclusive content will be available with the Better Together Update," a Minecraftspokesperson said in a follow-up email. "We are still working out platform-exclusive content and hope to have more details on that as we get closer to release."
The final major piece of the expanding online connectivity is a newfound focus on shared servers. If Realms gives Minecraftplayers a private space to play in with their friends, servers go bigger and more public. Many of the minigames that committed content creators have built within Minecraft-- some of which are now sold in the marketplace -- started out on DIY servers.
Credit: nintendoCurrently, accessing a public Minecraftserver like Lifeboat -- which is one of Better Together's launch partners, along with MinePlex, InPVP, and CubeCraft -- involves a moderately complicated process of tracking down a server running the right version of the game, grabbing the IP address, and typing it in manually in-game.
With Better Together, all Bedrock versions of Minecraftwill simplify this process. No longer will you need to add a server via the "Friends" tab in your menu. Instead, a dedicated "Servers" tab will present players with a list of click-and-play destinations.
There is, however, one missing piece in Better Together when it comes to linking all your owned versions of Minecraft: cloud sync for your worlds.
When the update launches, the Realms service will be your best bet to get PC, mobile, Xbox One, and Switch players into the same play space. But there are drawbacks: in addition to requiring a subscription, you also have to be online in order to access your world.
Even now, there are ways to import and export worlds in the various versions of Minecraft, though it varies by platform and it's not a one-click process. The ability to back up your personal, non-Realms worlds in the cloud fits with the Better Together philosophy, but it's not a feature that will launch with the update this summer.
UPDATED June 11, 2017 at 11:31 p.m. ET An earlier version of this post incorrectly stated that Better Together makes Minecraft the first-ever cross-console game. In fact, Final Fantasy XIcarries that distinction. I would have fixed this sooner, but E3 can be time-consuming. I regret the error.
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