as someone who's been modding for years, i'm not annoyed at the rate of development of minecraft features, but what does annoy me is the poor performance on java edition when the community have created mods that not only increase the quality of the visuals but also double to triple the performance of the game.
But not for everyone. And its not proven to work across all platforms and hardware specs. As someone who uses these mods they have issues with rendering that are not on parity with the base game
I think many of the performance improvements involve using features only in newer versions of java and opengl, which would leave some of minecraft's playerbase behind if they were to require these versions
@@xisumavoid I agree in some scenarios but for the majority if you use mods the games performance is boosted by tenfold and there is essentially nothing taken away from the game aside from some immersiveness if you chose to use those mods to improve your performance. At least the game works and you can have fun rather than looking at a nice game but at 10 frames which is basically unplayable. I'm speaking about performance enhancing mods specifically
@@jannik19191 Minecraft already ships with newer versions of java as needed. so there is zero reason why they couldnt ship the newer versions of open GL and java
@@xisumavoid That's a fair point, personally I have not experienced any problems with performance mods, so i wasn't aware that there were visual and performance issues with them. Thanks for the insight!
Minecraft has hundreds of features discarded in their early stage of development for one reason or another. There are dozens of iterations for each feature that actually makes it into the game. If you make a mod and a year later realize that your ideas aren't that great, well, no harm no foul. Some people will actually like it anyway. And you always can release a "2.0" version that's better in every way. But if Mojang is to release a bad feature, well, Chat Reporting and the community reaction to it is an exhibit on exactly that.
Not that I disagree with your point, but wasn't the community's reaction to chat reporting mainly caused by Mojang's unwillingness to reconsider? The reaction wouldn't have been as harsh if they listened to their player base like they did in the past.
The easiest way to explain it is that Mojang is building a house while modders are doing interior decoration. Mojang has to get the building permits, build the house itself, make sure the house is safe to live in, that it has all the necessary features like plumbing, and so on. Then the interior decorators can furnish the house with whatever features the individual who's going to move in might want. Mojang really has to make sure it works for everyone at all times, while modders don't. It's ok if the curtains don't hang perfectly straight, but if the plumbing bursts every other week that's a disaster.
I would also like to add that mojang has also recently hired modders of Aether, Tropicraft and carpet mod to work on the game. They themselves have said that developing the game is pretty different from modding it. Especially Kingbdogz (The developer of Aether mod) during the development of the nether update.
I actually recently had a conversation with a former Aether mod dev, Jaryt, about this kind of stuff. There is genuinely a lot more that goes into it than people think, and even modding the game can be time consuming. You really gain a lot of respect for game devs and modders when you talk with them and actually see the process.
its not, there is just dumb restrictions that they put on creativity of people . minecraft is really lacking in content and most features are dull and lacklaster for example: copper another boring building item to create boring building block , they could make it so you turn it in prmitive copper wire and make some simple machines that help players in big scale building cz nowadays its just big boring grind that you cant speed up . mods always be better cz there is no limit to creativity and people can create really usefull things like inventory tweaks, upgradable storage , machines, building tools and much much more
Of course it is different. They arent the lead of the operation, have less creative input, have to run everything through other people before being able to work on it and they have to work on it in a restrictive manner. Everyone should be able to see how it is different.
@@felixknorke5072 it's not different, it's just dumb, like indie devs are way much more productive and creative than aaa devs, just compare minecraft and terraria like in terraria there is lots of stuff to do, and nobody forces you "to be creative" because...... REASONS!! not because we are lazy and can't do stuff cz our lead dev doesn't approve anything" by handicapping it's devs mojang achieved only lackluster updates and literally wasteland of missed possibilities that they never will be able to fill in (cz it will not be approved lol) but mods can and literally fill that large hole and do that 400% better then handicapped mojang that can only create boring biomes and worthless animals
“Modded is a choice” This one is one of the strongest arguments I like to use. Vanilla updates need to be extra careful with what they add and change, because if it isn’t, people won’t remove that specific modification - they more often than not will just stop playing the game altogether for the time being. So that alone is already a very sensible part of development mods don’t really need to worry about (since those who download them just remove it once they’re bored of it), but that is crucial when talking about default development. And boy oh boy are there many types of people to find a middle ground for in a game this big, which makes such task even tougher. (Keep in mind this is only one of the Vanilla updates challenges, there are plenty more still - and the video points out others too)
And we all know what happens when they add a feature without taking feedback. 1.9 is a great example of why they should be careful while they consider adding something
exactly. The warden was coded into the game well, it pretty much works exactly as intended almost all the time. Most mods, when a new mob is added or during the first versions, are often pretty buggy and janky in comparison, and are improved in future updates. For example, pixelmon love to suffocate themselves. I say that with love to those mods, its hard to add pokemon or dragons and stuff into the game, but the warden is a perfect example of the time mojang puts into its updates as right out of the gate it is a very smooth and functional addition.
@@qzimyion Nah, mate. 1.9 was great. People have been upset every time PVP has been changed, so people being especially upset over the biggest change to it ever was a given. Can't let a minority get in the way of what is objectively a change for the better.
@@Missingno_Miner It's still bad though. I prefer this combat with cooldown between attacks. But it's not the same as what bedrock has. I think it should be made the same on both, regardless of which one they choose.
THANK YOU for saying this. Mojang of course deserves criticism sometimes, but they don't get enough credit for just how hard their job is from some more uninformed members of the community. It's not stated enough that Minecraft is the most succesful video game of ALL time - every single tiny decision that the Mojang team makes affects tens of millions more players than any mod that's ever been made (and I say this as someone who loves modded).
I agree. Mojang deserves criticism... specifically _constructive criticism._ Sadly they get way too much "destructive" criticism (for lack of a better term). The community as a whole (myself included) needs to work on trying to be more understanding and accepting. :3
@@lasercraft32 This. I often see people complain about how the new items are useless and how the new updates are "bad" without telling the reasoning behind it and giving possible solutions to those said problems.
@@qzimyion I know, right? But when you look at it as a whole you realize the updates are actually really good, especially in comparison to older updates with less content.
One thing that secrets of minecraft showed is how many iterations something goes through before it gets presemted to us minecraft life. The warden was showcased in 2020 as a working mob (it needed polishing) but we know it went through many texture, shape and behaviour changes before settleing in the current warden so it was probably worked on for a year before it was showed plus the concept had to be settled. The developers are probably right now decing on some content we will not see in three years. And another thing this is the first update I followed closely but the mojang teams do a lot of changes quietly or in the backround that dont get remebered as a feature of the update, in 1.19 they fiddled with changes in rails (wich were reverted) and they changed mob spawning in the nether fortreses.
@@man-ce5iv originally they were going to make the warden unkillable, now killing it is just disincentivized you can do anything, but not everything rewards you
Excellently articulated video. While Mojang isn't exactly a perfect development team by all means, it's refreshing to educate more people on why updates take so long, and why that time might be necessary for such a monolithic game to develop for all of its players.
I just recently got into modding, and for making a mod, you basically just fire up intellij, add a few blocks and your good to go. Whereas for a whole update, mojang has to plan out what is going to be in the game for the rest of time, and make sure that it will be accessible to all players.
Well you're still a beginner and definitely have a wrong view on modding, because modding has no boundaries, yes you've learned how to put already existing features to blocks and mobs. But believe me when I say it that modders that experienced made much more complex additions to the game. And I am a modder myself, and a java software engineer myself.
@@APDesignFXP Yeah, for modding there really is no limit, I've been programming for years, about to finish my masters. I was just pointing out that for modding you can make something extremely simple that takes a little time, and its a full on mod. But for mojang, they need to make an update feel like an update.
I must agree with APDesignFXP and say, that this sounds like a very limited view. I would say, the best mods are way more complex, creative and challenging than most of the minecraft updates. The problem Mojang faces is, that they need to have a extreme quality control and must be very sure about things they add, because they normally can't remove it. But the whole thing with modders are faster then the studios isn't something new. I would say in every game we have that.
@@Inditorias Yet there are projects that usually accomplished by 1-3 devs from the modding community and are a huge on update if were implemented to the game, how mojang can’t achieve it with its devs isn’t a problem of development or feeling like an update is more a problem of organization. The Mild Update 1.19 is a part 3 of 1.17 an update that needed to be made 3 years ago and could be finished within 3-6 months, 1.19 doesn’t feel like an update. modders can stand up to those standards pretty easily
As a modder I'm a bit sad about Mojang not focusing on performance and modularity. In another comment you mentioned how mods like Sodium do have visual issues or might not work everywhere, unlike vanilla. On the other hand Sodium is held back by Minecrafts really old rendering technique that can't simply be changed by just a mod. This is also the reason why Minecraft starts to loose a lot of performance when rendering a few blocky entities/some text, but modern games have no issue rendering thousands of high-res meshes. This is not an issue with java or OpenGL, but with Mojangs legacy rendering pipeline. On the note of OpenGL, really want to see them support multiple rendering pipelines. Some players can't run 1.17+ due to OpenGL updates, and VulkanMod has proven that using more modern rendering pipelines can result in massive performance gains. So reworking their render pipeline to be more dynamic(switching between OpenGL/Vulkan, different OpenGL versions, batched rendering) would be a huge gain for Mojang, users and modders.
Making Java Minecraft better definitely won’t be a huge gain for Mojang/Microsoft. It’s so much easier to monetise a game that doesn’t support modding, so spending money on improving Java Minecraft, to make it more competitive against Bedrock, to eventually earn less money from microtransactions in the latter, definitely doesn’t sound like something Microsoft would do
I co-work on Supplementaries, and we often talk about this very problem. One of the largest disparities between Mojang and Mods is not just that of responsibility, but rather expectations. We can say we will implement a feature and even show it off, but if we ultimately decide it doesn't fit we can just stop working on it. Mojang does not have this luxury. I personally am completely fine with development being slow, but it doesn't sit right with me when communities are blamed for their expectations. The base game of minecraft will inevitably have a larger audience than any mod, and therefore have more eyes on it. Unlike a mod, they must be more precise with what content they chose to display IMO.
Also the squeaky wheel get oil or something like that right, so while i see it too from time to time about "why can't mojang be quick or as good as modders" it's usually not many maybe 1 or 2 out of a whole comment section. I do though agree when it comes to optimization it's just silly at this point that mods have taken the lead to improve the playability in the game this much. vanilla minecraft makes my gaming pc feel like a potato forget about when i actually had a potato pc no way could i play i could barely move before a zombie killed me and that froze me and crashed that game. now on my current pc i run sodium and oculus for shaders and i'm good at 100 to 120 fps (i'm running about 30 mods at the same time) when vanilla was getting me at 15-20fps. I also agree that being disappointed shouldn't be banned lol ppl were shown something there was a miscommunication whatever it happens but the audience isn't to blame. They have a responsibility to figure out what is safe to show and what won't i mean common sense dictates you show what you are most likely gonna release but shit happens things get cut then say that at least people will understand don't say something safe but untrue or if true gain some better sense lol sorry i ranted lol ps love supplementaries
> We can say we will implement a feature and even show it off, but if we ultimately decide it doesn't fit we can just stop working on it. Didn't Mojang do just that with fireflies and birch forests?
@@Mnnvint The reasoning they gave made the community felt like they were so out of touch. They didn't say "This isn't working right now because X reasons", they put the blame in the community because "Oh fireflies are toxic to frogs!" and "The birch forest was just concept art, stupid you for believing something we showcased while talking about feature's we're going to implement was actually a feature we would implement!" as well as the wild update generally being disappointing in almost all aspects. The problem wasn't them deciding not to work on fireflies or birch forests, it was them being so out of touch with the community and their failure to communicate.
I've only recently started my journey as a developer, and started with a large company. Seeing the behinds the scenes I see a lot of work and care goes into software. Small things take time, schedules, QA testers, but an outsider would never realize. As a team lots of different things have to be considered when adding content to the game. Balance, maintainability through versions, cohesion (where items added feel like they belong), as well as making sure all the additions work in tandem. As well making sure to not impact the game too heavily, I played many mod packs before and my older PC had issues with maintaining a good framerate and I also had to deal with longer load times. Also as an aside note, I have been a bit burnt out with all the negativity with Minecraft recently and seeing a video that doesn't just attack Mojang is greatly appreciated.
I love that you have in the background Twilight forest running, which is still in development and the final boss is still missing for years now :D Still a beautiful mod
@@screret4794 quite the time, I played it over a year ago, and when I went to the the final stage I only thought, that this is rather anti climactic. It's sad but when the original creators don't have an interest or passion to continue it, it can't be helped.
@@screret4794 is it the main team or someone who got the code and the Okey to do so. Because that something you would rather see when the main creators are gone and a few try to keep it alive. Which of curse is a great thing.
Fun fact, mods can also use the testing system! It's just that setting up tests takes a lot of time and it has only recently become a thing so most mods don't use it.
I think one other thing that many people tend to forget is that updates in Minecraft have gotten much bigger. People joke about how Caves & Cliffs was split into 3+ updates, but if you actually take a look at it, 1.17 was still the largest ever update in terms of blocks added. Of course, that's not the best method of determining an update's overall size (especially since many of 1.17s blocks are just simple variants of other blocks, and 1.18 didn't add any blocks but had large sweeping changes to the game), but every single block still takes a bit of time to add. 1.19 may have been relatively small by today's standards, but it absolutely would have been considered big if it released any time from 1.0 through 1.6, and would probably fit right in from updates 1.7 through 1.12 in terms of size (at least in my opinion). Of course, it does make sense that as Minecraft has gotten bigger, updates have gotten larger. But, the relationship between update size and development time is not linear. The more content you have to add in an update, the more time you need to make sure that content works with everything else. The more time you need to spend testing and fixing bugs. And, the more considerations you have to make when even planning out new content and how it meshes with all of the existing content. I think people have just gotten used to the much larger updates we've been getting, and there's been a sort of force pushing to make every single update bigger and better than the last especially since 1.13 (which I believe was the main downfall of Caves & Cliffs and why it ended up needing to be split, Mojang got too ambitious). And, because of that, it takes longer to make updates, but people still kind of expect the faster update cycles we used to have. I personally don't care if updates take a long time. I'd in fact like if updates took a while, I want Mojang to make sure they can add what they want while fixing all of the issues. I just wonder if a lot of people have kind of stopped playing Minecraft just to play Minecraft, instead only playing it for the updates.
@@Koooo4 1.15 is the main exception of recent updates since it was the only major update ever released after 1.0 where content wasn't the main focus. It was primarily a bug fixing and optimization update. After all, Minecon Live 2019 announced the Nether Update a few months before 1.15 even came out, with the content focus clearly being on 1.16. If 1.15 were ever meant to be a big content update, they would've focused entirely on that instead.
I usually play Minecraft more after updates, but I stop sooner since I already know everything that they added. Sometimes I just play creative mode though.
My modpack in a 1.7.10 version, from 9 years ago, have between 10 and 20x more content than the vanilla 1.19 version. This is a fact. Simple, short and direct.
It's really funny to me that the first mod show in a video about "mod dev vs vanilla dev" is Twilight forest, a mod wich I'm pretty sure that aside from updating to the newest release hasn't actually add anything since like, idk, 2014 for example
Seems to be a bedrock only feature.... Would be VERY helpful for java modders, or even map makers, imagine having a test suite to check your system works, or that a map segment/mechanic doesn't break in a new version.
Professional game developer here. A few perspectives were also missed: * N^2 communication problem. Fred Brooks on the classic _The Mythical Man-Month_ summarized it via: _Adding more people to a late project makes it even later._ The more devs there are the work “overhead in communication” that slows everyone down to keep everyone in the same page. Modders usually only need to communicate with a few people. When Mojang needs a new feature they need “sign off” not just from the team lead *but also* UI, Design, Audio, Artists, and Legal. * The original Java code is _extremely poorly written._ Fixing this can cause even more problems. It takes time to debug all the edge cases. Over time code complexity grows. It takes longer to understand the code.
Exactly this. Communications is often WAY overlooked. 6+ modders (1 current version) vs 713 employees across 2 major platforms (Bedrock/Java for ALL versions and ALL devices). And even then, there's still old versions of mods that have world corrupting crashes, or that one change made to the last version (because some dev wanted something special for their modpack) which introduces a dupe bug that'll never be fixed.
Which is why they made bedrock, but then they decided not to commit to it and left themselves stuck with 2 code bases that they now need to keep in parity...
@@SILVERF0X13 they're commited to bedrock, they're just not commited to killing off java (and i think they might not be allowed to? smth about when they bought the IP there was a clause about not binning the legacy game or smth like that) besides, despite the relatively low playerbase of java, they're definitely the loudest voices around, they whined and cried at a report system and they've been claiming that java will be binned/merged any day now since literally the purchase happened
@@Sopsy_Hallow To be fair, it SHOULD be discontinued. Java is an inherent security risk that can never be fixed. No patching, tweaking, or fixing can ever make it not dangerously vulnerable.
The creative freedom section is disingenuous. Nobody's saying Minecraft should do things like Pixelmon, they're complaining about the way official updates lack features when compared to mods that do similar things: such as the Wild Update's lack of new biomes or biome changes when compared to what biome mods can do, or the way the Mob Vote implements only one mob, when modders have repeatedly implemented dozens of mobs at once.
While the comparison between modders and mojang isn't really equivalent, I still think a lot of the points it brings up are worth discussing. It's all the cut features, the ignoring of player feedback, the half baked ideas, the weird priorities, the bugs, etc etc that are so often prevalent in every update that spark this comparison. "If mojang is so rigorous in their QA, then why are updates so often riddled with issues?" For me, mojang's questionable priorities have been the biggest issue highlighted to me by playing modded. There are loads of relatively simple ideas the fanbase has been begging for for ages, just scroll through r/minecraftsuggestions, and yet mojang instead chooses to focus on adding overly complex mechanics like panda genetics or the whole axolotl hunting thing that I still haven't seen a single player use since the snapshot phase. And then even if mojang finally does add those features, it just has to be in some weird "unexpected" form that just renders it really clunky and practically unusable, like the allay's unstackable item sorting. Modding has shown me what the game could be like if mojang wasn't so hindered by overanalyzing everything and the ensuing design paralysis, and that's why I don't play vanilla anymore
I get the points you’re making but I’ve seen several players use the panda genetics feature. Scicraft’s Peaceful Challenge is the obvious one - they couldn’t make a traditional slime farm bc slimes don’t spawn in Peaceful, so they instead bred up a bunch of sick pandas and made what is best described as a “panda snot death conveyor” to automatically breed baby sick pandas, collect the slime balls they sneeze out, and then… uh… dispose of them once they grow up.
@@Fireheart318 It's not that they're completely useless. None of them are "bad" per se, they're just a weird priority to sink so much effort into when there's things people have been begging for for ages
adding things people have been "begging for ages" isnt always as good as it seems as often people are just plain wrong, misguided or know nothing yet ask the impossible. im not saying the mojang teams know it all, and sure their way of implementing features can be quite puzzling and odd sometimes. but they are still a professional dev team who knows what they're doing and have actually thought about what they are adding. there are many ways to "solve" a problem or supply for a demand, and some are better than others. People will often ask for a solution that seems more reasonable to them, but in practise is clearly not thought about and doesnt fit in or work all that well. most mods that add "long requested features" do this, which is fine for a mod but would just decrease the game quality drastically over time. Ive played with plenty of mods that "optimise" or make things more "convieniant" and while they're usually fun for a while, an interesting change of pace. id say they definitly arent better than the vanilla version and will usually over simplify stuff and ignore whole sections of the game, they integrate terribly. (for refference, basically any science mod, i love them but man do they just not intergrate with normal farms, or redstone, or the technical aspects of minecraft, or arguably quite a lot of other aspects of minecraft)
@@Sopsy_Hallow Agreed. Mods exist for a reason. I always try to adopt the standpoint of what would fit MC through Mojang rather than simply a fan idea (some of which can be fun mod concepts, but some way overpowered or overcomplicated, some just for personal wishes, etc). Ideas can be suggested for vanilla, but most of the time will be rejected for a good reason that most people don't get and may get upset at Mojang (or others who disagree that they don't fit) over, hence having the option that they can instead be turned into mods (which is at least *better than nothing*). It's Mojang's game, after all, and they ultimately decide what they want or what may work best in it.
Bureaucracy is a huge part of it, but it's also there for a reason. Mojang is responsible for stability, quality, security and support, which takes a massive amount of their time away from developing new features, and also makes developing new features significantly harder. Many mods are horribly buggy and slow, have all kinds of design and compatibility flaws, etc. The mods that are actually good have taken years to make and the developers put an insane amount of effort into maintaining them and updating them with each new version of Minecraft (and if they don't, the mods die, which it okay for mods, but not okay for core features, so Mojang never has that easy out as a choice). It's definitely apples to oranges. Just be thankful that Mojang lets you have your cake and eat it too with both: free, official game updates for the foreseeable future, and tons of mods.
More people, more entities (companies) = more communications (and more lawyers). Most mod teams only have a half dozen people, but Mojang's got a few hundred I believe, and have to answer to Microsoft now. Microsoft is essentially the publisher, and if there's one thing I learned in the gaming world, when the publisher says, "Release your flagship game/update every X months", you have a limited amount of time for adding features and making sure they work.
@@JenInMinecraft and since mojang is being pressured by micro or upper management to make more updates faster, from 1 update a year to 2, yeah, your definitely right
@@charlestonianbuilder344 They have other games they're making to, and I was speaking in general (quoting game devs I've talked with many years ago). No need to be snarky.
I think a very important thing that people really don't consider is that minecraft isn't just the java version anymore, they need to figure out how everything will work for consoles and phones as well and it immediately can complicate things. Take the bundle, the item very lost in development for a long time now, last we heard about it from mojang they didn't add them yet because they need to figure out the way it could be used with a touch screen. Kind of the curse of the game this big.
Curse of mobile gaming, here. When you make a game, you have to consider the control scheme as a quintessential element of your game. Trying to retrofit a completely different scheme, especially a far worse one when it come to command availability, is doomed to fail.
There are different teams for each game-version - and it doesn't matter because translating features from one language to the other isn't a hard job as a programmer.
That excuse kind of falls apart when Re-Logic can produce updates with more content, follow through on all their promises and more, do it in a shorter time frame and release it on multiple platforms simultaneously. Then again, it also falls apart when you realize that Mojang was able to do all that pre 1.17 too.
@@RWQFSFASXC-qc5fq Re-Logic doesn’t actually do the mobile/console ports, they have a separate company (DR Studios) developing those, unlike development of Java/Bedrock. Terraria is also 2D, which makes it much easier to develop and has less potential for bugs, though it’s probably harder to make textures/animations for it. I do think Re-Logic is much better at listening to the community though.
@@APDesignFXP As a programmer myself I feel this isn't quite accurate. You wouldn't simply 'translate' the code from one code base to the other, especially in the circumstances of going from java minecraft which is a mess to the different implementation in bedrock. You can reuse things like probabilities and numbers, but a lot of the implementation is going to have to be written from scratch for each port. That being said though, as you said, there are different teams for each version, and thus that programming from scratch should be done in parallel, not slowing down game development. In other words, I agree with you, but not for the same reason, lol.
I think a lot of it is also "why does it take so long now when they have more resources dont they?" But they arent a random little indie studio anymore they have one of the most major influential brands in the world they cant be willy nilly and just so whatever sounds cool.
@@xisumavoid bigger also means decisions and minor changes have to go through a lot more people, which extends the time required to even make a simple addition.
My guess (being a developer for the marketplace) is this, having spoken to devs myself: 1.- There are many departments. People still think of mojang as some kind of indie studio, but it probably has over a hundred people with around 150+ employees at this point simply on the java side, let alone the bedrock side. This implies that communication between departments will be muddy and confusing, and miscommunication will cause heavy delays 2.- Bedrock exists and doesn't want to maintain less parity than it has in the past. This implies they need to communicate their ideas heavily with the bedrock team (another endeavor on itself) and tell them what they need and how it'll look, passing assets and whatnot between them. The bedrock team uses a different code base so sharing code is basically pointless and have to remake it from scratch, they ALSO have to take into account bedrock map makers because we want to know how new stuff works underneath to improve our maps for everyone who uses them. 3.- There are tons of updates that don't get released to the public right away but to select groups of testers. These testers find everything regarding things new stuff breaks, things that's inefficient, things that are probably going to break other things potentially, etc. Considering how often I have to report bugs for each beta snapshot, my guess is there's a lot that isn't considered to be breakable upon implementation. 4.- Modders aren't reworking the system. They have access to what would be called "intermediary level code" usually which implies they don't often try to change how the game works at its core, and instead trry to add system on top of said core. Mojang has to consider remodeling the core within every update, implying that they need to see what trickle-down effects this may have. One of the biggest recent ones being the new height and depth limits added, this used to be a hard-coded limit due to a core issue with bit numbers, and now it isn't. That implies there was a huge core modification. 5.- Modders oftentimes take years to churn out interesting content that's worth trying out, and both modders and map makers make something as well as they can before the game updates and breaks something. So it's a matter of time to see if anything will be destroyed by next update and you have to try and speed up the process. What happens however is that many many many bugs are either caught right after release and fixed after some updates, far after release and never fixed, or minecraft updates and the code no longer works for it. 6.- Fans of minecraft vanilla are FAR GREATER in number than modded minecraft players, simply by definition. There's millions upon millions of players who will get these updates automatically, and if it isn't as perfect as humanly possibly there will be consequences to sales, reputation, and player base. Java isn't the only consideration anymore as bedrock outperforms it in efficiency, sales, and general widespread appeal (due to it being on every imaginable console). This difference prompts far greater times needed to ensure the most perfect product possible (and even then they don't manage it most of the time) 7.- Game balance and design philosophy. Making a mob in a day is simple, it's testing out all the kinks and bugs and details and game design elements and design philosophies of minecraft meshing well with it that take a very long time to suss out. They try to make sure the game feels relatively similar, but expanded, where you have to earn things, nothing is necessarily easy, and exploration is rewarded (along with other factors), these are things I clearly can see are not considered in most modded content, and moreso they add in what they think would be cool (which is fine on its own, but not how mojang does things). There's probably more reasons, but just off the top of my head I'm guessing these are the reasons.
@@benroberts8363 perhaps, but the bedrock team is working hard to apply parity in as many ways as it can (and also contains more features for things like redstone, for example), and features on java are withheld for the sake of bedrock at times as well. Bedrock also has a far larger player base, so I see the possibility of maybe... 10 or so major updates from now the roles could very well switch on what's considered the better version.
This was the old office I never got to visit it :) thanks for the perspectives, I can't speak - not even sure I would be allowed to speak for the mojang teams, but it's very different for sure, I understand how people from the outside cant see everything and I get why people from the inside can't get all modders. It's just very different. And I wish people would be more friendly when discussing it, when people go hostile it's way more risk talking about it.
I love modding in every game, not just minecraft. My only beef with Minecraft modding is: why there are TWO (unofficial) mod loaders!? And the fact that there are multiple mod loaders or even that they are not "official" is just secondary, it is just a pain that the modding scene is split in half because of that. Other games also have multiple mod loaders, even official and unofficial, but generally a mod should be "loaded" the same way. I just wish Minecraft had some standardization in that aspect.
From my understanding: Forge was slow to update to new Minecraft versions, so Fabric was made as a "Forge-lite" that updates quicker but is less feature-rich. Then there's apparently Quilt. Looking it up, it seems to be a fork of Fabric born out of developer political drama and promotes preemptive deplatforming. Ain't touching that one.
The test world thing reminds me of factorio devs. they have a server running mechanic tests on everything in the latest build constantly. You never know how one thing may break another.
I always had the stance that mojang needs to ensure that the vast majority of people will enjoy the changes they make. Whereas modders have far less pressure to appeal to the entire player base
About the warden having a drop, kingbdogz stated that the sculk catalyst is not supposed to be a "reward" but that its just there for if people wanted to make a warden farm.
Yes to make a warden farm, because Mojang's original concept was to be able to let people farm the warden. Mojang wanted people to avoid the Warden at all costs, they even gave it more and more new abilities to prevent you from even getting close to it, but yeah they wanted you to be able to farm it. Pretty sure the Warden was given something for the community was consistently bugging them for it to drop something cool.
Wasn't less about "people wanting to farm the guardian" and more about ensuring a renewable source of catalysts for the technical players that wasn't going to be fearing it either way
@@lordthor5951 The Catalyst is already renewable without the Warden. a Catalyst can spawn another Catalyst instead of Sculk when spreading, it can also spawn a Sensor or Shrieker instead of Sculk. A Catalyst can be farmed without it coming from a Warden.
@@thanoscreeper Its the same and not, its not there for people who want to farm the warden to have a reason to do so, but its there cause providing renewable access to resources is good and the technical players where going to figure out how to do a farm anyway. @SomeBodyKares1 it doesn't though, try it for yourself or try to find a video of it happening, the wiki doesn't even reference it. Catalyst spawns naturally, is gained from chests and from the Warden as a drop. Theses are the sources available.
Thank you so much for this video. I work in a creative industry, so I understand the amount of work that goes on behind the scenes to deliver a product, and how huge the difference is between working on a personal project and a professional project. But yet no matter how I articulate this, how I explain all the steps Mojang has to go through, people simply do not want to hear it.
Yes. I agree with everything that's said in the video. and I have no objections to the facts. When I talk to my friends however, I think what we all miss is that spark Markus Persson (Notch) brought to the game. we get close with updates, and the updates feel like they should be in the game. but big stuff like the Enchantment Table and Brewing Stand, the Minecart system, aren't the types of things we're seeing much of anymore. it's mostly decoration blocks, if anything, that we've been seeing ever since Caves and Cliffs. and no I'm not saying decoration blocks are a bad thing because I love all the blocks they add even though I mainly play modded. all my friends agree that the Nether update, and Caves and Cliffs were great updates for the game. both of those were a step in the right direction. I just have to admit. I really miss Markus being on the dev team. If I forgot to mention anything, R.I.P.
The problem with trying to keep up those updates is that they were large changes to the game that required a lot of effort. You can't really keep up that effort, it just isn't feasible. So you have to have a big update, then a bunch of small updates, then another big update. It's just how this stuff is run.
Cohesive game design is far more of a focus than within the modding world, based on what i learned from Docm77s episode featuring developers. You can't just stick in a feature without a purpose that implicates other things in the game or that totally makes the game too easy. With mods theres no rules in that regard. When you give a player an item it can entirely change the game for better or worse. An example is the elytra wings, which is surprisingly a controversial topic, but i now realize why. Another aspect is we have to consider if the the features feel true to vanilla minecraft or are accessible to newer players. An example given was invisible item frames, which the developers felt were not entirely vanilla feeling. We get 2 updates per year and have for over 10 years, give or take a few. I am grateful the game has advanced over that time as most games dont.
The vanilla game itself feels very different from how it used to feel back then. Each new update works like a mini mod, adding in a few new blocks and one or two mobs or mechanics. My guess (which may be wrong) is that Mojang is afraid of updating the game too fast. That's why they artificially limit the scope of the updates to only a few new blocks at a time, and only one biome per update, etc. so the player base have time to get used to the new "Vanilla" feeling. There are no good explanations on why don't we have slabs and stairs of terracotta and concrete (and also for every other block), besides, that Mojang simply wants to add as few blocks to the game as it can. They actually used to blame this on the block limit (65536 back then, and slabs and stairs didn't even count as separate blocks, still more than enough for hundreds of mods), but that excuse got taken away when the blocks got their own name.
@@EvanOfTheDarkness most of your comment is false. The updates add way more blocks and biomes than 2 or 3. 1.18 for example added 8 biomes. 1.16 added 50 blocks, 4 biomes and 5 structures as well as 4 mobs. Latest update added 3 mobs, 2 biomes and 25 blocks. Updates are huge and they definitely aren't holding back. And they don't add slabs for everything because it doesn't fit with vanilla. Not everything needs a slab. Players should also get creative with block choices
When adding a feature they also have to consider the UI/how the player interacts with it. Fx if mojang were to add invisible item frames they wouldnt do it through a trigger command.
@@Koooo4 Invisible item frames are, in fact in the game, that's why you can use that trigger command with a datapack. That's not a mod. All the good mods have a great cohesion, both within their own blocks & features and with the vanilla game. That's part of what makes a mod "good". The problem is cohesion *between* mods, because it's impossible to have cohesion between all the thousands of mods out there.
@@EvanOfTheDarkness "in the game" is a bit misleading, but true, it's a datapack not a mod. I've played plenty of good mods that still had some terrible UI and clunky ways to use certain elements.
There's also the issue of crunch culture in the industry. Something I appreciate about Mojang is that they would rather delay an update than force their employees to sacrifice their health just to get something out faster (we saw this in the 1.17 and 1.18 split). I'd rather have healthy employees and "slow" updates than something rushed that burns out developers, harms their mental/physical health, and ends up unplayable. Before anyone says "just hire more developers": 9 mothers can't make a baby in 1 month.
Fun Fact: The original developer for Not Enough Items (NEI) (and possibly the older Too Many Items), ChickenBones, actually became a developer for Terraria.
Still doesn't excuse Mojang not implementing fireflies or horizontal birch logs in world generation. That would take even the newbie modders like a day or two to implement. They are a game dev company, and not an indie developer team anymore, they should be able to put out and handle more and more expansive updates as the time goes on.
I'm a game developer (not at Mojang), and this is one of the things people ask me a lot about. Now I'm a technical animator, so I put the skeleton in the model (simply said), and as such I don't go as deep in the inner workings of games. But I think you did a very good job at explaining this. And it counts for a lot of, if not all, other games. Stacking features is great, and when the developers allow modders to create content freely it's awesome, but if the base is unstable everything tumbles. Generally we need to make sure that whoever wants to play the game, can play the game (doesn't always hold up when you look at some of the beefy games out there, but generally speaking), not just in terms of hardware, but also in terms of mechanics and content. Where modders can add in all kinds of features to their own liking, to whatever their own interests are and whatever their own computer can support, developers need to make sure it is consistent with their own game, not age restricted (unless the game already is and even then usually in moderation), playable by most, supported by different types of hardware, etc etc There's a lot that goes on behind the scenes, which I believe you explained very well.
As a professional developer I can confirm that you can produce way more functionality as a single developer without things to hold you back. The things that hold you back is among others: - Business requirements - Code quality - Testing - Performance requirements - Documentation - Communication - Stability - Support - Meetings (so many meetings...) It is said that a professional developer on average delivers 10 lines of "productive" code per day. Sadly, that's not far from the truth...
It's because you're talking about people's money. With a mod, nobody is paying you. Or if they are, it's with the understanding of what the end result will be. Look what happens to major companies like Microsoft....one little thing goes wrong, or implemented in just the wrong way, one tiny bug that inconveniences people and they get crucified. When was the last time that happened to a mod developer? Almost never, even what they produce is "meh".
As someone who had a pretty decent gaming PC built (it’s a few years old now) but is still primarily a console gamer modding is such a daunting task. I’ve recently tried downloading the Vault Hunter’s mod pack and I kept running into issues. The MultiMC isn’t compatible anymore with the instructions provided and I had to download something called FTB to get it to load up. Then when I finally got it loaded I got a message that the mini map and compass were out of date and needed to be updated. It took me so long to get it to actually run that I didn’t even end up playing because it was late at night. I think mods are awesome across a bunch of games but for someone who is not that PC proficient it can be very complex compared to vanilla experiences.
People say “Mojang has to be careful adding and designing content that works for everyone and coding them in as to not break or affect the game’s functionality” yet the updates still come out buggy, laggy, unbalanced and incomplete. The content does not live up to the quality they claim their standards require
They arent even able to optimize the performance of their game while some mods that fix exactly that come out like a day the update launched. Minecraft Java literally became unplayable for some people because Mojang added so much more stuff (bigger Caves, mountains, build height) but still refuses to optimize the performance.
Yes, if you look at the entire modding scene there are more modders. If you look at most projects, they're usually only handled by one person, almost all the biggest mods have been made by individuals. So, a single person, can and will develop circles around mojang's entire team. That includes not only code, but they are also responsible for the game assets, the content out of game like wikis and such. So much, from just a single person, or small team.
I guess most grown up people understand this. And certainly everyone who happened to manage a code base and knows how much pain and time is involved with fixing minor stuff nobody will ever notice (except when it doesn't work out). But it's a game after all and many kids play it, they don't think twice about stuff they say and it's also a hobby done in their free time, so responsibilty attached to it. It's easy to complain when you have no obligation to fix things or satisfy millions of players equally. Thanks for the video, hope some complainers will listen.
One thing that was sort of mentioned but I think is important is that mods often have the goal to provide a new experiences away from vanilla. They are focused on creating new experiences and you can choose the experiences you want. Mojang is in a way stuck with one game and few way of playing it.
Pretty cool to see such an important voice in the community taking such a clear overview of this topic. People tend to see Mojang's and modder's work as something to choose between, instead of just enjoying both of them as different experiences that enrichen this amazing game. Good video xisuma! 👏👏
I just love how my 1.7.10 modpack runs better than vanilla 1.19.2 despite having over 100 mods in it. Modding most games also isn't illegal, at most modding certain multiplayer-only games will get your account banned, but I have never heard of it being illegal.
Selling modifications is illegal. The modder who is taking patreon money to continue his mod is in very cloudy water and would probably lose if Mojang felt like he was a problem.
@@uberculex Yeah, but there is a big difference between publicly releasing mods and selling them. Most games don't allow players to sell mods, which I think is usually fair.
Another thing to consider is that Java Minecraft had a bootstrap style of development. Notch did his thing, early Mojang did their thing on top of that, Microsoft-Mojang did stuff on top of _that._ And they had to tidy up the code quite a few times. Team Fortress 2 has a similar issue where it's full of spaghetti-code from 15 years of maintenance and added features, so it's difficult to do anything with it without breaking fifteen other things. 11:57 _"After all, modding is often illegal for most games [...]"_ ...I don't think that's true. Redistributing existing game files is and multiplayer cheats definitely break a Terms of Service, but the pure modifications are owned by the creator. I assume altering your personal copy of a game is in a similar vein to creating local backups of media you physically own for personal use, or the "home recording" that totally "killed" the music industry. :P It's like in Pokemon where grabbing the official game files without buying the game is clear piracy, but the distribution of "delta patches" (files that contain only the changes between the original and the modded file) is perfectly fine.
I think it mostly just comes down to the corporate structure and culture. Modders can achieve so much because of their enthusiastic hobbyist approach to creating content, creating amazing things at incredible speed/efficiency; But if you work for a company, doing that 9 to 5 every day would get you burnt out fast, so instead you have to take it slower if you'd like to still have a life outside work. That and the overhead that comes from such environments (having to do specific tickets, code reviews, testing, qa etc).
Mojang is working on other games too, such as Minecraft Dungeons and the new game they have in the works. Also, I agree with you comment on Pokemon. If they added Pokemon to the game, I would be much less interested since I don't care about Pokemon. Over the 10 years I've been on and off Minecraft, I've really liked the new additions to the game, so I'd say the time they take to ensure quality is worth it. I've played so many mod packs that crash, lag, glitch or contain mods that are incompatible (Such as the Witchery mod pack, which has Biomes O' Plenty, Thaumcraft, Botania, Twilight Forest, and Pam's Harvestcraft. Some items from different mods cannot be used in the same crafting recipes where you would expect them to work). When Mojang add new things, they insure everything works together as intended. With the exception of Loot Tables and Villagers... I've been messing with those recently, and text formatting for items is slightly different between the two and I'd like a fix. If the items are IDENTCAL, Loot Tables format the text differently, so you can't trade them with villagers if you change the name of the item or add lore.
Thank you so much for this video; the comments you mentioned at the beginning of this video are often frustrating for me to see as they are all too often full of contempt and derision for the mojang teams who make this game possible, and that just doesn't seem very fair to me. Criticism is important and has it's place, but "if modders can do it, why can't mojang" really isn't one of them. The points you made in the quality assurances section are especially important to me: I have an old creative world that is now perpeptually stuck in a previous game version unless my friend and I decide we are willing to lose a significant amount of our world and builds because a couple of modders decided to cull a lot of the 'messy' or 'unneeded' features in their mod - features they we have happened to use extensively in our builds. this is something that seems extremely unlikely to happen in vanilla minecraft - even when we got the texture overhaul they gave us the legacy resource pack IIRC, which allowed people the option to retain the vibe and look they were familiar with if they so chose. (edit to add: modders doing this is fine to me, honestly, regardless of any personal disappointment/frustration. It's one person making something because they enjoy it, and if maintaining a mod becomes frustrating or unfun because of cluttered or older, poorly implemented features then I don't really blame a mod maker for deciding 'actually, im gonna get rid of that'. It's important to hold onto your joy within your hobbies, but this is still a notable difference in vanilla vs mod dev.)
I wish it was as simple as them just dragging and dropping in fabulously optimised, 3d chunk, distant horizons and more but things are never that simple with game dev!
You mention that modpacks require beefy computers, but it's worth noting that Fabric (with performance mods) is much more performant than Forge and in many cases even vanilla. A modpack with LazyDFU installed, for instance, is going to launch faster than even vanilla. As a result, Fabric modpacks don't actually have very heavy system requirements and can run pretty well.
Hey! Modder here! Making mods is a very time consuming process and it takes a lot of thought to make the experience the way you want it to be. In one of my mods, I spent upwards of 20 hours just getting the particles to spawn in the way I want it to. It also takes a lot of effort to still be balanced with vanilla and other mods. Hope this helps!
It's still game development, which isn't easy. You're just piggybacking off another game and skipping a lot of the boring parts like world Gen and networking (if you find that boring) but still need art, animations, particles, Code, etc. Side note, thank you for keeping the game alive for me. Even if I've never played your mods, without people like you I would have stopped playing a decade ago. Maybe I should try my hand at making a mod...
Someone from the Satisfactory dev team put the dev side of the modding community well. "They can make whatever they want, but we have to make a game for everyone, mods are optional, the base game is not."
offering apples to oranges isn't "perspective" it's an entirely different premise. It's intellectually dishonest, which is the core problem of mojang's communications. Yet some of you get off on being intellectually dishonest so here we are.
@@xisumavoid i don't disagree that statement is 100% true... it's simply not a perspective on a thing, it's asserting that two things are different, invalidating the premise, if that premise is simply bewilderment at the amount of in game content there is available via mods. It doesn't really provide any perspective on the more serious and thoughtful assertions you flashed on the screen such as, why are third parties providing optimization, why does mojang struggle (or avoid) to find things that aren't already done in mods, why does it seem like mojang is holding moders back (whilst relying on them to optimize the game while they create new plush characters and make licensing deals). Responding only to the lowest common 12 year old's sentiment isn't providing perspective, it's intellectually dishonest. The answer is providing tools for mod developers is not good for business... (unless it's helping c developers scam people in the bedrock marketplace)... buying out mods is expensive and not a practice in running a game studio, and avoiding using IP created for mods, even if they might have the rights too, is noble and a sound legal practice. ok then, where is the warden plushie on the merch site? the story of optifine is fascinating and i'm not all that versed on it... I can't imagine at 1.7 the creator thought they would be relied upon 12 version later. I'm sure there is an equally great story behind Lithium and Sodium, just the idea of the community coming together to get lithium temporarily running is great. I would love to ask them the question why they are able to find performance improvements and why this seems like an never ending need, why aren't they rendered obsolete.
Mojang has to put things in the game that everyone likes because all vanilla minecraft players have to experience the feature. Modders can put anything in, because not everyone is going to play their mod.
Copyright issues are still an issue within modding. Pixelmon for instance was asked to be taken down due to copyright issues. Some mods are not open source, and even with an open source license, what permission you get still varies between mods. If not we will be swamped by clones on Curseforge. I should also point out the extremely high device requirement could be a result of unoptimized modpacks which are thrown together half hazardly and not configured properly. Smaller, lightweight packs could run on older PCs with little to no issues. Obviously many, many factors had to be at play here, but I just want to point out modded can be less resource intensive than people think.
As a mod pack developer I can speak lots to the difficulty of making mods and compatibility but I’m glad xisumavoid touched this I know it’s hard to do a lot of things with programming especially updates so thank you xisumavoid for covering the differences but also the strange stuff that goes between them
Minecraft gets new content very frequently for a game of its size, so I consider the premise itself (that Minecraft updates slowly) of little to no concern.
Very untrue, it's the biggest game in the world, considering it by player count. And it's quite simple to change. It's just not Mojang's/Microsoft's priority anymore.
OG player here-- I don't find myself caring nearly so much that the game gets new features slowly as much as the fact that old optimization problems and old features have been left untouched for a decade. Let them go as slow as they want, but they need to pick relevant things to work on.
Having worked in the software industry for over a decade now and having modded Minecraft (and a few other games), I can tell you that the processes are entirely different, even when working with a modding team. In a software house like Mojang there are established procedures on how things get done, how tickets are addressed and worked on, how code is reviewed, how code gets out the door, how they work with an art team, how iteration and testing are done, and so on. Modders often don't have those rigorous processes; I can't recall the last time I had a peer review while working with a modding team, for instance. Bottom line: the processes and working environments for hobbyists and employed developers with a paid product are not comparable.
As someone who has started with modding and is now seeking professional software development employment, having been trained in all the appropriate business modelling, I still struggle to see the purpose in all this overhead. Coming from a mathematical background I understand the point of rigorous processes to increase quality, but all I see looking at the data is that the business overhead actively detracts from quality, which is why open source projects with a proper contribution community work so well. The way I see it is that each layer of modelling and communication you introduce is another barrier that is prone to misinterpretation, and itself takes time and needs to be revised, and when all align the improvement is barely appreciable. You therefore lose a lot of the potential productivity that you could have if you assigned small teams to develop specialised software to targeted audiences, instead of large software that has to work for all audiences.
I even personally think, that companies like mojang benefit from such a huge modding community. These guys out there find stuff, such a company would never find that fast. Also, the ideas such communities can bring to the game should not be disregarded and will also influence the mojang devs in any way a little bit.
Really enjoyed the video, X. I belive Mojang also follows Agile and Scrum methodologies. These guidelines might make things a little slower, yet they will give feedback on a more regular basis to the dev team and the vision team. (these are the snapshots and previews mojang shares with us) There's also a point i think you could've touched more on. You talked about backwards compatibility, but there's also hardware and version compatibility. When Mojang adds a new feature, they will have to add it at least in 2 different programming languages, for Java and Bedrock. Not only that, but they release versions to a lot of different consoles too, which makes it all even more time consuming.
Hey there, agile programmer here. Agile and Scrum methodologies are actually designed to significantly INCREASE the speed at which things get developed and to adapt to changing circumstances. I guarantee you that if they switched to waterfall, things would slow down significantly from where they are now (and we wouldn't hear anything from them for many months at a time until something just magically appears and then needs a bunch of fixes). Also, while you are right about 2 different programming languages being an issues, there are definitely 2 different teams to develop those versions of the game. I think it does lead to some slowdown due to needing to do some back and forth to make sure functionality is similar enough, but the actual development should be made in parallel between the two teams.
@@SILVERF0X13 true, it is meant to increase speed when you put it against waterfall, not when you put it against the kidding community, my bad. for sure meant to increase speed on providing value to the user. also agree, that the features are developed in parallel, but when you do things twice, a lot more variables can go wrong. it is the same feature, it can be as easy as doing it again... or not thanks for the response bro :)
@@jannik19191 what older hardware? they literally raised ram and opengl requirements recently AND even if you use a mod to disable the requirement the game still works they're not even using anything specific to the newer version, probably just don't want to mess with very very old hardware
Fun fact back in the early days of Minecraft someone made a mod that improve the lighting system of Minecraft it was so popular that mojang actually worked with the modder and put it into the base game
I very much agree with most of Mojang's approach to updating the game. It is clear that they are trying to only add content, that doesn't negatively interfere with existing mechanics, unless they specifically want to update those mechanics. Usually this is a great idea (think bees 🐝👍) sometimes the Elytra happens.... HOWEVER the "avoid plagiarism" is a ridiculous idea. There are many mods that specifically aim to add content that SHOULD be in Minecraft and they usually do a great job. Then Mojang either never add it, because "its already a mod" or they add an awful, less developed version of it (The recipe book is a joke) Finally, modding is not allowed because Mojang is so "awesome and nice", it is allowed because they literally can't legally stop you. (Not that Mojang would want to. It is however important to know, that we are not at their mercy) Don't forget that Mojang used to try and prevent people from monetizing their mods. And, for a long time, they succeeded because people believed them.
I remember this coming up with your discussion about inventory management. Mojang can only do so much to change the inventory system before it stops being Minecraft. Walking that fine line is tricky. I would personally HATE to see a stack of 64 turning into a stack of 999, but that’s the most common solution I see, so it’s completely reasonable for Mojang to just not act and let the modders do the heavy lifting in that department.
As a software developer, it's one thing to work on something for fun, and another entirely to get paid to turn up and do it :D Plus unlike modders they're being pushed on deadlines by project managers and higher ups - so they half-ass it and ship it asap...
I find it funny that one of the bug reports you showed was for the /recipes command. I recently submitted a bug report because stone cutters don't respect the doLimitedCrafting gamerule. Whilst they say its intended it would be nice for the gamerule to get a little more love.
Just a small correction, X: it's a "Rube Goldberg" machine, not a "Rude Goldberg". Rube was a cartoonist who designed and drew a lot of these overly complex and whimsical machines to accomplish simple tasks.
i saw antvenoms older video on Minetest, and it kind of opened my eyes on what it takes for modding to happen, and why it can be so unstable what modloaders like fabric and forge do is akin to ripping to game apart, shoving some code in, and sewing it back together. Minecraft wasn't necessarily designed with mods in mind which is why modded can crash a lot
I don't agree, the Branches mod kinda makes trees look way to cluttered. Though I'd not be against it if like some leave blocks had a branch design in them, because like leaves are meant to be growing on branches.
@@Sopsy_Hallow Yeah, plus if anything they would have to update all the tree structures to add branches into them, the trees have been the same for eons.
as someone who's been playing modded minecraft since 1.5.2, the modded community is huge and they made some crazy stuff that could never be in the game, saying something feels modded usually means it feels like it doesn't belong in the game(even if its completely vanilla). the modded community usually don't want or try to make something that works in vanilla, and even mods like the create that feels very vanilla like wouldn't actually work because it makes redstone almost obsolete. if mojang was developing the game like modders the game would be more like fortnite with tens of IPs that have nothing to do with each other all somehow together, and it would feel like it shouldn't be there. mojang have to think about all the mechanics in the game and make sure none of them become obsolete or unusable, they have to keep the game balanced and make sure its not too complicated for the average player, there is way more thought into each and every update and they have to maintain all of it, unlike modders who can make one update and maintain only that one update. if mojang had a team for every update, and a new team for every new update the game would be easier to develop, but its impossible because they can'y afford this amount of developers, and it would be a nightmare to coordinate everyone together.
11:56 "modding is often illegal..." This feels a bit misleading. As long as a mod doesn't infringe on copyright or something similar, it's legal. Even for multiplayer games with servers controlled by the devs and with strict rules (why would you want to mod those anyway?) modding isn't illegal per se, but rather against the rules and can result in a ban. What *is* true is that minecraft is a relatively easy game to mod, and mojang has largely been gracious in not being hostile towards modders or patching out things that support its moddability.
The thing people often forget is that modders usually work for free, and only with their passion. Developers, however, can't allow themselves this luxury. Every thing changed needs to be approved by higher ups. HOWEVER, Mojang still has no excuse for their update antics. How long updates take isn't even that much of a problem, but the way updates in general are handled. Constant abandonment of promises is really jarring. This could've been excused if Mojang had better communication on why this happens, yet the only thing we usually get is: "oh, those were just concepts, don't be angry lol".
Also, Java is quite an outdated engine. It is in no way bad, of course, but it is quite old and limited. Also it is worth remembering that Minecraft was originally made by one guy, without much experience, so some technical difficulties are to be expected. That's why the Bedrock edition runs better, and usually gets snapshots first.
@@raven75257 I definitely wouldn't say bedrock gets snapshots more, sure there was the mountains, goats, frogs, and more, but java also has got a lot of snapshots first (warden, deep dark, etc)! If anything, it's about the same rate.
@@bfodoesstuff have you tried running Bedrock before? It's rendering engine is substantially faster and more optimized. Java's render distance cap WITHOUT mods is around 32 chunks on average... Bedrock's average render distance cap is more than DOUBLE that on the same hardware, offering render distances above 64. (the highest I've seen is 96)
The vast majority of players are not expecting all the wacky and wild mods to be included in the vanilla game. We are mostly just begging for more details in biomes, more variations of passive and hostile mobs, and more generated structures. An End update is desperately needed, too.
You are missing the point here. Also, even if you took the time spent on making some of the more vanilla mods (like Abnormals or Quark), and compared it to Mojangs time, youd see that those take a LONG time as well.
I believe the “plagiarism” argument isn’t that fair. I think the solution is what other companies have done in the past like Valve: hire your mod programmers, and if need be, purchase the copyright to the mod. Then, take the mod, and modify it to be “mojangs way.” Is that a lot of work, yes. But its probably less time consuming than coming up with every idea from scratch, trying to come up with ideas no one has had before. Mojang SHOULD be more like the Devs at Terraria. Yes the games are very different, but Re-Logic really care about their community.
What's worse is a few of the best modders of yesteryear are now working for Mojang. Can you imagine the atmosphere and immersion of TropiCraft or Aethermod in the vanilla game? And we even got so close with the "Wild" update's hype trailers only to not actually do it.
@@LineOfThy And yet-- look at the mangrove swamp in vanilla and the mangrove swamp in TropiCraft and you will immediately see that the beauty, atmosphere, and variety of the original did not translate into the static world of vanilla MC.
Love the info X. One of my favorite, FAVORITE mods is Mekanism. I love how he added a ton of craftable items and energy sources to it. McJty also makes really good mods. i do miss the Prefab for 1.19.2 though. I myself would like to make a mod of my own.
You could *almost* believe this, if not for the many, many hack-fixes by Mojang, for bugs, that were already long patched in Carpet mod, they were provided with the fix by the community, and *still* got it wrong. Let's face it: the Mojang devs are just not as good programmers as some modders. I'd say they are pretty average as programmers go. The SciCraft guys could probably fix most of the long standing bugs in a few weeks (they actually do that in the Carpet mod for the worst ones) They also have an inexplicable goal of adding as *few* items and mobs to the vanilla game as possible. Adding a new decorative block is literally the easiest things to do, some mods add hundreds of them. And yet things, like concrete slabs and stairs are still not in the game, simply because Mojang doesn't want to add too many new blocks into the game. Maybe Vanilla players will get them in 2030 or 2040...
@@rompevuevitos222 But you see, it *is* 90% the same process. For example: mod developers too, have to make sure to remain compatible with the base game, just like Mojang does it with older versions. And fixing a bug in the code is the same as well. The only difference is that instead of just _changing_ the file, and recompiling Minecraft, a mod developer needs to use a modding framework (Forge or Fabric) to add his changes to the code - bascially its just an extra step after what a Mojang dev would need to do. Mojang *does* some things, most modders don't. Reworking how water works, changing the terrain generation, adding chunk blending. These are things modders don't need to do. So I don't claim to know how long those should take. But for "normal" content the process is basically the same as modding, and it is _shocking_ how slow they are at that. It is even more striking when you compare what game updates/DLC usually contain for other games. (whole new maps, a dozen more skins and models, new heroes, new unique skills, etc.) Mojang is not a small company, and some games can do a whole lot more with similarly sized teams.
@@ari-mariberry Yes, although he was hired less then a year ago, and 1.19 is basically the first update where he's involved - and that was a disaster for a whole another reason. Still, its good new that he's there, and can help Mojang utilize the power of the hivemind to fix some long standing bugs.
My take is that not only do mods never end up becoming features that cannot be disabled, but modmakers for java don't have to communicate with a bedrock team and try to get it to work on not only java but c++ as well. Also, if bad features were to end up being released, the game itself could suffer as players' enjoyment is impacted (as seen from Beta 1.8, 1.9, 1.19.1 and the likes)
Mojang should add an fps system and ways you can increase your fps even more instead of having to use lunar and other clients just to boost fps because the performance and fps on default minecraft is crazy, its funny how on lunar client I could get from 100 - 300 fps but on default mc I get barely above 60 fps
It’s fine that updates take a long time, but they should include more features with what they are adding. Nothing too crazy as you said that may make some people made at the addition, but just a richer variety. One example is the crimson forest. No new mobs for it, and only type of plant. I would have loved to see some unique mob for it, perhaps one that I could design and enclosure for in my base or be surprised when seeing it. As well as the warped forest, no new mobs or unique mobs for it either. Something small could’ve easily done the job and make it feel more alien and really get you into the atmosphere of the place.
Every time I watch one of Xisuma's videos about these sorts of things it always brings a smile to my face and renews my hope for humanity. He's so chill, understanding, and slow to anger. And often pays attention to both sides of an argument. It's an example we should all try to follow.
I'm still waiting for the minecarts to be fixed since- 2017... ( For reference, bug MC-101713. ) I'm amazed people don't notice it. Even when i notice it in YT videos...
10:12 I actually don’t believe this is completely true, I enjoy game development as a hobby and most smart game developers segment out systems and turn systems into mechanics, I doubt they are creating systems entirely from scratch, they have essentially an engine, they are doing the same thing mod developers are doing just with official content, they do very similar things to modders, creating custom models, custom ai, and custom attacks, but it’s certainly not from scratch, it’s more just taking premade clay and shaping the clay, maybe even painting your clay then baking it to get a final product. The only major difference is that mojang has direct control over the main source code, while modders get control over the tools and systems given by mod api’s like fabric or forge.
11:35 this is like what we do at my job at IBM. We have these automated test cases that our github PRs go through in order to make sure the code changes aren't breaking anything drastic. It creates a simulated environment on its own server and runs through the tests on the branch and let's us know if there is an issue or not. That's very cool that mojang has this internally of the game as well
I think you missed a major point. Mojang showcased features and didn’t even add them. And they still took a long time. If you ask me, it’s time for Mojang to get good management. Maybe then they’ll figure out how awful chat reporting is.
They spend half their time researching about animals and stuff idk maybe so they can make sure they don't add features that could portray a bad behavior to ten year olds that probably know better than to feed thousands of fireflies to a pet frog.
Excellent video! I really liked the way you used popular mods as background footage, but the real-life video sequences just felt kinda wrong to me. Maybe have them be still footage for future videos like these? On a completely different note, do any programmers out there know if it would be possible/feasible to port Minecraft Java to C#? I know the two languages are very quite similar, but I’m guessing it would still take ages. Fully hypothetical question, I could not do that, I just thought it to be interesting.
as someone who's been modding for years, i'm not annoyed at the rate of development of minecraft features, but what does annoy me is the poor performance on java edition when the community have created mods that not only increase the quality of the visuals but also double to triple the performance of the game.
But not for everyone. And its not proven to work across all platforms and hardware specs. As someone who uses these mods they have issues with rendering that are not on parity with the base game
I think many of the performance improvements involve using features only in newer versions of java and opengl, which would leave some of minecraft's playerbase behind if they were to require these versions
@@xisumavoid I agree in some scenarios but for the majority if you use mods the games performance is boosted by tenfold and there is essentially nothing taken away from the game aside from some immersiveness if you chose to use those mods to improve your performance. At least the game works and you can have fun rather than looking at a nice game but at 10 frames which is basically unplayable.
I'm speaking about performance enhancing mods specifically
@@jannik19191 Minecraft already ships with newer versions of java as needed. so there is zero reason why they couldnt ship the newer versions of open GL and java
@@xisumavoid That's a fair point, personally I have not experienced any problems with performance mods, so i wasn't aware that there were visual and performance issues with them. Thanks for the insight!
Minecraft has hundreds of features discarded in their early stage of development for one reason or another. There are dozens of iterations for each feature that actually makes it into the game.
If you make a mod and a year later realize that your ideas aren't that great, well, no harm no foul. Some people will actually like it anyway. And you always can release a "2.0" version that's better in every way.
But if Mojang is to release a bad feature, well, Chat Reporting and the community reaction to it is an exhibit on exactly that.
Not that I disagree with your point, but wasn't the community's reaction to chat reporting mainly caused by Mojang's unwillingness to reconsider? The reaction wouldn't have been as harsh if they listened to their player base like they did in the past.
True, also hey i know you from the sodium discord
@@c-djinni they can't reconsider iirc, main reason it was added is some newer EU laws- they probably had to do it to avoid a lawsuit
@@elithris Which EU laws? I'm interested
@@elithris wait why didn't they just say it was due to that why they needed to add them that would made the whole thing alot better
The easiest way to explain it is that Mojang is building a house while modders are doing interior decoration. Mojang has to get the building permits, build the house itself, make sure the house is safe to live in, that it has all the necessary features like plumbing, and so on. Then the interior decorators can furnish the house with whatever features the individual who's going to move in might want. Mojang really has to make sure it works for everyone at all times, while modders don't. It's ok if the curtains don't hang perfectly straight, but if the plumbing bursts every other week that's a disaster.
That's a pretty good analogy!
Beautiful explanation
Nice way of explaining it metaphorically
That's a very neat way of explaining it.
thats a really good way of explaining it
I would also like to add that mojang has also recently hired modders of Aether, Tropicraft and carpet mod to work on the game. They themselves have said that developing the game is pretty different from modding it. Especially Kingbdogz (The developer of Aether mod) during the development of the nether update.
I actually recently had a conversation with a former Aether mod dev, Jaryt, about this kind of stuff. There is genuinely a lot more that goes into it than people think, and even modding the game can be time consuming. You really gain a lot of respect for game devs and modders when you talk with them and actually see the process.
its not, there is just dumb restrictions that they put on creativity of people . minecraft is really lacking in content and most features are dull and lacklaster for example: copper another boring building item to create boring building block , they could make it so you turn it in prmitive copper wire and make some simple machines that help players in big scale building cz nowadays its just big boring grind that you cant speed up . mods always be better cz there is no limit to creativity and people can create really usefull things like inventory tweaks, upgradable storage , machines, building tools and much much more
Carpet mod W
Of course it is different. They arent the lead of the operation, have less creative input, have to run everything through other people before being able to work on it and they have to work on it in a restrictive manner. Everyone should be able to see how it is different.
@@felixknorke5072 it's not different, it's just dumb, like indie devs are way much more productive and creative than aaa devs, just compare minecraft and terraria like in terraria there is lots of stuff to do, and nobody forces you "to be creative" because...... REASONS!! not because we are lazy and can't do stuff cz our lead dev doesn't approve anything" by handicapping it's devs mojang achieved only lackluster updates and literally wasteland of missed possibilities that they never will be able to fill in (cz it will not be approved lol) but mods can and literally fill that large hole and do that 400% better then handicapped mojang that can only create boring biomes and worthless animals
“Modded is a choice”
This one is one of the strongest arguments I like to use. Vanilla updates need to be extra careful with what they add and change, because if it isn’t, people won’t remove that specific modification - they more often than not will just stop playing the game altogether for the time being.
So that alone is already a very sensible part of development mods don’t really need to worry about (since those who download them just remove it once they’re bored of it), but that is crucial when talking about default development.
And boy oh boy are there many types of people to find a middle ground for in a game this big, which makes such task even tougher.
(Keep in mind this is only one of the Vanilla updates challenges, there are plenty more still - and the video points out others too)
And we all know what happens when they add a feature without taking feedback. 1.9 is a great example of why they should be careful while they consider adding something
exactly. The warden was coded into the game well, it pretty much works exactly as intended almost all the time.
Most mods, when a new mob is added or during the first versions, are often pretty buggy and janky in comparison, and are improved in future updates.
For example, pixelmon love to suffocate themselves.
I say that with love to those mods, its hard to add pokemon or dragons and stuff into the game, but the warden is a perfect example of the time mojang puts into its updates as right out of the gate it is a very smooth and functional addition.
As if the playerbase isn’t notably split across different versions already
@@qzimyion Nah, mate. 1.9 was great. People have been upset every time PVP has been changed, so people being especially upset over the biggest change to it ever was a given. Can't let a minority get in the way of what is objectively a change for the better.
@@Missingno_Miner It's still bad though. I prefer this combat with cooldown between attacks. But it's not the same as what bedrock has. I think it should be made the same on both, regardless of which one they choose.
THANK YOU for saying this. Mojang of course deserves criticism sometimes, but they don't get enough credit for just how hard their job is from some more uninformed members of the community. It's not stated enough that Minecraft is the most succesful video game of ALL time - every single tiny decision that the Mojang team makes affects tens of millions more players than any mod that's ever been made (and I say this as someone who loves modded).
I agree. Mojang deserves criticism... specifically _constructive criticism._ Sadly they get way too much "destructive" criticism (for lack of a better term). The community as a whole (myself included) needs to work on trying to be more understanding and accepting. :3
@@lasercraft32 No
@@felixknorke5072 Why no?
@@lasercraft32 This. I often see people complain about how the new items are useless and how the new updates are "bad" without telling the reasoning behind it and giving possible solutions to those said problems.
@@qzimyion I know, right? But when you look at it as a whole you realize the updates are actually really good, especially in comparison to older updates with less content.
One thing that secrets of minecraft showed is how many iterations something goes through before it gets presemted to us minecraft life. The warden was showcased in 2020 as a working mob (it needed polishing) but we know it went through many texture, shape and behaviour changes before settleing in the current warden so it was probably worked on for a year before it was showed plus the concept had to be settled.
The developers are probably right now decing on some content we will not see in three years.
And another thing this is the first update I followed closely but the mojang teams do a lot of changes quietly or in the backround that dont get remebered as a feature of the update, in 1.19 they fiddled with changes in rails (wich were reverted) and they changed mob spawning in the nether fortreses.
tbf most of the work Warden got was because Mojang were mad that players didn't play the game how Mojang inviosned them to play it
@@5uperM the quite literal intended way to play the game is to do whatever you want.
@@man-ce5iv exactly
@@5uperM but a game where people do whatever the fuck they want isn't a fun game when you're trying to give the player a challenge
@@man-ce5iv originally they were going to make the warden unkillable, now killing it is just disincentivized
you can do anything, but not everything rewards you
Excellently articulated video. While Mojang isn't exactly a perfect development team by all means, it's refreshing to educate more people on why updates take so long, and why that time might be necessary for such a monolithic game to develop for all of its players.
I just recently got into modding, and for making a mod, you basically just fire up intellij, add a few blocks and your good to go. Whereas for a whole update, mojang has to plan out what is going to be in the game for the rest of time, and make sure that it will be accessible to all players.
Well you're still a beginner and definitely have a wrong view on modding, because modding has no boundaries, yes you've learned how to put already existing features to blocks and mobs. But believe me when I say it that modders that experienced made much more complex additions to the game. And I am a modder myself, and a java software engineer myself.
@@APDesignFXP That's true, but Inditorias still has got a point.
@@APDesignFXP Yeah, for modding there really is no limit, I've been programming for years, about to finish my masters. I was just pointing out that for modding you can make something extremely simple that takes a little time, and its a full on mod. But for mojang, they need to make an update feel like an update.
I must agree with APDesignFXP and say, that this sounds like a very limited view. I would say, the best mods are way more complex, creative and challenging than most of the minecraft updates.
The problem Mojang faces is, that they need to have a extreme quality control and must be very sure about things they add, because they normally can't remove it.
But the whole thing with modders are faster then the studios isn't something new. I would say in every game we have that.
@@Inditorias Yet there are projects that usually accomplished by 1-3 devs from the modding community and are a huge on update if were implemented to the game, how mojang can’t achieve it with its devs isn’t a problem of development or feeling like an update is more a problem of organization. The Mild Update 1.19 is a part 3 of 1.17 an update that needed to be made 3 years ago and could be finished within 3-6 months, 1.19 doesn’t feel like an update. modders can stand up to those standards pretty easily
As a modder I'm a bit sad about Mojang not focusing on performance and modularity. In another comment you mentioned how mods like Sodium do have visual issues or might not work everywhere, unlike vanilla. On the other hand Sodium is held back by Minecrafts really old rendering technique that can't simply be changed by just a mod. This is also the reason why Minecraft starts to loose a lot of performance when rendering a few blocky entities/some text, but modern games have no issue rendering thousands of high-res meshes. This is not an issue with java or OpenGL, but with Mojangs legacy rendering pipeline. On the note of OpenGL, really want to see them support multiple rendering pipelines. Some players can't run 1.17+ due to OpenGL updates, and VulkanMod has proven that using more modern rendering pipelines can result in massive performance gains. So reworking their render pipeline to be more dynamic(switching between OpenGL/Vulkan, different OpenGL versions, batched rendering) would be a huge gain for Mojang, users and modders.
Making Java Minecraft better definitely won’t be a huge gain for Mojang/Microsoft.
It’s so much easier to monetise a game that doesn’t support modding, so spending money on improving Java Minecraft, to make it more competitive against Bedrock, to eventually earn less money from microtransactions in the latter, definitely doesn’t sound like something Microsoft would do
...."more modern pipelines" don't tell them to make java also use directX
I still want to play Minecraft on linux bruh
@@zero-ej6rt vulkan?
@@mateusz2099 my beloved
I co-work on Supplementaries, and we often talk about this very problem. One of the largest disparities between Mojang and Mods is not just that of responsibility, but rather expectations. We can say we will implement a feature and even show it off, but if we ultimately decide it doesn't fit we can just stop working on it. Mojang does not have this luxury. I personally am completely fine with development being slow, but it doesn't sit right with me when communities are blamed for their expectations. The base game of minecraft will inevitably have a larger audience than any mod, and therefore have more eyes on it. Unlike a mod, they must be more precise with what content they chose to display IMO.
Also the squeaky wheel get oil or something like that right, so while i see it too from time to time about "why can't mojang be quick or as good as modders" it's usually not many maybe 1 or 2 out of a whole comment section. I do though agree when it comes to optimization it's just silly at this point that mods have taken the lead to improve the playability in the game this much. vanilla minecraft makes my gaming pc feel like a potato forget about when i actually had a potato pc no way could i play i could barely move before a zombie killed me and that froze me and crashed that game. now on my current pc i run sodium and oculus for shaders and i'm good at 100 to 120 fps (i'm running about 30 mods at the same time) when vanilla was getting me at 15-20fps. I also agree that being disappointed shouldn't be banned lol ppl were shown something there was a miscommunication whatever it happens but the audience isn't to blame. They have a responsibility to figure out what is safe to show and what won't i mean common sense dictates you show what you are most likely gonna release but shit happens things get cut then say that at least people will understand don't say something safe but untrue or if true gain some better sense lol sorry i ranted lol ps love supplementaries
They need to start showing which bugs they’re going to fix at the Minecon lives
> We can say we will implement a feature and even show it off, but if we ultimately decide it doesn't fit we can just stop working on it.
Didn't Mojang do just that with fireflies and birch forests?
@@Mnnvint Absolutely, but they faced immense backlash. Modders are not subject to this level of scrutiny.
@@Mnnvint The reasoning they gave made the community felt like they were so out of touch. They didn't say "This isn't working right now because X reasons", they put the blame in the community because "Oh fireflies are toxic to frogs!" and "The birch forest was just concept art, stupid you for believing something we showcased while talking about feature's we're going to implement was actually a feature we would implement!" as well as the wild update generally being disappointing in almost all aspects.
The problem wasn't them deciding not to work on fireflies or birch forests, it was them being so out of touch with the community and their failure to communicate.
I've only recently started my journey as a developer, and started with a large company. Seeing the behinds the scenes I see a lot of work and care goes into software. Small things take time, schedules, QA testers, but an outsider would never realize. As a team lots of different things have to be considered when adding content to the game.
Balance, maintainability through versions, cohesion (where items added feel like they belong), as well as making sure all the additions work in tandem. As well making sure to not impact the game too heavily, I played many mod packs before and my older PC had issues with maintaining a good framerate and I also had to deal with longer load times.
Also as an aside note, I have been a bit burnt out with all the negativity with Minecraft recently and seeing a video that doesn't just attack Mojang is greatly appreciated.
6:19 i love this
Zedaph's videos use such obscure mechanics that youtube considers them modded minecraft
I love that you have in the background Twilight forest running, which is still in development and the final boss is still missing for years now :D
Still a beautiful mod
*it's been 10 years...*
@@screret4794 quite the time, I played it over a year ago, and when I went to the the final stage I only thought, that this is rather anti climactic.
It's sad but when the original creators don't have an interest or passion to continue it, it can't be helped.
@@MasterMadaraXD they're still updati the mod to new versions, which i find peculiar considering newest content is from ~6 yrs ago
@@screret4794 is it the main team or someone who got the code and the Okey to do so. Because that something you would rather see when the main creators are gone and a few try to keep it alive.
Which of curse is a great thing.
I think the "final boss" has become a running joke now and will never get added
Fun fact, mods can also use the testing system! It's just that setting up tests takes a lot of time and it has only recently become a thing so most mods don't use it.
My testing much of the time consists of
> create new world
> test feature
> it worked once in dev cool it must therefore work in production
🥴
I think one other thing that many people tend to forget is that updates in Minecraft have gotten much bigger. People joke about how Caves & Cliffs was split into 3+ updates, but if you actually take a look at it, 1.17 was still the largest ever update in terms of blocks added. Of course, that's not the best method of determining an update's overall size (especially since many of 1.17s blocks are just simple variants of other blocks, and 1.18 didn't add any blocks but had large sweeping changes to the game), but every single block still takes a bit of time to add.
1.19 may have been relatively small by today's standards, but it absolutely would have been considered big if it released any time from 1.0 through 1.6, and would probably fit right in from updates 1.7 through 1.12 in terms of size (at least in my opinion).
Of course, it does make sense that as Minecraft has gotten bigger, updates have gotten larger. But, the relationship between update size and development time is not linear. The more content you have to add in an update, the more time you need to make sure that content works with everything else. The more time you need to spend testing and fixing bugs. And, the more considerations you have to make when even planning out new content and how it meshes with all of the existing content.
I think people have just gotten used to the much larger updates we've been getting, and there's been a sort of force pushing to make every single update bigger and better than the last especially since 1.13 (which I believe was the main downfall of Caves & Cliffs and why it ended up needing to be split, Mojang got too ambitious). And, because of that, it takes longer to make updates, but people still kind of expect the faster update cycles we used to have.
I personally don't care if updates take a long time. I'd in fact like if updates took a while, I want Mojang to make sure they can add what they want while fixing all of the issues. I just wonder if a lot of people have kind of stopped playing Minecraft just to play Minecraft, instead only playing it for the updates.
1.15 basically just added Bees and honey lol
@@Koooo4 1.15 is the main exception of recent updates since it was the only major update ever released after 1.0 where content wasn't the main focus. It was primarily a bug fixing and optimization update.
After all, Minecon Live 2019 announced the Nether Update a few months before 1.15 even came out, with the content focus clearly being on 1.16. If 1.15 were ever meant to be a big content update, they would've focused entirely on that instead.
Well said
I usually play Minecraft more after updates, but I stop sooner since I already know everything that they added. Sometimes I just play creative mode though.
My modpack in a 1.7.10 version, from 9 years ago, have between 10 and 20x more content than the vanilla 1.19 version. This is a fact. Simple, short and direct.
It's really funny to me that the first mod show in a video about "mod dev vs vanilla dev" is Twilight forest, a mod wich I'm pretty sure that aside from updating to the newest release hasn't actually add anything since like, idk, 2014 for example
11:00 These tests are stored as structure files of which any player can use in-game by using the /gametest command
Seems to be a bedrock only feature....
Would be VERY helpful for java modders, or even map makers, imagine having a test suite to check your system works, or that a map segment/mechanic doesn't break in a new version.
Professional game developer here. A few perspectives were also missed:
* N^2 communication problem. Fred Brooks on the classic _The Mythical Man-Month_ summarized it via: _Adding more people to a late project makes it even later._ The more devs there are the work “overhead in communication” that slows everyone down to keep everyone in the same page. Modders usually only need to communicate with a few people. When Mojang needs a new feature they need “sign off” not just from the team lead *but also* UI, Design, Audio, Artists, and Legal.
* The original Java code is _extremely poorly written._ Fixing this can cause even more problems. It takes time to debug all the edge cases. Over time code complexity grows. It takes longer to understand the code.
Exactly this. Communications is often WAY overlooked. 6+ modders (1 current version) vs 713 employees across 2 major platforms (Bedrock/Java for ALL versions and ALL devices). And even then, there's still old versions of mods that have world corrupting crashes, or that one change made to the last version (because some dev wanted something special for their modpack) which introduces a dupe bug that'll never be fixed.
Which is why they made bedrock, but then they decided not to commit to it and left themselves stuck with 2 code bases that they now need to keep in parity...
@@SILVERF0X13 they're commited to bedrock, they're just not commited to killing off java (and i think they might not be allowed to? smth about when they bought the IP there was a clause about not binning the legacy game or smth like that)
besides, despite the relatively low playerbase of java, they're definitely the loudest voices around, they whined and cried at a report system and they've been claiming that java will be binned/merged any day now since literally the purchase happened
@@Sopsy_Hallow To be fair, it SHOULD be discontinued. Java is an inherent security risk that can never be fixed. No patching, tweaking, or fixing can ever make it not dangerously vulnerable.
@@williameldridge9382 bedrock is completely safe then, not a single security issue huh? impressive for a shitty port of java minecraft honestly
The creative freedom section is disingenuous. Nobody's saying Minecraft should do things like Pixelmon, they're complaining about the way official updates lack features when compared to mods that do similar things: such as the Wild Update's lack of new biomes or biome changes when compared to what biome mods can do, or the way the Mob Vote implements only one mob, when modders have repeatedly implemented dozens of mobs at once.
Id say again you might of missed the overall points as to why mojang does not and how when modders do it does not need to meet the same standards.
1.21 fixes all of that
While the comparison between modders and mojang isn't really equivalent, I still think a lot of the points it brings up are worth discussing.
It's all the cut features, the ignoring of player feedback, the half baked ideas, the weird priorities, the bugs, etc etc that are so often prevalent in every update that spark this comparison. "If mojang is so rigorous in their QA, then why are updates so often riddled with issues?"
For me, mojang's questionable priorities have been the biggest issue highlighted to me by playing modded. There are loads of relatively simple ideas the fanbase has been begging for for ages, just scroll through r/minecraftsuggestions, and yet mojang instead chooses to focus on adding overly complex mechanics like panda genetics or the whole axolotl hunting thing that I still haven't seen a single player use since the snapshot phase. And then even if mojang finally does add those features, it just has to be in some weird "unexpected" form that just renders it really clunky and practically unusable, like the allay's unstackable item sorting.
Modding has shown me what the game could be like if mojang wasn't so hindered by overanalyzing everything and the ensuing design paralysis, and that's why I don't play vanilla anymore
I get the points you’re making but I’ve seen several players use the panda genetics feature. Scicraft’s Peaceful Challenge is the obvious one - they couldn’t make a traditional slime farm bc slimes don’t spawn in Peaceful, so they instead bred up a bunch of sick pandas and made what is best described as a “panda snot death conveyor” to automatically breed baby sick pandas, collect the slime balls they sneeze out, and then… uh… dispose of them once they grow up.
@@Fireheart318 It's not that they're completely useless. None of them are "bad" per se, they're just a weird priority to sink so much effort into when there's things people have been begging for for ages
adding things people have been "begging for ages" isnt always as good as it seems as often people are just plain wrong, misguided or know nothing yet ask the impossible.
im not saying the mojang teams know it all, and sure their way of implementing features can be quite puzzling and odd sometimes. but they are still a professional dev team who knows what they're doing and have actually thought about what they are adding.
there are many ways to "solve" a problem or supply for a demand, and some are better than others. People will often ask for a solution that seems more reasonable to them, but in practise is clearly not thought about and doesnt fit in or work all that well. most mods that add "long requested features" do this, which is fine for a mod but would just decrease the game quality drastically over time.
Ive played with plenty of mods that "optimise" or make things more "convieniant" and while they're usually fun for a while, an interesting change of pace. id say they definitly arent better than the vanilla version and will usually over simplify stuff and ignore whole sections of the game, they integrate terribly. (for refference, basically any science mod, i love them but man do they just not intergrate with normal farms, or redstone, or the technical aspects of minecraft, or arguably quite a lot of other aspects of minecraft)
I'd be happy if they just added some of the simple inventory management improvements from modded.
@@Sopsy_Hallow Agreed. Mods exist for a reason. I always try to adopt the standpoint of what would fit MC through Mojang rather than simply a fan idea (some of which can be fun mod concepts, but some way overpowered or overcomplicated, some just for personal wishes, etc). Ideas can be suggested for vanilla, but most of the time will be rejected for a good reason that most people don't get and may get upset at Mojang (or others who disagree that they don't fit) over, hence having the option that they can instead be turned into mods (which is at least *better than nothing*). It's Mojang's game, after all, and they ultimately decide what they want or what may work best in it.
Bureaucracy is a huge part of it, but it's also there for a reason. Mojang is responsible for stability, quality, security and support, which takes a massive amount of their time away from developing new features, and also makes developing new features significantly harder. Many mods are horribly buggy and slow, have all kinds of design and compatibility flaws, etc. The mods that are actually good have taken years to make and the developers put an insane amount of effort into maintaining them and updating them with each new version of Minecraft (and if they don't, the mods die, which it okay for mods, but not okay for core features, so Mojang never has that easy out as a choice). It's definitely apples to oranges. Just be thankful that Mojang lets you have your cake and eat it too with both: free, official game updates for the foreseeable future, and tons of mods.
More people, more entities (companies) = more communications (and more lawyers). Most mod teams only have a half dozen people, but Mojang's got a few hundred I believe, and have to answer to Microsoft now. Microsoft is essentially the publisher, and if there's one thing I learned in the gaming world, when the publisher says, "Release your flagship game/update every X months", you have a limited amount of time for adding features and making sure they work.
@@JenInMinecraft and since mojang is being pressured by micro or upper management to make more updates faster, from 1 update a year to 2, yeah, your definitely right
@@charlestonianbuilder344 They have other games they're making to, and I was speaking in general (quoting game devs I've talked with many years ago). No need to be snarky.
@@JenInMinecraft they....they were agreeing with you...
@@JenInMinecraft bro was literally siding with you 🗿
I think a very important thing that people really don't consider is that minecraft isn't just the java version anymore, they need to figure out how everything will work for consoles and phones as well and it immediately can complicate things. Take the bundle, the item very lost in development for a long time now, last we heard about it from mojang they didn't add them yet because they need to figure out the way it could be used with a touch screen.
Kind of the curse of the game this big.
Curse of mobile gaming, here. When you make a game, you have to consider the control scheme as a quintessential element of your game. Trying to retrofit a completely different scheme, especially a far worse one when it come to command availability, is doomed to fail.
There are different teams for each game-version - and it doesn't matter because translating features from one language to the other isn't a hard job as a programmer.
That excuse kind of falls apart when Re-Logic can produce updates with more content, follow through on all their promises and more, do it in a shorter time frame and release it on multiple platforms simultaneously.
Then again, it also falls apart when you realize that Mojang was able to do all that pre 1.17 too.
@@RWQFSFASXC-qc5fq Re-Logic doesn’t actually do the mobile/console ports, they have a separate company (DR Studios) developing those, unlike development of Java/Bedrock. Terraria is also 2D, which makes it much easier to develop and has less potential for bugs, though it’s probably harder to make textures/animations for it. I do think Re-Logic is much better at listening to the community though.
@@APDesignFXP As a programmer myself I feel this isn't quite accurate. You wouldn't simply 'translate' the code from one code base to the other, especially in the circumstances of going from java minecraft which is a mess to the different implementation in bedrock. You can reuse things like probabilities and numbers, but a lot of the implementation is going to have to be written from scratch for each port. That being said though, as you said, there are different teams for each version, and thus that programming from scratch should be done in parallel, not slowing down game development. In other words, I agree with you, but not for the same reason, lol.
My issue is that the cohesiveness in Minecraft has been decreasing. Mechanics are overlapping less and less.
I think a lot of it is also "why does it take so long now when they have more resources dont they?"
But they arent a random little indie studio anymore they have one of the most major influential brands in the world they cant be willy nilly and just so whatever sounds cool.
Bigger doesnt always mean easier. It can also mean more considerstions and responcibilities
@@xisumavoid bigger also means decisions and minor changes have to go through a lot more people, which extends the time required to even make a simple addition.
My guess (being a developer for the marketplace) is this, having spoken to devs myself:
1.- There are many departments. People still think of mojang as some kind of indie studio, but it probably has over a hundred people with around 150+ employees at this point simply on the java side, let alone the bedrock side. This implies that communication between departments will be muddy and confusing, and miscommunication will cause heavy delays
2.- Bedrock exists and doesn't want to maintain less parity than it has in the past. This implies they need to communicate their ideas heavily with the bedrock team (another endeavor on itself) and tell them what they need and how it'll look, passing assets and whatnot between them. The bedrock team uses a different code base so sharing code is basically pointless and have to remake it from scratch, they ALSO have to take into account bedrock map makers because we want to know how new stuff works underneath to improve our maps for everyone who uses them.
3.- There are tons of updates that don't get released to the public right away but to select groups of testers. These testers find everything regarding things new stuff breaks, things that's inefficient, things that are probably going to break other things potentially, etc. Considering how often I have to report bugs for each beta snapshot, my guess is there's a lot that isn't considered to be breakable upon implementation.
4.- Modders aren't reworking the system. They have access to what would be called "intermediary level code" usually which implies they don't often try to change how the game works at its core, and instead trry to add system on top of said core. Mojang has to consider remodeling the core within every update, implying that they need to see what trickle-down effects this may have. One of the biggest recent ones being the new height and depth limits added, this used to be a hard-coded limit due to a core issue with bit numbers, and now it isn't. That implies there was a huge core modification.
5.- Modders oftentimes take years to churn out interesting content that's worth trying out, and both modders and map makers make something as well as they can before the game updates and breaks something. So it's a matter of time to see if anything will be destroyed by next update and you have to try and speed up the process. What happens however is that many many many bugs are either caught right after release and fixed after some updates, far after release and never fixed, or minecraft updates and the code no longer works for it.
6.- Fans of minecraft vanilla are FAR GREATER in number than modded minecraft players, simply by definition. There's millions upon millions of players who will get these updates automatically, and if it isn't as perfect as humanly possibly there will be consequences to sales, reputation, and player base. Java isn't the only consideration anymore as bedrock outperforms it in efficiency, sales, and general widespread appeal (due to it being on every imaginable console). This difference prompts far greater times needed to ensure the most perfect product possible (and even then they don't manage it most of the time)
7.- Game balance and design philosophy. Making a mob in a day is simple, it's testing out all the kinks and bugs and details and game design elements and design philosophies of minecraft meshing well with it that take a very long time to suss out. They try to make sure the game feels relatively similar, but expanded, where you have to earn things, nothing is necessarily easy, and exploration is rewarded (along with other factors), these are things I clearly can see are not considered in most modded content, and moreso they add in what they think would be cool (which is fine on its own, but not how mojang does things).
There's probably more reasons, but just off the top of my head I'm guessing these are the reasons.
This needs pinned
Excellently thought out and explained.
yes
Java>Bedrock. 😆
@@benroberts8363 perhaps, but the bedrock team is working hard to apply parity in as many ways as it can (and also contains more features for things like redstone, for example), and features on java are withheld for the sake of bedrock at times as well. Bedrock also has a far larger player base, so I see the possibility of maybe... 10 or so major updates from now the roles could very well switch on what's considered the better version.
This was the old office I never got to visit it :) thanks for the perspectives, I can't speak - not even sure I would be allowed to speak for the mojang teams, but it's very different for sure, I understand how people from the outside cant see everything and I get why people from the inside can't get all modders. It's just very different. And I wish people would be more friendly when discussing it, when people go hostile it's way more risk talking about it.
hi
@@gnembon hi
I love modding in every game, not just minecraft. My only beef with Minecraft modding is: why there are TWO (unofficial) mod loaders!? And the fact that there are multiple mod loaders or even that they are not "official" is just secondary, it is just a pain that the modding scene is split in half because of that. Other games also have multiple mod loaders, even official and unofficial, but generally a mod should be "loaded" the same way. I just wish Minecraft had some standardization in that aspect.
From my understanding: Forge was slow to update to new Minecraft versions, so Fabric was made as a "Forge-lite" that updates quicker but is less feature-rich.
Then there's apparently Quilt. Looking it up, it seems to be a fork of Fabric born out of developer political drama and promotes preemptive deplatforming. Ain't touching that one.
Ironic how fabric seems to be more toxic than forge
Different libraries, different apis etc. They both have their benefits so modders use either depending on what they want to make.
“imagine the reaction if mojang added pokemon”
*minecraft earth*
The test world thing reminds me of factorio devs. they have a server running mechanic tests on everything in the latest build constantly. You never know how one thing may break another.
Modifying something you bought is always legal, never let them try to tell you otherwise
I always had the stance that mojang needs to ensure that the vast majority of people will enjoy the changes they make. Whereas modders have far less pressure to appeal to the entire player base
About the warden having a drop, kingbdogz stated that the sculk catalyst is not supposed to be a "reward" but that its just there for if people wanted to make a warden farm.
Yes to make a warden farm, because Mojang's original concept was to be able to let people farm the warden. Mojang wanted people to avoid the Warden at all costs, they even gave it more and more new abilities to prevent you from even getting close to it, but yeah they wanted you to be able to farm it. Pretty sure the Warden was given something for the community was consistently bugging them for it to drop something cool.
Wasn't less about "people wanting to farm the guardian" and more about ensuring a renewable source of catalysts for the technical players that wasn't going to be fearing it either way
@@lordthor5951 Same difference. If you want a renewable source of catalysts, you’ll have to make a warden farm to do so.
@@lordthor5951 The Catalyst is already renewable without the Warden. a Catalyst can spawn another Catalyst instead of Sculk when spreading, it can also spawn a Sensor or Shrieker instead of Sculk. A Catalyst can be farmed without it coming from a Warden.
@@thanoscreeper Its the same and not, its not there for people who want to farm the warden to have a reason to do so, but its there cause providing renewable access to resources is good and the technical players where going to figure out how to do a farm anyway.
@SomeBodyKares1 it doesn't though, try it for yourself or try to find a video of it happening, the wiki doesn't even reference it. Catalyst spawns naturally, is gained from chests and from the Warden as a drop. Theses are the sources available.
Thank you so much for this video. I work in a creative industry, so I understand the amount of work that goes on behind the scenes to deliver a product, and how huge the difference is between working on a personal project and a professional project. But yet no matter how I articulate this, how I explain all the steps Mojang has to go through, people simply do not want to hear it.
Yes. I agree with everything that's said in the video. and I have no objections to the facts.
When I talk to my friends however, I think what we all miss is that spark Markus Persson (Notch) brought to the game.
we get close with updates, and the updates feel like they should be in the game. but big stuff like the Enchantment Table and Brewing Stand, the Minecart system, aren't the types of things we're seeing much of anymore. it's mostly decoration blocks, if anything, that we've been seeing ever since Caves and Cliffs. and no I'm not saying decoration blocks are a bad thing because I love all the blocks they add even though I mainly play modded.
all my friends agree that the Nether update, and Caves and Cliffs were great updates for the game. both of those were a step in the right direction.
I just have to admit. I really miss Markus being on the dev team.
If I forgot to mention anything, R.I.P.
The problem with trying to keep up those updates is that they were large changes to the game that required a lot of effort. You can't really keep up that effort, it just isn't feasible. So you have to have a big update, then a bunch of small updates, then another big update. It's just how this stuff is run.
Cohesive game design is far more of a focus than within the modding world, based on what i learned from Docm77s episode featuring developers. You can't just stick in a feature without a purpose that implicates other things in the game or that totally makes the game too easy. With mods theres no rules in that regard. When you give a player an item it can entirely change the game for better or worse. An example is the elytra wings, which is surprisingly a controversial topic, but i now realize why.
Another aspect is we have to consider if the the features feel true to vanilla minecraft or are accessible to newer players. An example given was invisible item frames, which the developers felt were not entirely vanilla feeling.
We get 2 updates per year and have for over 10 years, give or take a few. I am grateful the game has advanced over that time as most games dont.
The vanilla game itself feels very different from how it used to feel back then. Each new update works like a mini mod, adding in a few new blocks and one or two mobs or mechanics.
My guess (which may be wrong) is that Mojang is afraid of updating the game too fast. That's why they artificially limit the scope of the updates to only a few new blocks at a time, and only one biome per update, etc. so the player base have time to get used to the new "Vanilla" feeling.
There are no good explanations on why don't we have slabs and stairs of terracotta and concrete (and also for every other block), besides, that Mojang simply wants to add as few blocks to the game as it can.
They actually used to blame this on the block limit (65536 back then, and slabs and stairs didn't even count as separate blocks, still more than enough for hundreds of mods), but that excuse got taken away when the blocks got their own name.
@@EvanOfTheDarkness most of your comment is false. The updates add way more blocks and biomes than 2 or 3. 1.18 for example added 8 biomes. 1.16 added 50 blocks, 4 biomes and 5 structures as well as 4 mobs. Latest update added 3 mobs, 2 biomes and 25 blocks. Updates are huge and they definitely aren't holding back.
And they don't add slabs for everything because it doesn't fit with vanilla. Not everything needs a slab. Players should also get creative with block choices
When adding a feature they also have to consider the UI/how the player interacts with it. Fx if mojang were to add invisible item frames they wouldnt do it through a trigger command.
@@Koooo4 Invisible item frames are, in fact in the game, that's why you can use that trigger command with a datapack. That's not a mod.
All the good mods have a great cohesion, both within their own blocks & features and with the vanilla game. That's part of what makes a mod "good". The problem is cohesion *between* mods, because it's impossible to have cohesion between all the thousands of mods out there.
@@EvanOfTheDarkness "in the game" is a bit misleading, but true, it's a datapack not a mod.
I've played plenty of good mods that still had some terrible UI and clunky ways to use certain elements.
There's also the issue of crunch culture in the industry. Something I appreciate about Mojang is that they would rather delay an update than force their employees to sacrifice their health just to get something out faster (we saw this in the 1.17 and 1.18 split). I'd rather have healthy employees and "slow" updates than something rushed that burns out developers, harms their mental/physical health, and ends up unplayable. Before anyone says "just hire more developers": 9 mothers can't make a baby in 1 month.
Fun Fact: The original developer for Not Enough Items (NEI) (and possibly the older Too Many Items), ChickenBones, actually became a developer for Terraria.
Wait seriously?
Still doesn't excuse Mojang not implementing fireflies or horizontal birch logs in world generation. That would take even the newbie modders like a day or two to implement.
They are a game dev company, and not an indie developer team anymore, they should be able to put out and handle more and more expansive updates as the time goes on.
ive seen firefly speedruns where people speedrun making a firefly mod and it takes like less than 30 mins most the time lol
@@nicknick493 And then you download it on a potato and the framerate drops lower than my SAT scores
I'm a game developer (not at Mojang), and this is one of the things people ask me a lot about.
Now I'm a technical animator, so I put the skeleton in the model (simply said), and as such I don't go as deep in the inner workings of games.
But I think you did a very good job at explaining this. And it counts for a lot of, if not all, other games.
Stacking features is great, and when the developers allow modders to create content freely it's awesome, but if the base is unstable everything tumbles.
Generally we need to make sure that whoever wants to play the game, can play the game (doesn't always hold up when you look at some of the beefy games out there, but generally speaking), not just in terms of hardware, but also in terms of mechanics and content.
Where modders can add in all kinds of features to their own liking, to whatever their own interests are and whatever their own computer can support, developers need to make sure it is consistent with their own game, not age restricted (unless the game already is and even then usually in moderation), playable by most, supported by different types of hardware, etc etc
There's a lot that goes on behind the scenes, which I believe you explained very well.
As a professional developer I can confirm that you can produce way more functionality as a single developer without things to hold you back.
The things that hold you back is among others:
- Business requirements
- Code quality
- Testing
- Performance requirements
- Documentation
- Communication
- Stability
- Support
- Meetings (so many meetings...)
It is said that a professional developer on average delivers 10 lines of "productive" code per day. Sadly, that's not far from the truth...
It's because you're talking about people's money. With a mod, nobody is paying you. Or if they are, it's with the understanding of what the end result will be. Look what happens to major companies like Microsoft....one little thing goes wrong, or implemented in just the wrong way, one tiny bug that inconveniences people and they get crucified. When was the last time that happened to a mod developer? Almost never, even what they produce is "meh".
stability and optimization? are we talking about java minecraft
@@MusicalSkele- without it the game would have even lower fps than it already has
I hate writing docs (really it can take more time than actually writing the code lmao) but I love reading then
As someone who had a pretty decent gaming PC built (it’s a few years old now) but is still primarily a console gamer modding is such a daunting task.
I’ve recently tried downloading the Vault Hunter’s mod pack and I kept running into issues. The MultiMC isn’t compatible anymore with the instructions provided and I had to download something called FTB to get it to load up. Then when I finally got it loaded I got a message that the mini map and compass were out of date and needed to be updated.
It took me so long to get it to actually run that I didn’t even end up playing because it was late at night. I think mods are awesome across a bunch of games but for someone who is not that PC proficient it can be very complex compared to vanilla experiences.
People say “Mojang has to be careful adding and designing content that works for everyone and coding them in as to not break or affect the game’s functionality” yet the updates still come out buggy, laggy, unbalanced and incomplete. The content does not live up to the quality they claim their standards require
not at all
@@KwikBR exactly
They arent even able to optimize the performance of their game while some mods that fix exactly that come out like a day the update launched.
Minecraft Java literally became unplayable for some people because Mojang added so much more stuff (bigger Caves, mountains, build height) but still refuses to optimize the performance.
they arent buggy, and if they are they fix all the bugs. Do you see how many bugs they fix in each changelog?
i insta knew that was twilight forest bc the grass its one of my fav mods
Yes, if you look at the entire modding scene there are more modders.
If you look at most projects, they're usually only handled by one person, almost all the biggest mods have been made by individuals.
So, a single person, can and will develop circles around mojang's entire team.
That includes not only code, but they are also responsible for the game assets, the content out of game like wikis and such.
So much, from just a single person, or small team.
I guess most grown up people understand this. And certainly everyone who happened to manage a code base and knows how much pain and time is involved with fixing minor stuff nobody will ever notice (except when it doesn't work out). But it's a game after all and many kids play it, they don't think twice about stuff they say and it's also a hobby done in their free time, so responsibilty attached to it. It's easy to complain when you have no obligation to fix things or satisfy millions of players equally. Thanks for the video, hope some complainers will listen.
One thing that was sort of mentioned but I think is important is that mods often have the goal to provide a new experiences away from vanilla. They are focused on creating new experiences and you can choose the experiences you want. Mojang is in a way stuck with one game and few way of playing it.
Pretty cool to see such an important voice in the community taking such a clear overview of this topic. People tend to see Mojang's and modder's work as something to choose between, instead of just enjoying both of them as different experiences that enrichen this amazing game. Good video xisuma! 👏👏
I just love how my 1.7.10 modpack runs better than vanilla 1.19.2 despite having over 100 mods in it.
Modding most games also isn't illegal, at most modding certain multiplayer-only games will get your account banned, but I have never heard of it being illegal.
Selling modifications is illegal. The modder who is taking patreon money to continue his mod is in very cloudy water and would probably lose if Mojang felt like he was a problem.
@@uberculex Yeah, but there is a big difference between publicly releasing mods and selling them. Most games don't allow players to sell mods, which I think is usually fair.
1.7.10 runs really bad on my pc. And 1.20 runs smooth like butter
Another thing to consider is that Java Minecraft had a bootstrap style of development. Notch did his thing, early Mojang did their thing on top of that, Microsoft-Mojang did stuff on top of _that._ And they had to tidy up the code quite a few times. Team Fortress 2 has a similar issue where it's full of spaghetti-code from 15 years of maintenance and added features, so it's difficult to do anything with it without breaking fifteen other things.
11:57 _"After all, modding is often illegal for most games [...]"_
...I don't think that's true. Redistributing existing game files is and multiplayer cheats definitely break a Terms of Service, but the pure modifications are owned by the creator. I assume altering your personal copy of a game is in a similar vein to creating local backups of media you physically own for personal use, or the "home recording" that totally "killed" the music industry. :P
It's like in Pokemon where grabbing the official game files without buying the game is clear piracy, but the distribution of "delta patches" (files that contain only the changes between the original and the modded file) is perfectly fine.
I think it mostly just comes down to the corporate structure and culture. Modders can achieve so much because of their enthusiastic hobbyist approach to creating content, creating amazing things at incredible speed/efficiency; But if you work for a company, doing that 9 to 5 every day would get you burnt out fast, so instead you have to take it slower if you'd like to still have a life outside work. That and the overhead that comes from such environments (having to do specific tickets, code reviews, testing, qa etc).
Mojang is working on other games too, such as Minecraft Dungeons and the new game they have in the works.
Also, I agree with you comment on Pokemon. If they added Pokemon to the game, I would be much less interested since I don't care about Pokemon. Over the 10 years I've been on and off Minecraft, I've really liked the new additions to the game, so I'd say the time they take to ensure quality is worth it. I've played so many mod packs that crash, lag, glitch or contain mods that are incompatible (Such as the Witchery mod pack, which has Biomes O' Plenty, Thaumcraft, Botania, Twilight Forest, and Pam's Harvestcraft. Some items from different mods cannot be used in the same crafting recipes where you would expect them to work). When Mojang add new things, they insure everything works together as intended.
With the exception of Loot Tables and Villagers... I've been messing with those recently, and text formatting for items is slightly different between the two and I'd like a fix. If the items are IDENTCAL, Loot Tables format the text differently, so you can't trade them with villagers if you change the name of the item or add lore.
Thank you so much for this video; the comments you mentioned at the beginning of this video are often frustrating for me to see as they are all too often full of contempt and derision for the mojang teams who make this game possible, and that just doesn't seem very fair to me. Criticism is important and has it's place, but "if modders can do it, why can't mojang" really isn't one of them. The points you made in the quality assurances section are especially important to me: I have an old creative world that is now perpeptually stuck in a previous game version unless my friend and I decide we are willing to lose a significant amount of our world and builds because a couple of modders decided to cull a lot of the 'messy' or 'unneeded' features in their mod - features they we have happened to use extensively in our builds. this is something that seems extremely unlikely to happen in vanilla minecraft - even when we got the texture overhaul they gave us the legacy resource pack IIRC, which allowed people the option to retain the vibe and look they were familiar with if they so chose.
(edit to add: modders doing this is fine to me, honestly, regardless of any personal disappointment/frustration. It's one person making something because they enjoy it, and if maintaining a mod becomes frustrating or unfun because of cluttered or older, poorly implemented features then I don't really blame a mod maker for deciding 'actually, im gonna get rid of that'. It's important to hold onto your joy within your hobbies, but this is still a notable difference in vanilla vs mod dev.)
Well put, X. Always appreciate your perspective and optimism.
I wish it was as simple as them just dragging and dropping in fabulously optimised, 3d chunk, distant horizons and more but things are never that simple with game dev!
You mention that modpacks require beefy computers, but it's worth noting that Fabric (with performance mods) is much more performant than Forge and in many cases even vanilla. A modpack with LazyDFU installed, for instance, is going to launch faster than even vanilla. As a result, Fabric modpacks don't actually have very heavy system requirements and can run pretty well.
Hey! Modder here! Making mods is a very time consuming process and it takes a lot of thought to make the experience the way you want it to be. In one of my mods, I spent upwards of 20 hours just getting the particles to spawn in the way I want it to. It also takes a lot of effort to still be balanced with vanilla and other mods. Hope this helps!
It's still game development, which isn't easy. You're just piggybacking off another game and skipping a lot of the boring parts like world Gen and networking (if you find that boring) but still need art, animations, particles, Code, etc.
Side note, thank you for keeping the game alive for me. Even if I've never played your mods, without people like you I would have stopped playing a decade ago. Maybe I should try my hand at making a mod...
Someone from the Satisfactory dev team put the dev side of the modding community well.
"They can make whatever they want, but we have to make a game for everyone, mods are optional, the base game is not."
offering apples to oranges isn't "perspective" it's an entirely different premise. It's intellectually dishonest, which is the core problem of mojang's communications. Yet some of you get off on being intellectually dishonest so here we are.
Being a Mojang developer is a very different roll to creating a mod.
@@xisumavoid i don't disagree that statement is 100% true... it's simply not a perspective on a thing, it's asserting that two things are different, invalidating the premise, if that premise is simply bewilderment at the amount of in game content there is available via mods.
It doesn't really provide any perspective on the more serious and thoughtful assertions you flashed on the screen such as, why are third parties providing optimization, why does mojang struggle (or avoid) to find things that aren't already done in mods, why does it seem like mojang is holding moders back (whilst relying on them to optimize the game while they create new plush characters and make licensing deals). Responding only to the lowest common 12 year old's sentiment isn't providing perspective, it's intellectually dishonest.
The answer is providing tools for mod developers is not good for business... (unless it's helping c developers scam people in the bedrock marketplace)... buying out mods is expensive and not a practice in running a game studio, and avoiding using IP created for mods, even if they might have the rights too, is noble and a sound legal practice. ok then, where is the warden plushie on the merch site?
the story of optifine is fascinating and i'm not all that versed on it... I can't imagine at 1.7 the creator thought they would be relied upon 12 version later. I'm sure there is an equally great story behind Lithium and Sodium, just the idea of the community coming together to get lithium temporarily running is great. I would love to ask them the question why they are able to find performance improvements and why this seems like an never ending need, why aren't they rendered obsolete.
Gnembon making an appearance. So happy for him!
Mojang has to put things in the game that everyone likes because all vanilla minecraft players have to experience the feature. Modders can put anything in, because not everyone is going to play their mod.
Copyright issues are still an issue within modding. Pixelmon for instance was asked to be taken down due to copyright issues. Some mods are not open source, and even with an open source license, what permission you get still varies between mods. If not we will be swamped by clones on Curseforge.
I should also point out the extremely high device requirement could be a result of unoptimized modpacks which are thrown together half hazardly and not configured properly. Smaller, lightweight packs could run on older PCs with little to no issues. Obviously many, many factors had to be at play here, but I just want to point out modded can be less resource intensive than people think.
As a mod pack developer I can speak lots to the difficulty of making mods and compatibility but I’m glad xisumavoid touched this I know it’s hard to do a lot of things with programming especially updates so thank you xisumavoid for covering the differences but also the strange stuff that goes between them
Whoa, seeing that branch block made me think that would be a great edition to the game. Like an end rod that connects all the way through
Minecraft gets new content very frequently for a game of its size, so I consider the premise itself (that Minecraft updates slowly) of little to no concern.
Very untrue, it's the biggest game in the world, considering it by player count. And it's quite simple to change. It's just not Mojang's/Microsoft's priority anymore.
OG player here-- I don't find myself caring nearly so much that the game gets new features slowly as much as the fact that old optimization problems and old features have been left untouched for a decade. Let them go as slow as they want, but they need to pick relevant things to work on.
remember: yearly updates with minor updates in between and snapshots
Pretty sure X has a massive adoration for the Twilight Forest mod.
Y'know I don't even think Java develops that slow, when they started doing 6-monthly updates that almost feels rather fast
Having worked in the software industry for over a decade now and having modded Minecraft (and a few other games), I can tell you that the processes are entirely different, even when working with a modding team. In a software house like Mojang there are established procedures on how things get done, how tickets are addressed and worked on, how code is reviewed, how code gets out the door, how they work with an art team, how iteration and testing are done, and so on. Modders often don't have those rigorous processes; I can't recall the last time I had a peer review while working with a modding team, for instance. Bottom line: the processes and working environments for hobbyists and employed developers with a paid product are not comparable.
As someone who has started with modding and is now seeking professional software development employment, having been trained in all the appropriate business modelling, I still struggle to see the purpose in all this overhead.
Coming from a mathematical background I understand the point of rigorous processes to increase quality, but all I see looking at the data is that the business overhead actively detracts from quality, which is why open source projects with a proper contribution community work so well.
The way I see it is that each layer of modelling and communication you introduce is another barrier that is prone to misinterpretation, and itself takes time and needs to be revised, and when all align the improvement is barely appreciable. You therefore lose a lot of the potential productivity that you could have if you assigned small teams to develop specialised software to targeted audiences, instead of large software that has to work for all audiences.
I even personally think, that companies like mojang benefit from such a huge modding community. These guys out there find stuff, such a company would never find that fast. Also, the ideas such communities can bring to the game should not be disregarded and will also influence the mojang devs in any way a little bit.
Twilight forest gameplay on the background gives me nostalgia
Really enjoyed the video, X.
I belive Mojang also follows Agile and Scrum methodologies. These guidelines might make things a little slower, yet they will give feedback on a more regular basis to the dev team and the vision team. (these are the snapshots and previews mojang shares with us)
There's also a point i think you could've touched more on. You talked about backwards compatibility, but there's also hardware and version compatibility. When Mojang adds a new feature, they will have to add it at least in 2 different programming languages, for Java and Bedrock. Not only that, but they release versions to a lot of different consoles too, which makes it all even more time consuming.
they also try to stay compatible with older pc hardware and older versions of operating systems
Hey there, agile programmer here. Agile and Scrum methodologies are actually designed to significantly INCREASE the speed at which things get developed and to adapt to changing circumstances. I guarantee you that if they switched to waterfall, things would slow down significantly from where they are now (and we wouldn't hear anything from them for many months at a time until something just magically appears and then needs a bunch of fixes).
Also, while you are right about 2 different programming languages being an issues, there are definitely 2 different teams to develop those versions of the game. I think it does lead to some slowdown due to needing to do some back and forth to make sure functionality is similar enough, but the actual development should be made in parallel between the two teams.
@@SILVERF0X13 true, it is meant to increase speed when you put it against waterfall, not when you put it against the kidding community, my bad. for sure meant to increase speed on providing value to the user.
also agree, that the features are developed in parallel, but when you do things twice, a lot more variables can go wrong. it is the same feature, it can be as easy as doing it again... or not
thanks for the response bro :)
@@jannik19191 what older hardware? they literally raised ram and opengl requirements recently AND even if you use a mod to disable the requirement the game still works
they're not even using anything specific to the newer version, probably just don't want to mess with very very old hardware
Fun fact back in the early days of Minecraft someone made a mod that improve the lighting system of Minecraft it was so popular that mojang actually worked with the modder and put it into the base game
They worked with lots of modders already.
I very much agree with most of Mojang's approach to updating the game. It is clear that they are trying to only add content, that doesn't negatively interfere with existing mechanics, unless they specifically want to update those mechanics. Usually this is a great idea (think bees 🐝👍) sometimes the Elytra happens....
HOWEVER the "avoid plagiarism" is a ridiculous idea. There are many mods that specifically aim to add content that SHOULD be in Minecraft and they usually do a great job. Then Mojang either never add it, because "its already a mod" or they add an awful, less developed version of it (The recipe book is a joke)
Finally, modding is not allowed because Mojang is so "awesome and nice", it is allowed because they literally can't legally stop you. (Not that Mojang would want to. It is however important to know, that we are not at their mercy) Don't forget that Mojang used to try and prevent people from monetizing their mods. And, for a long time, they succeeded because people believed them.
I remember this coming up with your discussion about inventory management.
Mojang can only do so much to change the inventory system before it stops being Minecraft. Walking that fine line is tricky. I would personally HATE to see a stack of 64 turning into a stack of 999, but that’s the most common solution I see, so it’s completely reasonable for Mojang to just not act and let the modders do the heavy lifting in that department.
I think if they wanna increase inventory size they should revamp the UI to match
@@dumigamez397 and by revamping the UI is aslo a way to make Minecraft less "Minecraft" to some ppl
@@PhantomShibe I know, It'll be controversial, but it needs to be done
@@dumigamez397 Tbh, Minecraft recent changes are pretty controversial already, another small one shouldn't be a problem.
Just let me open a shulkerbox (or something like it) from inside my inventory.
As a software developer, it's one thing to work on something for fun, and another entirely to get paid to turn up and do it :D Plus unlike modders they're being pushed on deadlines by project managers and higher ups - so they half-ass it and ship it asap...
I find it funny that one of the bug reports you showed was for the /recipes command. I recently submitted a bug report because stone cutters don't respect the doLimitedCrafting gamerule. Whilst they say its intended it would be nice for the gamerule to get a little more love.
Just a small correction, X: it's a "Rube Goldberg" machine, not a "Rude Goldberg". Rube was a cartoonist who designed and drew a lot of these overly complex and whimsical machines to accomplish simple tasks.
i saw antvenoms older video on Minetest, and it kind of opened my eyes on what it takes for modding to happen, and why it can be so unstable
what modloaders like fabric and forge do is akin to ripping to game apart, shoving some code in, and sewing it back together. Minecraft wasn't necessarily designed with mods in mind which is why modded can crash a lot
8:18 - That Tree Branch Mod is something that definitely needs to come to the vanilla game.
I don't agree, the Branches mod kinda makes trees look way to cluttered. Though I'd not be against it if like some leave blocks had a branch design in them, because like leaves are meant to be growing on branches.
it really shouldnt, it doesnt fit at all and ontop of that it uses mixels, something minecraft wouldnt do (they'd use flat sprites instead)
@@Sopsy_Hallow Yeah, plus if anything they would have to update all the tree structures to add branches into them, the trees have been the same for eons.
Besides, I don't think people have been enjoying chopping the bigger variation of the oak tree. I personally don't
as someone who's been playing modded minecraft since 1.5.2, the modded community is huge and they made some crazy stuff that could never be in the game, saying something feels modded usually means it feels like it doesn't belong in the game(even if its completely vanilla). the modded community usually don't want or try to make something that works in vanilla, and even mods like the create that feels very vanilla like wouldn't actually work because it makes redstone almost obsolete. if mojang was developing the game like modders the game would be more like fortnite with tens of IPs that have nothing to do with each other all somehow together, and it would feel like it shouldn't be there. mojang have to think about all the mechanics in the game and make sure none of them become obsolete or unusable, they have to keep the game balanced and make sure its not too complicated for the average player, there is way more thought into each and every update and they have to maintain all of it, unlike modders who can make one update and maintain only that one update. if mojang had a team for every update, and a new team for every new update the game would be easier to develop, but its impossible because they can'y afford this amount of developers, and it would be a nightmare to coordinate everyone together.
as huge as the modded community seems, the truth is it's only a very small fraction of the total number of minecraft players
11:56 "modding is often illegal..." This feels a bit misleading. As long as a mod doesn't infringe on copyright or something similar, it's legal. Even for multiplayer games with servers controlled by the devs and with strict rules (why would you want to mod those anyway?) modding isn't illegal per se, but rather against the rules and can result in a ban. What *is* true is that minecraft is a relatively easy game to mod, and mojang has largely been gracious in not being hostile towards modders or patching out things that support its moddability.
Fun fact: those automated tests can be run in bedrock edition with /gametest commands! It's SUPER cool.
The thing people often forget is that modders usually work for free, and only with their passion.
Developers, however, can't allow themselves this luxury. Every thing changed needs to be approved by higher ups.
HOWEVER, Mojang still has no excuse for their update antics. How long updates take isn't even that much of a problem, but the way updates in general are handled. Constant abandonment of promises is really jarring. This could've been excused if Mojang had better communication on why this happens, yet the only thing we usually get is: "oh, those were just concepts, don't be angry lol".
Also, Java is quite an outdated engine. It is in no way bad, of course, but it is quite old and limited. Also it is worth remembering that Minecraft was originally made by one guy, without much experience, so some technical difficulties are to be expected. That's why the Bedrock edition runs better, and usually gets snapshots first.
@@raven75257 Bedrock edition doesnt really run better actually
@@raven75257 I definitely wouldn't say bedrock gets snapshots more, sure there was the mountains, goats, frogs, and more, but java also has got a lot of snapshots first (warden, deep dark, etc)! If anything, it's about the same rate.
@@bfodoesstuff does it? I heard from few people with bad pcs that it does run better
@@bfodoesstuff have you tried running Bedrock before? It's rendering engine is substantially faster and more optimized. Java's render distance cap WITHOUT mods is around 32 chunks on average... Bedrock's average render distance cap is more than DOUBLE that on the same hardware, offering render distances above 64. (the highest I've seen is 96)
The vast majority of players are not expecting all the wacky and wild mods to be included in the vanilla game. We are mostly just begging for more details in biomes, more variations of passive and hostile mobs, and more generated structures. An End update is desperately needed, too.
You are missing the point here. Also, even if you took the time spent on making some of the more vanilla mods (like Abnormals or Quark), and compared it to Mojangs time, youd see that those take a LONG time as well.
@@thebreadbunny1863 is it abnormalin time
@@elithris ELITHRIS ITS YOU
Hi its me its bonnie
I believe the “plagiarism” argument isn’t that fair. I think the solution is what other companies have done in the past like Valve: hire your mod programmers, and if need be, purchase the copyright to the mod. Then, take the mod, and modify it to be “mojangs way.” Is that a lot of work, yes. But its probably less time consuming than coming up with every idea from scratch, trying to come up with ideas no one has had before.
Mojang SHOULD be more like the Devs at Terraria. Yes the games are very different, but Re-Logic really care about their community.
What's worse is a few of the best modders of yesteryear are now working for Mojang. Can you imagine the atmosphere and immersion of TropiCraft or Aethermod in the vanilla game? And we even got so close with the "Wild" update's hype trailers only to not actually do it.
@@TheTrenchesYT the mangrove swamp was developed on by the tropic raft mod maker, so your point is actually moot.
@@LineOfThy And yet-- look at the mangrove swamp in vanilla and the mangrove swamp in TropiCraft and you will immediately see that the beauty, atmosphere, and variety of the original did not translate into the static world of vanilla MC.
mojang cares about the community (1.21 example and ik that your comment was made before all that)
Love the info X. One of my favorite, FAVORITE mods is Mekanism. I love how he added a ton of craftable items and energy sources to it. McJty also makes really good mods. i do miss the Prefab for 1.19.2 though. I myself would like to make a mod of my own.
You could *almost* believe this, if not for the many, many hack-fixes by Mojang, for bugs, that were already long patched in Carpet mod, they were provided with the fix by the community, and *still* got it wrong.
Let's face it: the Mojang devs are just not as good programmers as some modders. I'd say they are pretty average as programmers go. The SciCraft guys could probably fix most of the long standing bugs in a few weeks (they actually do that in the Carpet mod for the worst ones)
They also have an inexplicable goal of adding as *few* items and mobs to the vanilla game as possible. Adding a new decorative block is literally the easiest things to do, some mods add hundreds of them. And yet things, like concrete slabs and stairs are still not in the game, simply because Mojang doesn't want to add too many new blocks into the game. Maybe Vanilla players will get them in 2030 or 2040...
So you ignore the part where mods are not the same as Mojhang's work and just make your own false conclusion? ok
@@rompevuevitos222 But you see, it *is* 90% the same process.
For example: mod developers too, have to make sure to remain compatible with the base game, just like Mojang does it with older versions. And fixing a bug in the code is the same as well. The only difference is that instead of just _changing_ the file, and recompiling Minecraft, a mod developer needs to use a modding framework (Forge or Fabric) to add his changes to the code - bascially its just an extra step after what a Mojang dev would need to do.
Mojang *does* some things, most modders don't. Reworking how water works, changing the terrain generation, adding chunk blending. These are things modders don't need to do. So I don't claim to know how long those should take.
But for "normal" content the process is basically the same as modding, and it is _shocking_ how slow they are at that. It is even more striking when you compare what game updates/DLC usually contain for other games. (whole new maps, a dozen more skins and models, new heroes, new unique skills, etc.) Mojang is not a small company, and some games can do a whole lot more with similarly sized teams.
The Carpet mod is a pretty funny example to use in this comment especially since its developer has been a Mojang dev for a good while now
@@ari-mariberry Yes, although he was hired less then a year ago, and 1.19 is basically the first update where he's involved - and that was a disaster for a whole another reason.
Still, its good new that he's there, and can help Mojang utilize the power of the hivemind to fix some long standing bugs.
This comment is loaded with unbacked assumptions. Source?
My take is that not only do mods never end up becoming features that cannot be disabled, but modmakers for java don't have to communicate with a bedrock team and try to get it to work on not only java but c++ as well.
Also, if bad features were to end up being released, the game itself could suffer as players' enjoyment is impacted (as seen from Beta 1.8, 1.9, 1.19.1 and the likes)
I think another point to bring up is interface differences between devices and accessibility for all people to be considered by Mojang
The stock people footage felt wrong.
Mojang should add an fps system and ways you can increase your fps even more instead of having to use lunar and other clients just to boost fps because the performance and fps on default minecraft is crazy, its funny how on lunar client I could get from 100 - 300 fps but on default mc I get barely above 60 fps
Exactly I don't see why Xsuma is d1ck riding Mojang so hard.
you get 60fps? that's amazing!
It’s fine that updates take a long time, but they should include more features with what they are adding. Nothing too crazy as you said that may make some people made at the addition, but just a richer variety. One example is the crimson forest. No new mobs for it, and only type of plant. I would have loved to see some unique mob for it, perhaps one that I could design and enclosure for in my base or be surprised when seeing it. As well as the warped forest, no new mobs or unique mobs for it either. Something small could’ve easily done the job and make it feel more alien and really get you into the atmosphere of the place.
For real, I also didn't expect to get new biomes as shallow and lackluster as the ones that came out under Notch.
Every time I watch one of Xisuma's videos about these sorts of things it always brings a smile to my face and renews my hope for humanity. He's so chill, understanding, and slow to anger. And often pays attention to both sides of an argument. It's an example we should all try to follow.
My biggest complaint isn’t the content itself but the quality of the content and the many many many bugs that they fail to stamp out.
I'm still waiting for the minecarts to be fixed since- 2017...
( For reference, bug MC-101713. )
I'm amazed people don't notice it. Even when i notice it in YT videos...
10:12 I actually don’t believe this is completely true, I enjoy game development as a hobby and most smart game developers segment out systems and turn systems into mechanics, I doubt they are creating systems entirely from scratch, they have essentially an engine, they are doing the same thing mod developers are doing just with official content, they do very similar things to modders, creating custom models, custom ai, and custom attacks, but it’s certainly not from scratch, it’s more just taking premade clay and shaping the clay, maybe even painting your clay then baking it to get a final product. The only major difference is that mojang has direct control over the main source code, while modders get control over the tools and systems given by mod api’s like fabric or forge.
11:35 this is like what we do at my job at IBM. We have these automated test cases that our github PRs go through in order to make sure the code changes aren't breaking anything drastic. It creates a simulated environment on its own server and runs through the tests on the branch and let's us know if there is an issue or not. That's very cool that mojang has this internally of the game as well
I think you missed a major point.
Mojang showcased features and didn’t even add them.
And they still took a long time.
If you ask me, it’s time for Mojang to get good management.
Maybe then they’ll figure out how awful chat reporting is.
Yes, they wheren't added for design choices. The birch forest was never promised for this update btw
yeah the chat reporting is awful, it's much better to just allow people to insult and harass others non-stop
They spend half their time researching about animals and stuff idk maybe so they can make sure they don't add features that could portray a bad behavior to ten year olds that probably know better than to feed thousands of fireflies to a pet frog.
Better teach the kids about enslavement of humans and animals.
Excellent video! I really liked the way you used popular mods as background footage, but the real-life video sequences just felt kinda wrong to me. Maybe have them be still footage for future videos like these? On a completely different note, do any programmers out there know if it would be possible/feasible to port Minecraft Java to C#? I know the two languages are very quite similar, but I’m guessing it would still take ages. Fully hypothetical question, I could not do that, I just thought it to be interesting.
I wish microsoft/mojang would STOP releasing updates FOREVER. That way the mod community could focus on a single version.