Minecraft Modding For Kids For Dummies
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Modding Minecraft allows players to make large interactive modifications to their Minecraft worlds with a simple click of a button. Although you can build infinite mods, this book focuses on creating Minigames within Minecraft, where players can compete in single-player and multi-player mode. Designing and coding the Minigames requires coding, but with the help of LearnToMod, you can create your own Minigame to play with friends!

Learning basic coding skills to mod Minecraft

To mod Minecraft, you have to write code. Luckily, the LearnToMod Software walks you through that! One of the first things that you should learn is how to make drones in Minecraft and use them to build structures.

Drones are invisible robots that can move and place blocks of certain types, or even spawn entities (like Creepers)!

For example, this code:

  1. Creates a Drone and names it d.

  2. Tells d to place a Brick block in Minecraft.

    The code you use tells your drone what to do.

    The code you use tells your drone what to do.

Since Minecraft always starts with the function named ‘main,’ what you will see when you run this mod in Minecraft is this:

You can do cool stuff with your code.

You can do cool stuff with your code.

You can also move drones. For example, if you wanted to make a row of bricks, you could do this:

Make your drones do your bidding.

Make your drones do your bidding.

Designing your Minecraft minigame

Before writing all the code to make a Minecraft Minigame, you need to design your game. The Gameplay Loop is a simple process that you can follow to make sure your game is fun, challenging, and complete.

The Gameplay Loop has four parts:

  1. Start: Create a basic scene.

  2. Goal: Add a way to win and lose.

  3. Challenges: Make winning more difficult.

  4. Rewards: Make your players want to win.

    The Gameplay Loop.

    The Gameplay Loop.

You iterate (repeat) this loop until you are happy with the game you have. For example, if you were making the game of Spleef, you might do the following:

Iteration 1:

Start: Make an arena:

Where kind of arena will you make for your player?

Where kind of arena will you make for your player?

Goal: Make it so that the player starts in the middle of the arena if they respawn:

Remember to think about what the player will see as a result of your code.

Remember to think about what the player will see as a result of your code.

Iteration 2:

Challenge: Make blocks disappear below the player:

Don’t forget code to make the blocks disappear.

Don’t forget code to make the blocks disappear.

Reward: Congratulate the player on destroying blocks:

Players always appreciate a pat on the back.

Players always appreciate a pat on the back.

Don’t forget to test your Minecraft Minigame often and with friends!

About This Article

This article is from the book:

About the book authors:

Sarah Guthals, Ph.D. is the CTO of ThoughtSTEM and has dedicated her life to coding education.

Stephen Foster, Ph.D. is the CEO of ThoughtSTEM, a company that teaches computer science to kids across America.

Lindsey Handley, Ph.D. is the COO of ThoughtSTEM and has hundreds of hours of experience as a classroom instructor for Minecraft based science and computer science classes.

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