MINECON Earth – Java Team Panel

Welcome to the 2017 Java Edition Panel with questions from the community. First up is, “Can we expect more slabs?” Eric, what do you say? I say no. You cannot expect more slabs. Not now, not ever. No. Wow. That harsh, Eric. What’s that? Oh, never mind. Just keep on rolling here.

“Can we get more wooden pressure plates?” Yeah, that’s definitely possible. On 1.13, we have the ability to add more, so I think we will do that. “Will we ever get different types of wooden trap doors?” Yes. You get those as well. And aren’t they looking beautiful?

-Oh, yeah. They truly are pretty. -Yeah, absolutely. I like them so much. Great. So we have pressure plates and we have trap doors. We also have buttons, right? -Yup. You would get those as well. -All right. So we’ll have different trap doors, buttons, and pressure plates.

Yeah, so people can go wild with making whatever build they want to make. Wow, great news. “What gave you guys the idea to change textures in a future “Minecraft” update? Will we still be able to download and use the old textures?” Agnes?

Yes, we wanted to have a uniform style as if the textures- -were all from the same game. But, yes, you will be able to use the old textures as well. Wow. That’s great news, then. “So when will these textures be released? Can I get them in 1.13? Will they be in 1.14?”

No, they will be in a stand-alone release actually. So the plan is that while we are testing the new textures, you can download them in our resource pack. And then when we are happy about the feedback, we will release them. And then the old textures will be available in the resource pack.

Okay, great. So I can download them? Where I can get them from when we let them out to the public? -Minecraft.net. -Nice. I want to go back here, Eric. So you mentioned– Can we get more slabs? -All right. So we’re getting more slabs. -Yeah. Yes, you’re getting more slabs.

Thanks. Thanks. I really wanted more slabs. Okay. Next top question. “Vertical slabs?” No. We feel like vertical slabs don’t really fit in the current vision that we have for the game. But we’re not completely closed to the idea of having them in the future.

But right now, with the direction that we’re trying to make the game, we feel like there’s maybe not a place for them. So it’s a possibility in the future, but right now, it’s probably a no. “Will there be new stuff in the underground like underground biomes and features and such in the future?”

Prof, what do you think? We have been working for quite a while now in trying to modify the World Gen so we can actually include new content more easily. And– So that’s actually one of the thing we looked at to be able to add more things in caves,

More things above ground in the various dimensions. And so, yes, at some point, eventually, we will have more content underground and possibly underground biomes. That sounds fantastic. So with your new World Generation that you’ve been developing, we can see new stuff coming in.

-It will allow us to do more stuff. -Yeah, in the near future. Great. So we’ll see more features and hopefully biomes then. Then we have another one that was a fairly popular question. “What was the reason for developing Endermites and adding them into the game?” Nathan?

There’s a long story behind that one. It’s been forgotten through the ages. They were added back when we wanted to– We knew they’ll be wanted to flush out the end dimension because there was only a boss and that was it.

But we had no concrete ideas on how we we’re going to do that back then. So what we thought would might be fun is to play on the teleportation mechanic That was the key point of Enderman. Whenever they’re teleporting, they’re going through this extra dimension

That has all this bad stuff in it such as Endermites. And whenever they teleport, they leave some of this bad stuff behind. That was the initial idea. It didn’t really come to fruition like that. So we went to a different direction in the end.

They’re still kind of there, but they won’t be up anytime soon. That’s interesting, though. So they’re from an in-between place. Yes. But they’re there and they’re cute. Pretty fun. You can use them for various things. Farms, for instance. So the next up question is, “Will there be a new boss?” Maria?

Yeah. We don’t have any plans for adding a new boss at this moment. We are focusing on fleshing out the game, making it more interesting for all the players. But in the future, yeah, probably we’ll add more bosses. Wow. So future-wise, we’ll get new bosses.

But right now, we’re just working on expanding what we already have. -Yes. -All right. “Will we add controller support to the Java edition?” Not in the near future. Update to the LWJGL version 3 enables us to do that if we can in the future.

But before we actually do that, we need to redesign the UI system because it’s not designed with controller support in mind. -Okay. But it’s possibile to do it. -Exactly. All right. So first, we need like this. A small little revamp of the UI, then we can get controller support.

At least we have the possibilities. So that’s great news. “Will Bedrock-exclusive features like the Book and Quill UI and the armour stands also be added to the Java edition?” We are walking toward getting all edition as soon as possible. But we are also trying to decide

Which features are good for the Java edition. So we will have to look at every feature before we include it. So right now I’m not exactly sure for the specific ones. -So eventually, we’ll have new features. -Yes, totally. Do we have any timeline? Will the next update-

Have any new better or exclusive features? Right now, there is no fixed timeline. So they might pop up in any update. Okay, so we’ll be looking forward to those things. “Will you implement fixes to bugs suggested by players if they’re verified by a Mojira moderator

So we can increase the bug fixing rate?” Maria? Yes. I had to say thank you for all the nice bug reports that we get. And they do help a lot. And the specific cases where we get suggested a fix, it’s very helpful for pointing us in the right direction

For finding exactly where the issue is. But most of the time, we have to look at the bigger picture and do a fix that affects bigger parts than just the one-liners that we get. Most of the time, we need to look at the root issue of the actual bug

In order to be able to fix it. But the fixes we get provided usually points us in the right direction. So they still want to keep the fixes coming in, I guess. -Yeah, definitely. Keep them coming. -Great. Okay. Next question up is more of a broad one and it’s,

“What was the hardest feature to get into the Java edition?” Maria? Yes. Actually, it’s maybe one of the most not-so-visible ones. I noticed this that you couldn’t put torches on the back of stairs, and I wanted to fix this. But to make this possible,

I had to actually change every block in the game. And it resulted in a lot of bugs coming with it. But now it works. You can have torches on backs of stairs. I use it a lot. It looks a lot nicer. That’s for that, Maria.

Okay. So, Prof, which one was the hardest feature for you to implement? I think it would have been… …path finding when I started looking at it. We needed it for bug fixing, and I ended up basically having to rewrite a large portion on how monsters determine where they are going.

But I was really happy with them because now they look the way they are trying to go to the player looks way smarter than they used to be. Yeah. Skeletons are quite difficult currently. Thanks for that. Then we have Fry our newest developer here. So you haven’t developed too many features, have you?

No, none so far. So my answer is none. Your answer is none, but we have the LWJGL3 now. It’s not a feature per se, but it does improve the quality of life for us developers. I think so, yes. Eric, what was the hardest feature for you to get into the Java edition?

The hardest feature I’ve added is… …is the barrier block. It’s definitely hard. What’s the difficult part about it? -Well, it’s just hard. -Oh, it’s literal hard. Thank you for that, Eric. Great answer. So, Nathan, what do you think was the hardest feature to get in?

I feel it’s very hard to nail that down to any specific feature. I think I usually have a history of putting way too much work into a small thing that nobody will notice. So I will spend like a day’s worth of effort putting in

Just like a tiny little feature on top of something else. -Do you have an example? -The one that took the most time, because I think it’s not fixed yet, is the teleportation with portals. If you enter on the left side, you should come out of the left side.

Nobody will notice this, but I’ve put years into this. I never noticed that, I’m sorry. I never noticed that one. I will think about them next time. Thank you. So, Agnes? What do you say? Maybe when I did the llama spit thing because I had to test it

And it was really heartbreaking to see the llamas kill each other with spitting especially the baby llamas. It’s hard. Like, heartbreaking. So it’s heartbreaking, I see. -Of course. It broke my heart. -Okay, great. We have another question also in a kind of broad in that sense.

“What percentage of your time is spent making new features compared to fixing bugs and other tasks? What’s the most fun thing about your job?” Prof? It really depends. Right after we release, usually we are trying to fix also bugs which I botted for the new version.

So that’s a time where most of the time is spent doing bug fixing for the feature we had produced or the changes we did to the game. After that it gets a bit calmer so we can do a feature or doing a bit more back end.

And that’s the point where actually we produce new things for the game. So I can’t really tell you how long for each because it depends how broken the release is. Hopefully, it’s not. And the most fun part will be actually the prototyping of new features. You just do whatever you want.

When you start working on the feature, you do like– You go through iteration really fast. And you get something looking nice relatively fast. After that, you have to put it back into the game in properly. Yeah, we’ve seen some crazy prototypes every now and then. So I can guess that’s fun.

Maria, what would be the most fun part of your job and what time do you spend, like, bugs versus features? The most fun part I think is when you’re doing the prototyping and you got into a stage where you’re trying to, for example,

Make a mob not just do what exactly what it’s going to do but add some quirkiness to it as well. That’s really fun. All right. Do you have an example of that? -Well, like the parrots I made. -Yeah? When I started out they started to feel like just another mob flying around.

But then I add some more annoying features. Like they have a tendency to make the same noise as mobs nearby. But they can also, all of a sudden, just make a noise random. Oh, yeah, so they can be like the jump scare almost.

Yeah. So I added that as a quirky personality thing or a troll thing. That’s a nice thing to have, though. It makes the mob feel more alive. Yeah. And for making new features and bugs percentage, I’ve been working here for a year now, and it feels like it’s almost fifty-fifty.

Because even during the prototyping and making new features, you have to look at what you’re doing and fix the issues that come up as well. So you fix things as you go. -So that makes it fifty-fifty for you. -Yeah. Yeah. Great answer. Fry? How much time will you spend

With new features versus bugs, And what’s the most fun thing so far? Well, for me, I think the most fun thing will be when I get the chance to use some new technology to implement some new algorithms that back inside of things. Not the front and center things, I will say.

And as for features versus bugs fixing, it’s hard for me to say now because I’m new here. I don’t know how it will be in the future. Would your estimate be like what Maria’s and Prof’s? A fifty-fifty one? I think fifty-fifty is a fair estimate.

Especially if you just keep on going and just fixing things as you go. -That sounds so right. Yeah. -Yeah. Right. I most make new features in the background. So you usually don’t see them. There’s only a few that you have seen. -Try breeding different-coloured sheep. -Or the barrier block.

So most of my time goes to the back end work and making sure it’s easier to add new features. Same with 1.13. And I think I spend more than 80 percent of my time with that. And the rest goes to bug fixing. All the stuff I break. So you spend time fixing things.

It’s not features per se but also fixing things and bugs loop in– Yeah, I’m more in making the background systems. Okay. So, what will be the most fun part about your job? -That part. -That’s the best part. -Yes, I like 80 percent of my job. -Everything is broken and I love it.

Great. Nathan, what would you say? Bugs versus features? How much time do you spend? It changes. It really changes from time to time. In-between snap shots it’s like almost 100 percent features. And then as the snapshots get on, it’s 90 percent bugs and, “No!”

So it really does vary. But I think on a typical work day, it’s probably like 60 percent bug fixing and then 40 percent making something better or features. That kind of makes sense, I’d say. So, what’s the most fun part about your job?

Most fun for me is whenever I’ve made a new feature and seeing someone else play with that feature. I think that just looks– It feels very good to see other people having fun with something you made. So do you watch streams of people using the features that you made?

Yeah, I’m usually signed out, so people don’t notice. But I’m watching those stuff. I mean, it’s a lot fun. I also think it’s really cool to see “Minecraft” things in general out there. Agnes, then, what do you say? Bugs versus features? Yeah. It’s similar to Nathan, actually.

It depends on the period. Sometimes it’s 100 percent fixing bugs. But then sometimes, we’ll do a lot of features. So if you sum it up, maybe it’s nearly fifty-fifty actually. And the most fun part? I mean, it’s really, really fun to come up with ideas for features and testing new things.

Yeah, I can imagine just fooling around with things. Just finding the things that will fit and prototyping. It’s very fun. Great answers. Thanks, everyone.