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What is it?
A mod for Minecraft survival mode which makes the early game harder and slower, while improving on the simulation of real-world ancient technology development.

Who and why
This mod has been created by a two-person team. Both of us love Minecraft and games (both digital and otherwise) in general. While we appreciate Minecraft, we felt that we had ‘played it out’ unless things were changed up a bit. We began by looking at what things we loved and wouldn’t change for the world, and what things could be better. One of us is a zealous abstractor (the one who does the magic coding stuff), the other is a die-hard simulator (the one who gets fussy about what is realistic). Getting the balance between these has made for some salty exchanges, some heated arguments, and quite a bit of laughing.

In what way?
Geomastery is all about survival mode. If you enjoy unlimited sandbox building, you will play in creative mode. We are making survival mode harder and more involved and our general impulse has been to slow down the rate of technological progress in the game. When you’ve been playing Minecraft for a while, you can survive, make a safe home and be mining diamonds within about twenty minutes. We thought it was a shame to skip over all that stuff so briefly, and that slowing down progress would give a new game experience. We wanted a nice slow upward spiral of technology. The only way to slow development but keep things intuitive is to make a slightly closer simulation of real-world technological progress. Don’t get me wrong – we’re firmly in a fantasy world here! But all the best fantasies are grounded in some kind of reality. With that in mind, we chose areas that we thought could be developed, and those we wouldn’t mess with....

If you want to play the mod without any further spoilers, stop reading now! The next section gives some hints to whet your appetite but does not give any major advice about exactly how to play.

Things we don’t plan to mess with:

 * A world made of blocks!
 * Graphics.
 * Biomes.

Things we are definitely messing with:

 * Creating the world. Although all the familiar biomes still exist in Geomastery, some of their qualities are slightly different. New kinds of blocks generate alongside old favourites. Each has its uses.
 * Subsistence. You arrive in an empty landscape, with no food. It should be scary - you need to eat! In Geomastery, food and eating are more complex and at first, you may be feel pretty hungry. Or worse.
 * Temperature. In the real world, some places are dangerously cold, others dangerously hot. In Geomastery, you can use your environment as a difficulty setting. To begin with, spawn somewhere nice and mild. When you are ready for a challenge, spawn in the arctic. Or the desert. Wherever you spawn, be ready for harsh climates if you intend to travel.
 * Making stuff. Technological progress is now slow and cumulative. In Geomastery, you will need to concentrate on the basics at first but in time, you will wield impressive labour-saving tools.
 * Animals and monsters. As yet, we have made only minor changes to the way these work, but see ‘Things we are yet to mess with’ below.
 * Digging, carrying and building. For good simulation, we knew that we either had to slow the rate of digging (which would be annoying) or limit the rate of placing blocks (which would be even more annoying) or limit what could be carried. We went with this, and in Geomastery, you will find yourself shockingly limited in what you can carry. But the right tools and implements will come to your aid – in time.
 * Building. Although the great strength of Minecraft is in its ‘building block’ style and versatility, we wanted to ground this in more realism. If you have not chosen to play in creative mode, then you want an ongoing challenge. In Geomastery, you will need to think and plan a bit more before you build something you can be proud of.

Things we are yet to mess with:

 * Trees and forests. We are currently working on a major update to the way wood, trees and forests look and work. Forests are central to the way the Minecraft world looks and feels. Wood is a versatile resource and in Geomastery the right technology must be employed to take advantage of it.
 * Animals and monsters. Plans are under way to radically overhaul these. You will need to look after yourself and your livestock a bit more carefully in future.
 * Magic. This is still at a conceptual stage but we envisage a complete re-imagining of all things magical.

For an explicit breakdown of significant changes from vanilla, use these links

 * The inventory is different, with a changeable size and new special equipment slots.
 * There are now three hunger types which are drained and refilled independently.
 * There is a new temperature factor which can cause damage based on the environment.
 * Building is more difficult, with more specific and adaptive types of building block.
 * There are many different crafting and furnace devices, with new recipes.
 * There are several types of bed, some with limited durability, and sleeping drains hunger while restoring health.
 * Animals drop carcasses which must be butchered to obtain items.
 * Movement speed is variable based on equipped and held items.
 * There are different materials and types of apparel, tools and weapons.
 * Food items decay and rot over time.
 * There are several new types of crop.