I had always dreamed of having my own house and when I saw this post from @neoxiancity's weekly paper and read about the minetest server, I had to try it.
I have played minetest Minecraft in the past and minetest has the same vibe. All my good memories of playing that in the past came rushing to me. Then, I decided to join and explore this buzzing minetest city.
When you join you get spawned in this area. (I went back to take the screenshot)
And you are on your own. The basics are punching trees, making some basic tools like an axe to chop trees, a pickaxe to mine stones and other precious resources etc.
I explored the city first and saw some shiny buildings and houses. Lots of development is going around this area. I also wanted to settle around here. But first I had to explore more.
So, I made some stone tools and ventured into the unknown. Little did I know that there are many monsters you will encounter in the dark. I was familiar with the monsters in the standard version of Minecraft and they were fairly basic and easy to get through.
But, the minetest world is full of dangers. I saw many monsters...trying to take my life and send me back to the spawn point. I died a few times (okay, much more than a few times...lol), and these monsters are scary. Everything wants you dead in the dark. This one time I was chased by a dead tree trunk. Damm that was so scary on my first day here.
The first few nights were very scary, I was still learning the game while trying to figure out where should I settle down. I sailed over a vast ocean and found a jungle with open green plains nearby. I decided to settle there but a monster ruined my plans and killed me. I was so far away, I never went back to collect my stuff. I will go back there soon.
I eventually decided to build closer to everyone's house and most of the houses were fairly close to the spawn area. I had an idea, to go to a tall mountain and live there. Well, I went in search of that place and found a nearby mountain. It was not an easy climb. I chopped down some trees, made a few stacks of stairs and climbed. It was not easy but I finally had a place that I liked.
Now the real work started, gathering resources for my new house was not easy. I reached a mining entrance and went down the stairs. I started to dig deeper for gold and diamonds.
After a few days of hard work, I found diamonds and other valuable resources. I could now create some travel boxes to fast travel around the map. Upgraded my tools and now they mine faster and deal more damage to the monsters.
I collected loads of sand from a nearby beach and smelted all that to make glass. Later I found out you can make glowing glass by adding some torches. So, I decided to make those instead. Went back into the mine and Xabi and Val also joined me in that session.
We explored deep underground caves. Killed a few monsters while also getting one shot deaths, it was a fun mining experience. And to add to the chaos I fell into a 200 blocks-deep hole. It was a mess but we managed to climb down the hole by using ladders.
I came back and started working on my house. First I had to terraform the land. I made the base bigger and then started working on my house design. It took me hours to decide on a design.
This looked way cooler in my imagination...haha. But I will add another storey to the house later on and add more decorations and possibly more. I have a few ideas.
Lots of work is to be done on the interior and lightning. But I can call it home at least. I was living out in the open for days.
I had to create a farm as well for my food needs and the farm needs water but I was way up over the clouds (literally). I had to bring a few buckets of water and made some water channels under my crops. I did a great job of hiding that so it looks more natural.
I have a big enough farm for now. I have grown some wheat and cotton. I will look at what other things I can grow here. I suspect there will be a dozen of things to plant and harvest in this game. Still learning about the game.
This was my journey starting in this new city. I missed the part where there are daily giveaways from minetesters and they are fun and challenging. One of the giveaways running now is finding a book hidden on Xabi's Island. Can you find it?
I tried but didn't find it. Maybe you can... come, join us and start your adventure here. I can even teach you some basic stuff and we will go on adventures, play games, mine super rare resources or fight deadly monsters. There are so many things to do here.
I wish more people get to know about this amazing game and city.
Thanks for reading...