Minecraft Earth

Minecraft Earth is a free-to-play (AR) mobile game developed by Mojang Studios and published by  for, , and. The game is about building structures and collecting materials by traveling to real-life locations. Minecraft Earth was released in closed beta on July 16, 2019, and gradually expanded its available countries over the rest of 2019, being released worldwide on December 11, 2019. The game received its final update, 0.33.0, on January 5, 2021, and will be discontinued on June 30, 2021, due to the effect of coronavirus-related restrictions on outdoor activities.

Design
Minecraft Earth is an adaptation of the traditional Minecraft experience to an augmented-reality setting, similarly to Ingress and Pokémon Go. The game itself was built on the Bedrock engine. It features many unique gameplay aspects and interactions similar to the main game.

Minecraft Earth requires an Xbox Live account.

The game uses Microsoft Azure Spatial Anchors along with OpenStreetMap to power location-based gameplay. This technology syncs the position of buildplates in multi-player by referencing objects in the real world, creating a seamless experience.

It was announced that the Nether and the End were planned for Minecraft Earth in a future update, but these plans were scrapped due to the game being discontinued on June 30, 2021.

Gameplay


In Minecraft Earth, players can build structures with other players and "place them in the real world at life-size".

In the map view, players can see their character, which can be changed with skins owned from the marketplace or generated using the Character Creator. Scattered around the maps are tappables. If a tappable is within a player's collection range, the player can tap it and collect items. There are multiple types of tappables, including stone, grass, pond, chests, and mobs.

Adventures
Adventures appear on the map but can also be spawned in using Adventure Crystals. Adventures are the survival aspect of Minecraft Earth. Players can fight mobs, collect additional resources that are unavailable with tappables, and collect rewards. Adventures can be played only in life-size mode.

Buildplates
Buildplates are worlds that players can use to build on. They can be shared remotely for viewing, and worked on by invited players in the same location.

Buildplates can be 8×8, 16×16 or 32×32 blocks in size, and their build height limit is 221 blocks. From ground level, a buildplate also extends downward in varying depth, depending on the buildplate. The minimum depth before bedrock appears after digging down is 3 blocks and the buildplate with the maximum recorded depth is 12 blocks

Using the shop, players can buy new plots using rubies. Plots can also be earned via a leveling system.

Buildplates function like personal realms and can be used anywhere. They run in the Bedrock Engine, meaning redstone, physics, and other mechanics are identical to Bedrock Edition. Players may invite friends to build with them locally and then share the world to others via a link.

A player can interact with a buildplate in miniature and life-size modes. In miniature mode, the buildplate functions the same as creative mode in Minecraft, allowing the player to build structures and populate the buildplate with mobs. In life-size mode, the buildplate functions the same as survival mode, in which the player must use tools to interact with blocks, hostile mobs on the buildplate attack the player, and the player can lose health and life.

A planned feature for buildplates that was announced but never implemented was the ability to pin buildplates on the map for other players to view publicly.

Buildplates can also be shared via a link, so players don't need to be in the same location as the creator to see creations. The links shared can be temporary or never expiring. Mojang Studios claims to have a 24/7 moderation team, reviewing and looking at reports of inappropriate builds.

Minecraft Earth adventures have their own buildplates, with predefined above-ground and underground structures and hostile mobs. Like user buildplates, an adventure plate must be placed somewhere on the ground before interacting with it. Adventure buildplates cannot be saved or moved by a player although multiple players can interact with the same adventure at the same time.

Gameplay differences from regular Minecraft
Minecraft Earth offers somewhat different mechanics to players more familiar with Java or Bedrock editions of Minecraft. These differences include:


 * The game is basically two-dimensional; that is, while one can build upward and dig downward, a player cannot climb or descend unless a real-world structure is available for climbing and descending.
 * There is no daylight cycle. Buildplates and adventures always have the same lighting regardless of the real-world time of day. Some buildplates may be available with night illumination.
 * Inventory:
 * Inventory is effectively unlimited, both in inventory slots and the stack size of items or blocks.
 * There is no inventory crafting grid, and no way to repair damaged items by combining them.
 * There are no armor slots in the inventory.
 * Mobs can be collected, and achievements earned for collecting them. Occasionally a tappable drops a hostile mob that can be collected and placed on a buildplate.
 * Inventory is unaffected by death, as it is inaccessible during adventures. Only items in the hotbar and backpack (the items collected during an adventure), are lost.
 * Crafting:
 * Both crafting and smelting take time, sometimes several minutes (or even hours) depending on the item. Like smelting in regular Minecraft, the player can exit the crafting or smelting interface to do other things while the process completes.
 * Several items cannot be crafted at all, such as chests, crafting tables, armor, villager workstations, fishing rods, and anything related to enchantments or potions (anvils, enchanting tables, brewing stands, etc.).
 * Tools and melee weapons have infinite range. Ranged weapons can be crafted but are normally not needed.
 * Health and hunger are combined into one health gauge bar. Health is depleted by mob attacks, and restored by eating food.
 * Food cannot be cooked in survival mode (i.e. during an adventure), but must be cooked outside of an adventure. Food can be eaten during an adventure and outside of an adventure.
 * Iron ingots are available only by smelting iron ore, which is rare and never dropped by tappables. Iron ore can be obtained only via mining during an adventure, provided the adventure includes any iron at all, and rarely when killing zombies, similar to Vanilla Minecraft.
 * There is no way to craft or wear armor in the game. A player must use tactics rather than armor for protection. A player can obtain different clothing items but these offer no armor protection.
 * Chests cannot be found as items, crafted, or stored in the player's inventory. They exist only as tappables.
 * Ladders are available for construction but cannot be climbed.
 * Obsidian does not exist and cannot be created. Lava flowing into water forms cobblestone, but lava is unaffected by water flowing onto it.

Other differences:


 * Mini boosts are figurines that are tapped to the device's NFC reader giving temporary boosts to stats in-game, such as better defense or attack strength. Only five can be used at a time and the same boost.
 * Adventure crystals were added for people isolating during the COVID-19 pandemic. Adventure crystals allow a player to experience a small, medium, large or huge adventure without having to go outside, provided the adventure has enough open area. Adventure crystals are a permanent feature and are not going to be removed.

Microtransactions
The game has been confirmed to have full microtransactions. The in game currency is rubies, which is not to be confused with Minecoins.

Rubies can be used to:


 * Purchase buildplates
 * Purchase boosts
 * Purchase second and third slots for crafting and smelting
 * Speed up crafting and smelting tasks

Minecoins are also used as a secondary currency in Minecraft Earth, for purchasing skins and clothing.

In 0.33.0, the final update to Minecraft Earth, all microtransactions have been removed.

Development
During Microsoft Build 2015, Microsoft's HoloLens team unveiled an augmented reality version of Minecraft. On May 6, 2019, Microsoft released a video on, where some features from Minecraft Earth were shown. On May 8, 2019, a trailer was released, showing some AR mods in Minecraft Earth. On Minecraft's 10th anniversary (May 17), Minecraft Earth was officially announced.

iOS and iPadOS
The closed beta for Minecraft Earth was launched for AR-compatible devices running iOS and iPadOS in the cities listed below.

Android
The closed beta for Minecraft Earth was launched for AR-compatible devices running Android in the same five cities the iOS closed beta was launched in.

Early access
The early access of Minecraft Earth was launched for everyone to download in the and  in the countries listed below.

Discontinuation
On January 5, 2021, Mojang Studios released the final update to Minecraft Earth, 0.33.0, and announced that the game's servers would be taken offline after June 30, 2021, after which the game would no longer be available to play even for users who keep the app installed. It would also be taken off the iOS App Store and Google Play Store.

System requirements
According to the FAQ page: