The Nether



The Nether (also known as "the Nexus" in Notch's blog, and previously, Hell or the Slip) is a hell-like dimension, filled with fire, lakes and rivers of lava, and dangerous and powerful mobs.

Accessing


To access the Nether, the Player must construct a Nether portal in the Overworld (Nether portals created in the End will not activate). To create the portal, one must first construct an obsidian frame, ranging in size from 4x5 at minimum to 23x23 at maximum. Once the frame is constructed, it can then be activated by placing fire within the frame. When the portal has been activated, it will emit a purple mist.

An activated portal will allow any entity (which is not riding or being ridden by another entity) to be transported to a corresponding portal in the Nether. A new portal will be created in the Nether if necessary. The portal can be destroyed by breaking the obsidian frame, by a nearby explosion, or by placing water or lava into it with a bucket or dispenser.

Environment
Nether terrain is largely composed of netherrack that forms complex platforms and niches, with lava oceans, "lavafalls", and rivers of lava being frequent. Lava sources hidden in the netherrack are also common, making large mining projects dangerous. Random fires across the netherrack are yet another hazard to the unwary player. The Nether is horizontally infinite.

Bedrock comprises the top and bottom 4 layers in a rough pattern (in the console edition, it can also be found at the sides of the Nether, as world sizes are limited to 862x862). Glowstone clusters hang from ceilings, and mushrooms grow abundantly on the ground. There are patches of floating gravel and soul sand. Small caves form in the netherrack, which contain random nether quartz deposits.

Nether fortresses, the Nether's only naturally occurring structures, provide valuable loot, and are the only places where blazes and wither skeletons will naturally spawn. Nether fortresses are also the only place where nether wart naturally generates (in the console edition, nether wart will naturally generate anywhere on soul sand).

The Nether has no day-night cycle and no weather. The only natural sources of light are fire, lava, portals, and glowstone. A dim ambient light can be seen throughout the Nether, and is what light level 0 looks like. Light otherwise functions exactly the same as it does in the Overworld and the End.

If the player dies in the Nether, they will respawn in the Overworld; any surviving inventory items will remain in the Nether.

Locations in the Nether correlate to Overworld coordinates, but horizontal Overworld distances are scaled down by a ratio of 8:1 for travel in the Nether. Therefore, traveling one block in the Nether means traveling eight blocks in the Overworld.



Most items and blocks in the Nether function the same as they do in the Overworld, with a few notable exceptions:


 * Beds will explode and cause fires when a player attempts to sleep in one.
 * The explosion is larger than that of TNT.
 * There is no way to place liquid water in the Nether in a Survival game without cheats, besides the usage of a cauldron.
 * Using water buckets will produce steam and an empty bucket.
 * Ice that is melted or smashed in the Nether will also not produce water.
 * Lava flows twice as far (8 blocks) and much faster in the Nether than in the Overworld.
 * Grass blocks and leaves take a dead-looking brownish color, since the Nether is considered a warm biome.
 * Maps will only generate a brown-gray static pattern.
 * The player's direction indicator will spin randomly, although its location is still relative to the players location in the Nether.
 * Compasses are unable to find the original spawn point, as it cannot be set to a single point within the Nether.
 * Clocks are unable to determine the position of the Sun and Moon.
 * Building snow golems is essentially useless, as they will rapidly take fire damage and die, due to the Nether being a warm biome.

Mobs
The Nether is home to its own share of mobs, most of which are completely fire-proof and immune to lava. Skeletons and chickens are the only Overworld mobs that can naturally spawn in the Nether; wither skeletons have a small chance of spawning as a regular skeleton instead, and baby zombie pigmen can spawn as chicken jockeys. Other Overworld mobs like cows and creepers do not naturally spawn in the Nether, but they can wander or be shoved through a portal.

Naturally generated
Naturally generated blocks includes those that are created through the world seed.

Naturally created
Naturally created blocks are created through a combination of events that lead these blocks to be placed by natural causes, not by the player.

Structures
These blocks are generated as part of nether fortresses, but only when the "generated structures" option is on.

Technical information
The Nether is saved in the same way normal worlds are, in the following locations by default:

Windows:

Mac:

''Note: This Library folder is not the one in Macintosh HD, but the one inside your home folder. The only way to access this is to go to the Go menu, and select Go To..., and type ~/Library.''

Linux:

On all systems, be sure to replace "worldname" with the name of your world.

Note that DIM-1 does not contain its own level.dat; the level.dat in the parent folder is used for all dimensions. This means that even if a player changes the level data in the /world folder for a particular save, Nether portals will still take the player to the Nether world originally generated for that save and vice versa.

Deleting the DIM-1 file will reset the Nether, and all man-made buildings will be deleted.

Trivia

 * The idea for the Nether came from a transportation method used in the novel series The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan. Within this transportation system, the Ways, people could travel a massive amount of distance in a few days instead of weeks. Like the Nether, the Ways has many dangers. Notch also once said that Jake, his co-worker, was a big key to the Nether. It isn't clear exactly what that means.
 * One of the level themes in Indev was Hell. It was a normal map, but with a lava ocean, perpetually dim lighting, and a black sky with dull red clouds.
 * Upon entering the Nether in singleplayer, the Overworld will essentially freeze, and resume when the player returns. This is due to chunks loading and unloading.
 * Pressing in the Nether will display the biome as "Hell".
 * In the Console Edition, everything in the Nether is renewable due to the fact the Nether can be restarted infinitely.
 * It is possible to complete the game (access the End and defeat the ender dragon) without ever entering the Nether.
 * The numbers for the 3 dimensions are: -1=The Nether, 0=The Overworld, 1=The End. This implies that the Nether is the next dimension over from the Overworld in the "down" direction and The End is the next dimension over in the "up" direction.
 * The Nether — an endless cave filled with masses of air — appears to be an inversion of the End, an endless sky with a central mass of end stone.