Achievement



"I like achievements. I know a lot of people don't, but I like them. I've had the idea to make achievements kind of like the in-game questing. So you'd be able to see the first achievement in a tree of achievements, and you unlock the top ones first before you can unlock the ones further down. So the first one might be to chop down a tree, or kill a chicken, and then these branch into more things you can do. Hopefully it would encourage people to try new areas. It could converge into a big task, like kill a dragon or something, which would put a kind of narrative into the achievement tree."

- Notch

Achievements are a way to gradually guide new players into Minecraft and give them challenges to complete. In the computer edition, they have been replaced with advancements in.

Obtaining
In the Console and Pocket editions achievements can only be done in Survival, and if the game is switched to Creative or host privileges are enabled, going back to Survival or disabling host privileges will not allow completion of achievements, because switching to Creative or enabling host privileges disables achievements. Achievements are independent of each other, allowing players to get them in any order.

There are 80 achievements in the Xbox 360 Edition, Xbox One Edition and Wii U Edition, 79 achievements in the Pocket Edition, and 81 trophies in the PlayStation 3 Edition, PlayStation 4 Edition and PlayStation Vita Edition.

Usage
When an achievement is obtained, a message is broadcast to the server declaring the player who earned the achievement.

In the Xbox and Pocket editions, achievements grant the player gamerscore, totaling 1,855 on Xbox and 1,750 on Pocket.

The achievements in the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation Vita editions act as trophies.

Interface


Minecraft's achievement system involves a tree composed of achievements. Originally the interface showed the achievement tree on the left, and a 'mini-map' of the tree on the right. The mini-map was removed in the final version, which now simply shows the tree. The background of the tree mimics the world with dirt at the top with stone spanning below, bedrock at the bottom, and ores distributed as they would be in the world. By clicking and dragging you can view different branches of the achievement tree. Using the scroll wheel on your mouse zooms in and out of this display, making it easier to see, at a glance, what you have achieved and what you still need to achieve.

Achievements have hovertext, which are more detailed the closer you are to achieving them:
 * Attained achievements are given as "Name/Description/Taken!" (for instance "Getting Wood/Attack a tree until a block of wood pops out/Taken!").
 * Unattained achievements for which you have achieved all the prerequisites are given as "Name/Description".
 * Unattained achievements for which you are one or two prerequisites away are given as "Name/Requires X" (for instance "The End./Requires 'The End?'").
 * Unattained achievements for which you are three prerequisites away are given as "???/Requires X" (for instance "???/Requires 'The Beginning?'").
 * Unattained achievements for which you are four prerequisites away are not given; there is just an icon, no hovertext at all.
 * Unattained achievements for which you are more than four prerequisites away are not shown, even as an icon.

The Console Edition & Pocket Edition use their system interfaces instead of the tree display.

Trivia

 * When an achievement is obtained, it is announced to all players in chat.
 * On PC version, achievements can be obtained in any game mode. Because of this, it is easy to get more difficult achievements such as On A Rail, When Pigs Fly, and Sniper Duel, and others by using creative mode.
 * Return to Sender is an exception to the above, because it requires a ghast fireball, and ghasts only attack the player in survival, hardcore, and adventure mode, although it can still be obtained through commands.
 * Achievements such as Delicious Fish cannot be rewarded if you hook up the furnace to a hopper, as you are not getting the item directly from the furnace.
 * When using to give an achievement, a player will receive all previously required achievements as well as the one being given.
 * You can reset all of your achievements in a world by deleting the "stats" folder in the world file. Beware that it also resets statistics.
 * Sniper Duel became much more difficult when monsters started despawning depending on their distance from the player. 50 blocks is far enough that skeletons will despawn fairly quickly (usually within a couple of minutes or less), and will not move around.
 * When Pigs Fly requires Cow Tipper. Cows drop leather, but there is no crafting recipe for a saddle.
 * A player can get both Time to Mine! and Getting an Upgrade at the same time by crafting a stone, iron, gold, or diamond pickaxe before crafting a wooden pickaxe.
 * "Benchmarking" is called "Benchmaking" in Pocket Edition.