Easter eggs

An Easter egg is an intentional hidden message, inside joke, or feature in a work such as a computer program, web page, video game, television program, movie, book, or crossword. Minecraft features several easter eggs hidden within the game.

April Fools 2011


The Locked chest was a naturally generated block used as the premise of Notch's 2011 April Fool's Day joke. Upon attempting to open the chest, a message would appear stating that a Steve Co. Supply Crate Key is needed, and that one could be purchased at the Minecraft store.

This concept is a reference to the Team Fortress 2 item drop system, where you can receive an item randomly while playing. One of the receivable items is called Mann Co. Supply Crate, which required a key purchased from the Mann Co. Store, a microtransaction system integrated into the Steam client.

Within the Minecraft store, there were many easter eggs: //Determine Entrance if(options.enterOn == 'timer') { setTimeout(init, options.delayTime); } else if(options.enterOn == 'click') { _this.bind('click', function(e) {					e.preventDefault;					if(!locked) {						init;					}				}) } else if(options.enterOn == 'konami-code'){ var kkeys = [], konami = "38,38,40,40,37,39,37,39,66,65"; $(window).bind("keydown.raptorz", function(e){			       kkeys.push( e.keyCode );			        if ( kkeys.toString.indexOf( konami ) >= 0 ) {			        	init;			        	$(window).unbind('keydown.raptorz');			        }			    }, true);
 * Clicking on the proceed to checkout button triggers a screamer in which a Velociraptor from the movie Jurassic Park will growl loudly and fly across the screen.
 * Entering items totaling over $10,000 into the cart causes a window pop-up asking if you are prone to seizures. Entering OK makes the screen start flashing.
 * The script that causes the Velociraptor to appear has a reference to the Konami Code in it.

Halloween
On October 31st, Zombies, Skeletons, and other mobs will sometimes wear Pumpkins or Jack 'o' Lanterns on their heads. They will occasionally drop these blocks if killed. This was added in version 1.4.2 for Halloween 2012.

Christmas
From December 24th-26th, Chests and their larger counterpart have their textures changed to Xmas Chests. This was added in version 1.4.6 for Christmas 2012. A texture known in the game files as "skis.png", was also added in the Christmas/New Year update in the same folder as the Xmas Chests. Its textures were added by Dinnerbone as a red herring.

April Fools 2013
On April 1st Mojang released a article about Minecraft 2.0 which was a april fools joke. Youtubers got the "beta" of it and made videos on it. For the article go on Mojang.com List of features added in the update: (From the Mojang article) Gameplay

Added new Super Hostile game mode, for a much more challenging Survival experience. Difficulty setting is now per-world and may never be changed once set. Added new graphics setting “Ultra Realistic” with new patent-pending experimental 4D-rendering. Added new chase-style 3D camera perspective. Animals

Added new realistic food/hunger system to animals. Overfeeding animals may have a negative effect on gameplay. Added a new “Horse” animal, with two different breeds to choose from. Each animal now has a gender and personality, introducing new farming mechanics. Added a new rare breed of chicken known as a “Diamond Chicken”. May lay diamonds or lapis instead of laying eggs. May also blow up from too much pressure. Handle with care. Added new friendly Pink Wither, which is the complete opposite of a wither. Shoots out Love, which heals the nearby land and causes things to grow faster. Known bug: Having both a Pink Wither and a Wither in your world at the same time may cause up to a 200% increase in framerate. Will be fixed for launch. All animals may be fed Golden Apples to unleash their hidden magical properties (see new Magic section). Chickens are now classified as a Monster and are no longer a friendly Animal. Monsters

Chickens do not appreciate being looked at and may get upset. Attacking a lone chicken may summon additional chickens to its defense. Zombie Pigmen now spawn with battlesigns and no longer use swords. Fixed a bug causing Skeletons to miss their targets on occasion. Added new Redstone Bug monster (see Redstone section).

Blocks

Furnaces have a new “heat” mechanic. Heat needs to be regulated in furnaces or they will blow up. Torches now burn out after a period of time, but may be relit with flint and steel. Added new TNT slab, known as an Etho Slab. Renamed Droppers to floppers, by popular community demand. Droppers were deemed too powerful and go against our original vision of the game. Floppers now turn everything that passes through them into raw fish (see Fishing section). Added six (6) new decoration blocks: Mud. Hay bales. Lapis Lazuli. Slime blocks. Added new compressed storage blocks for commonly mined ores: Coal Block. Lapis Lazuli Block. Redstone Block Block. Lapis may now be used for new Lapis furniture. Added dyed glass. Walking over many blocks will gradually wear them down, creating many new block variants such as Cracked Stone and Muddy Grass.

Redstone

Removed all BUD behaviour, and added safeguards so that it may never come back. Made redstone bugs spawn actual Redstone Bugs to assist with debugging. Added new Quantum Entangled redstone, obtained by mixing 1 redstone, 1 diamond and 3 lapis. One entangled redstone dust will connect to another pair elsewhere. No current way of specifying the connection, may in fact connect to another player’s world. Added new BUD blocks.

Magic

Added new Magic and Luck levels per player. Finding a Rainbow after rain passes will be the primary way of obtaining Magic. Finding a green-tinted horse will be the primary way of obtaining Luck. Added new spell system, costing magic to perform a spell. Spells may backfire, depending on Luck. Examples of new spells include: Turn any item into Fish. Turn current biome into another biome (bug: currently only turns into ocean). Ability to remove gravity from other creatures/players in the world.

Fishing

Overhauled fishing mechanics. New special types of fish may be found in various different biomes. Fish may become scared if too much noise is made nearby. Added 28 new achievements for fishing. Rare chance for extra items to drop when fishing, such as armor and maps. Removed fishing. Having a fish in your possession will drain your health by 1 each second, to help phase out fishing.

Combat

Removed crossbows. To deter cheating players on PvP servers, the PvP system has been completely redesigned. Players may no longer attack other players directly, but must recruit an army of Monsters and Animals. Each monster/animal has different strengths, weaknesses and abilities whilst attacking or defending in PvP combat. New turn-based combat system will help create epic battles that may last hours at a time.

World generation & terrain

Added many new mysterious adventuring locations. Added 6 new biomes. Reimplemented the Farlands. Going near the farlands will forcefully enable 3d anaglyph. Known bug: Teleporting towards the farlands may send you half way in the opposite direction. Added dozens of new village building templates. Flattened all terrain out slightly, with the exception of the hills biome to make it seem bigger by contrast. Added floating sky islands.

Zombie Pigman
In an unused area for the Zombie Pigman's texture, the words "THX XAPHOBIA" can be seen. This was written by Notch to give credit to the texture's original creator, XaPhobia.

MissingNo.
If one were to delete the file splash.txt without deleting the META-INF folder, the splash text on the title screen would appear to be missingno. This is a reference to the infamous glitch Pokémon, MissingNo.

Unused splash text
In the file "splashes.txt", there is a line that reads, "This message will never appear on the splash screen, isn't that weird?". The only version that shows this line is the Xbox 360 edition.

Déjà vu!
In the file "splash.txt." the line "Déjà vu!" appears twice, one under the other. This is a reference to the phenomenon of having the strong sensation that an event or experience currently being experienced had been experienced in the past.

Minceraft
There used to be a one in 10,000 chance that the title screen will display "Minceraft" instead of "Minecraft". At that time, the end of any crash log would have the phrase "You should try our sister game, Minceraft!"