Minecraft Wiki

The Minecraft Wiki has moved from Fandom; see the linked discussion page for details.

READ MORE

Minecraft Wiki
Advertisement

This article is about the April Fool's joke. For the NBT tag to lock chests added in 1.8, see Chunk format § Block entity format.
Information icon
This feature is exclusive to Java Edition. 
This page describes content that exists only in outdated versions of Minecraft. 
13w41a

The locked chest was an April Fools block.

Obtaining

When introduced, this block was indestructible except for explosions, allowing it to drop.

Natural generation

Every chunk generated between April 1 and April 5, 2011 had a small chance of having a locked chest in it.[1]

Usage

File:LockedChest.png

Message displayed upon attempting to open the chest.

Clicking use button on the chest would bring up a screen, and clicking on the "Go to Store" button would forward you to the "Minecraft Store". It linked to "https://minecraft.net/store/loot.jsp"[2], but now the original page was removed and an error is shown. Various items were "sold" in the Minecraft Store (see below). Clicking on the proceed to checkout button triggered a screamer in which a Velociraptor from the movie Jurassic Park growled loudly and flew across the screen.

Entering items totaling over $10,000 into the cart caused a window pop-up asking if you are prone to seizures. Entering OK made the screen start flashing. When first released, there was no seizure warning label; Notch later implemented it to avoid lawsuits and posts on the forum.

On April 2 (the day following April Fools), the store had the addition of a multicolored banner which read "♥ April Fools'! ♥"[3], accompanied by a midi instrumental of Rick Astley's 'Never Gonna Give You Up'. Tobias Möllstam stated that this was "the best script he's written to date.[4]"

The store page used the font tf2build.ttf from Team Fortress 2 which is downloadable from here.

Items "sold"

Minecraft store april fool 1

The "Minecraft Store"

Twelve "items" were "available":

  • Steve Co. supply crate key ($3)
  • Steve Co. supply crate key 5-pack ($18)
  • Miner's helmet ($21)
  • Name change ($99)
  • Creeper saddle ($42)
  • Secret griefer identity ($155)
  • Enlargement pill ($2)
  • Response from support ($494)
  • Three "coming soon" items (priced at $75, $7, and $1499)
  • Regular padlock ($8)
    • Used the same image as the "coming soon" items.

Light source

Locked chests emitted a light level of 15.

Fuel

Locked chests could be used as fuel, lasting 15 seconds (or 1.5 items).

History

beta
1.4Added locked chests.
1.4_01Notch planned to remove them at midnight April 2, but didn't due to illness.[5] Instead they were removed in the Beta 1.4_01 patch on April 5. They were not removed from the game entirely; instead code was added for locked chests in the world to disappear, causing them to decay in a fashion similar to leaves. If locked chests are stored in the inventory, they remain until they are placed in the world.
release
1.3.112w21aThe original chest texture was removed, causing the locked chest's texture to change from File:Locked Chest.png to File:Locked Chest 12w21a.png
12w22aTexture changed from File:Locked Chest 12w21a.png to File:LockedChest12w22.png with the addition of the block of emerald.
1.513w01aTexture changed from File:LockedChest12w22.png to File:LockedChest13w01a.png with the addition of the block of redstone.
13w02aWhen the textures were put into individual files the locked chest had nothing to use, causing the game to crash if a world containing one was loaded.
13w03aThe crash above was fixed by introducing a placeholder texture; texture changed from File:LockedChest13w01a.png to File:LockedChest13w03a.png.
1.6.113w18aThe locked chest texture was changed from File:LockedChest13w03a.png to File:Lockedchest13w18b.png following a placeholder texture/model change.
1.7.213w37aRemoved locked chest as an item. It can only placed with /setblock.
13w41aAdded stained glass, replacing the ID of locked chest (95).
Changed alphanumeric ID for block 95 from chest_locked_aprilfools_super_old_legacy_we_should_not_even_have_this to stained_glass

Trivia

  • Locked chests are a reference to the Mann Co. Supply Crates[6] from Team Fortress 2, where a key must be purchased for $2.49 in the in-game shop called Mann Co. Store in order to open the crate.[7]
  • This may have been what Notch was talking about in his Twitter post about a "silly secret project".[8]
  • Locked chests could generate in mid air or in the tops of trees.
  • Locked chests could be placed next to each other to form a 2 block long chest like normal chests do. These two chests are still however "locked".
  • The server console outputted "added a chest!" each time a chest was generated.
  • The 5-key pack is actually $3 more than 5 single keys.
  • The archived page is available in reduced functionality here.
  • Locked chests made lava particles when broken.
  • The locked chest's ID was named minecraft:chest_locked_aprilfools_super_old_legacy_we_should_not_even_have_this, and it is the longest named ID in Minecraft history.
  • Although locked chests were removed in the 13w41a, there are still translation strings for it in the en_US.lang file.
  • The Bedrock Edition, Legacy Console Edition and Minecraft website each have their own "Minecraft Store". However, they are actual in-game stores used to get downloadable content, purchase Java Edition as well as Minecraft merchandise, and are completely unrelated to the April fool's joke.

Gallery

References

Advertisement