This tutorial will help you understand and navigate the menus of Minecraft. Although they are mostly self-explanatory, some things may need explaining. If you need help navigating the menu just find the appropriate section of this tutorial.
There are two menu groups in Minecraft: The Main Menu and the Pause Menu.
Main Menu
The main menu is what you see when you first turn on the game. It allows you to choose which game type and world to play as well as access Minecraft Realms and access the game Options. There is also a button that will allow you to quit your game.
Singleplayer
The Singleplayer button, located at the top of the group of buttons on the main menu, leads you to the screen to the right. In this menu you can access all your singleplayer worlds. As seen on the right, there are 2 different worlds. Both of the worlds have 3 lines of information on them. The first line tells you the name of your world. You can change the name of your worlds by clicking on the "Rename" button. The second line tells you what the world is saved as in your "saves" folder in the .minecraft folder, and the the date and time you were last on that world. Ex. (month/day/year Hour:Minutes AM/PM). The third line of text tells you what type of world you have. the 3 types of world you can have are Survival Mode, Creative Mode, or Hardcore Mode. When you make a hardcore world, the text will read "Hardcore Mode!" in red text. The third line also says if your world have cheats on or off. If cheats are off, there will be no extra text, but if you have cheats on, it will also display Cheats, as seen in the picture in the right.
Multiplayer
Minecraft Realms
The third button on the main menu is labeled Minecraft Realms. This button allows you to, as it says, access Realms and perform all the functions that come with it.
The Realms Screen
The Minecraft Realms button will take you to the "Homepage" of Realms. Here you can perform all of the basic actions associated with Realms, which are as follows:
- See all of the Realms you own / are invited to and information about them
- Play on a Realm
- Buy a new Realm
- Configure your own Realm(s)
- Leave a Realm
- See new invitations
- Find out more about Realms
The majority of these functions can be carried out by clicking on a Realm and using the button group at the bottom of the screen. Invitations can be accessed via the envelope next to the Realms logo. The What is Realms? link in the upper right hand corner takes you to the Realms website where you can learn more about the program.
There is a distinct difference between the server list in the Multiplayer screen and the Realms list. Here you can see all of the basic information about the Realm you may need. The exact layout is shown here:
1. Realm name
- Can be changed by the owner
- Displays green of you're the owner of that Realm, white if it's someone else's Realm.
2. Realm description
- Can be changed by the owner
- When a Minigame is active this line is replaced with a Minigame notice.
3. Realm owner's name
- Shows the current chosen username of the owner (not their UUID)
4. Realm owner's face
- Can be changed by the owner changing the face of his skin
5. Realm status
- Has three states: Green, Gray, and Red
- Green: Realm is online
- Gray: Realm is offline
- Red: Realm has expired.
6. Online players count
- Updates constantly to show the number of players currently playing on the Realm
Invitations
Invitations can be accepted or declined via the envelope next to the Realms logo. If you have an invitation you will see a little number dancing on the envelope. If the little number is instead !!! then that means that you have more than five invitations!
If you hover over the envelope a tooltip will appear. It will either say No pending invitations! or Pending invitations! If you click on this when you have some invitations, it will take to to a screen where you can accept or decline various invites.
The screenshot at right is a list of any and all Realms you have been invited to. The operations here are simple: You simply click on a Realm and you can either accept the invitation or decline it.
Once you have been invited to a Realm and accepted it the Realm will appear on your Realm list. At any time you can click on that Realm and click the "Leave Realm" button, which will uninvite you from that Realm until such time as you are invited again.
If you decline an invite your name is taken back off the invited list of that Realm, but keep in mind that he/she can re-invite you at any time. If you are getting spammed with an invite from a particular person and you don't want to see them again, email the support address and they may be able to help.
Realm Configuration
The owner of a Realm has the ability to configure his/her Realm from inside Minecraft. To access the configuration screen you simply click on your Realm and click the Configure button.
From this screen, you can completely manage your Realm and it's players. Written below is a detailed walkthrough of everything you can do to manage your Realm.
Player Management
To invite a player to your Realm all you need to do is click the + button and type in that player's username. When you click Invite, that player will be added to the whitelist and they will receive an invitation letter (explained above.) In this list you can see the player's name and face, and you can also promote, demote, or remove them.
Promoting a player is done by clicking the crown icon next to their name. If it is lit up that player is promoted. If it is gray, that player has not been promoted. Being promoted is equivalent to becoming OP on the Realm. Only the owner can promote or demote players.
To remove a player all you need to do is click the red x button next to their name. They will be taken off the whitelist and your Realm will disappear off of their list.
Tracking Players
Realms also gives you the ability to monitor player activity. To do this click the Player Activity button below the + button. In this screen you can see who has been on at specific times of the day and days past. Every player is assigned a color code and the time they spend on your Realm is depicted with varying lengths of bars in their color.
World Management
You can easily change your world to a mini-game by clicking the configure button, then switch to mini game.