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Minetest | Open source voxel game engine

To note, this is not actually a game, but a platform which happens to provide similar features to Minecraft out of the box. Running the app. will give you a prompt to select a game from their content database (which includes at least three different projects that aim to be an open-source, community-driven variant of Minecraft, Mineclone 2, its fork Mineclonia, and Mesacraft).

Another option, you download the vanilla game and ‘build your own Minecraft’ with the hundreds of mods that are available. You may need to learn the Lua to tie them together smartly, but it gives you full control.

About those games I mentioned though, Minecraft itself has been getting a lot of discontent among the playerbase because of a constant stream of controversial changes (user feedback does not matter at all in most cases) as well as EULA changes that are really tightening the screws on what people are allowed to do.

To top it off, there has been widespread reports of the company cracking down on mods and removing access points for devs. in favor of an online store (where creators on contract make paid mods for Microsoft). The games I mentioned by nature cannot prevent modding and cannot prevent itself from being forked if the dev. team does similar controversial moves (for instance Mineclonia is a fork of MineClone and is quickly gaining in popularity).

It also runs quite fast as well, if you can run Blender Eevee (legacy, not next), then you can turn all of the graphics settings up as well (to note, graphics had a huge boost in the last year). There is also the usual advantage of having no DRM and no online store to install, just plug and play, and have fun.


To note, I am not surprised if the FOSS ecosystem for games is about to get a boost, as too many are now feeling burned by paid titles even if they start out good (ie. the game is great at first, but then gets plagued by bad updates). It does not hurt to give it a chance.

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Imagine if millions of these players go to the open source version instead? It would be a huge flop for the brand name.

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If you are playing Mineclone or Mineclonia and you want something akin to an expansion pack (that works well with it). Then there is this mod which adds a lot of new regions in the underground.
Dwarf Fortress style caverns - ContentDB (minetest.net)

It actually checks for the Minecraft-like bedrock layer and lowers it down to the point to make even the lowest layers accessible. The result is an underground layer that is an order of magnitude deeper than what Minecraft has (to note, the engine allows for extremely deep depths up to 32,000 meters below ground, the games I mentioned just limit the depth artificially).


Also, there is a developing content pack for those games as well (with a current focus on decorative items).
MineClone2 Furniture and decorations - ContentDB (minetest.net)

Their development update. Some interesting developments such as volumetric lighting and work on 3D model support (.gltf, so you will be able to use Blender to make content soon).

October to January in Minetest (16) - Minetest Blog

In addition, the Mineclone fork I mentioned is getting a lot of commits and continues to get up to several updates a month, and it is also popular enough now that it has its own suite of mods as well (such as one that replaces the flower sprites with 3D voxel models). It even swaps out the vanilla textures with its own to improve the visuals (which I found when toying around with the original Minetest augmented by mods).

What I find interesting already is that based on what Microsoft now would rather sell through its marketplace than add to Minecraft directly, Minetest and its content as of 2024 actually gives you a number of features and other things for free that you would otherwise have to pay for in the game that inspired it (beyond the cost of the game). That means the potential of hundreds of dollars in savings over time as Minecraft becomes as bad as The Sims in terms of paid packs.