Minecraft players know the strange, calming sensation of chopping away at blocks arranged into vast landscapes and biomes that people can explore.
Now, even those who haven’t played the game can check out the aesthetics, feel and sounds of the popular title in real life at the newest iteration of the game: Minecraft Experience: Villager Rescue, which makes its world premiere at 2712 N Central Expressway in Plano this week.
Olivier Goulet, executive director of the interactive exhibit, said the production team worked with Microsoft and Mojang Studios to understand the ins and outs of the game. The exhibit was two years in the making, Goulet said.
“We worked super hard to be authentic to the game. That was one of our main goals was when people step into the experience, they step into the game, and they feel like they’re in it,” Goulet said.
Using dozens of projectors and more than a hundred speakers, the exhibit surrounds people with the sounds and colors of the game.
The exhibit is about an hour long and includes puzzles, stories and minigames. Similar to Minecraft, players gather resources, craft important items and fend off hostile mobs, including spiders, skeletons and creepers.
That interaction is tethered to the “orb of interaction,” an inventory and toolkit throughout the experience. The first room is a tutorial where guides and narration will teach players how to use the orb.
“It’s truly the junction point between you and the world of Minecraft,” Goulet said.
Players navigate the world in groups of up to 25 people, and the 20,000 square-foot space is a maze of multiple rooms featuring subterranean, snow and underwater worlds. In total, there are about eight biomes, Goulet said.
All of the digital assets of the exhibit were designed with the same game engine as Minecraft and scaled to thrust players into the world.
“The experience was designed for everybody. Younger players will love stepping into the game, interacting with the game. Parents can better understand and appreciate the world their kids are playing in. There’s also an amazing feeling of nostalgia,” Goulet said.
Goulet said he has played Minecraft with his children, and he let the moments he enjoyed with his kids in the game inspire the experience of the exhibit.
“This is one of the rare games that my kids can play with no supervision,” he said.
During audience testing, Goulet and his team toned down the narration for a more sandbox experience. This way, parents and their kids could have more airspace to chat about how things work in the world of Minecraft.
“Often, it’s not the parents explaining to the kids; it’s the kids teaching the parents. We reduced the narration to allow for that, and it’s quite compelling,” he said. “For once, the kids train the parents.”
He said the production team chose Plano as its first stop because it had a large fan base. Single tickets are $32, but there are group options for $28 per person. The experience will remain open until the end of December.
“We know there are a lot of core fans here; it’s a very good market for tickets in our experience,” Goulet said.
Bear Schneider and Adam Baertlein attended the sneak peek of the exhibit Wednesday morning. Both are content creators based in Grand Prairie who focus on Minecraft.
Schneider said he enjoyed all of the features of the exhibit but wants the full experience with larger groups of players.
Baertlein, who creates videos related to Minecraft, said he thought the exhibit was true to the aesthetics of the original game.
“They really do a good job of bringing Minecraft aspects into setting you on a mission with this quest,” Baertlein said.
