Markus Persson aka Notch aka the guy who created Minecraft recently shared some thoughts on the future of his smash hit indie sandbox game with Gamasutra.<\/p>\n
Due to the open-ended nature of the game, Persson discusses achievements as a substitute for a quest system. “I’ve had the idea to make achievements kind of like the in-game questing. So you’d be able to see the first achievement in a tree of achievements, and you have to unlock the top ones first before you can unlock the ones further down. So the first one might be to chop down a tree, or kill a chicken, and then these branch into more things you can do. Hopefully it would encourage people to try new areas.”<\/p>\n
He suggests that the achievement tree could lead to something huge, such as killing a dragon, therefore framing the achievements with a bit of narrative purpose. Persson stresses that any achievement system would be to act as a suggestion on how to play, as he wouldn’t want to detract from the open-ended self-exploration mechanic the game currently enjoys.<\/p>\n