For years, Minecraft has managed to engross and entertain different generations of players who are fans of survival and creative open worlds. Curated by pixels and endless ambition, Minecraft is still updated every now and then.
However, even with its latest patch, the game is suffering from one major problem that is driving a lot of players a little frustrated. If there’s no fix for this, players looking to play local co-op on LAN may have to switch to online methods.
Minecraft’s Latest Patch Is Great, Blocks Out an Essential Feature
The newest patch for Minecraft (1.21.20.21) introduces a range of updates that are both cosmetic and gameplay-oriented in nature. It also fixes several issues that players may have been facing in the past.
Some of the major updates include player skin and name reporting, networked play, and how mobs function in the game. Even though Minecraft has been popular for more than 13 years now, there’s clearly room for improvement.
Players like EvilVirus4 and imnotchantelle are using Twitter as a platform to voice their concerns regarding LAN problems in the game. Previously, this feature would let players hop into a world within the world and enjoy the game with others if they shared the same internet connection.
Unfortunately, this feature is now being limited for many players, even though the game officially has LAN co-op available for free. Seemingly, this may just be available to PC players as certain players on the PlayStation aren’t able to access it.
Whether or not this is an intentional move by Mojang Studios to convince people to invest in Minecraft Realms is yet to be known.
At the time of writing, there are other ways players can enjoy the game with each other but it may be locked behind a paywall.
Minecraft Realms – Worth the Investment?
The latest patch may have fixed many problems and introduced some neat things into the game, but looks like this “free” update is for single-player gamers to enjoy. If you’re looking to play the game online with others across the globe, Minecraft Realms may be the way to go.
A “realm” in Minecraft is a fancy term for a server. It lets you host a virtual world online for others to connect to, and vice-versa in case you want to play on a realm hosted by someone else. From the official page, here’s the idea simplified:
A Minecraft Realm is a subscription to your own personal Minecraft server, where you can easily and safely play online with friends in shared worlds across devices.
For the Bedrock edition, Realms costs $3.99, while Realms Plus costs $7.99 (which gives you some additional benefits). For the Java edition, it’s $7.99 as well.
What are your thoughts on the different ways of playing Minecraft online? Do you think you’d invest in a service like Realms? Let us know in the comments below.
