paintings Archives

AppWizard

January 27, 2026

Minecraft gamifies Sir John Soane’s Museum

Minecraft has partnered with Sir John Soane’s Museum to create a digital experience called Soane’s Portals to the Past, allowing players to explore a virtual version of the museum. This interactive gaming experience features digital guides, including historical figures Sir John Soane and his wife, Eliza, as well as Soane's dog, Fan. Notable spaces like the Picture Gallery, Breakfast Room, and Dome have been recreated, showcasing artworks such as Canaletto's Riva degli Schiavoni, Venice. Players can also embark on guided tours of ancient sites in Egypt, Greece, and Rome. The virtual environment was created by BlockBuilders, and lesson plans from Microsoft Office 365 Education enhance its educational value. The partnership aims to fulfill the museum's educational mission and share its collection with a global audience through Minecraft. A demo of the experience is available for download.

AppWizard

December 14, 2025

Minecraft: 8 Best Mods to Celebrate the Winter Holidays

The text describes various mods for Minecraft that enhance the winter holiday experience. 1. Snow! Real Magic mod adds realistic snow layering and allows customization of snow behavior. 2. Christmas Leather Armor mod transforms leather armor into festive variations, including Santa red. 3. Creatures from the Snow mod introduces winter-themed creatures like reindeer and penguins, along with holiday items. 4. Choice Theorem’s Overhauled Village mod revitalizes villages with new designs tailored to different biomes. 5. Skiing mod allows players to ski down mountains and includes skiing-related items. 6. Winter Massacre mod introduces various types of snowballs for playful winter activities. 7. Christmas Culinary and Decorations mod offers festive meals and decorations for customizing homes. 8. Wintercraft mod combines multiple holiday elements, including presents, Santa, and new mobs.

AppWizard

November 21, 2025

Tavern Keeper: It’s Good

Tavern Keeper is a fantasy barkeeping video game that combines management simulation with creative customization. Players manage taverns by designing layouts, hiring staff, and ensuring operations run smoothly. The game features a creation suite that allows players to craft items like bookshelves and paintings, fostering a community for sharing designs. Challenges include hiring staff with questionable skills and managing customer satisfaction amidst chaotic scenarios. Players can adjust difficulty settings to suit their preferences. The game incorporates humor throughout, enhancing player engagement. Currently in Early Access, it has received positive feedback for its depth and personalization options.

AppWizard

November 4, 2025

URI art professor’s work featured in ‘Minecraft’video game

Travess Smalley, an assistant print media professor at the University of Rhode Island, discovered Minecraft over a decade ago and began exploring its creative potential. He has integrated his artistic expressions into the game, which has sold over 350 million copies globally. Smalley uses a "chance flower" program to generate unique art, similar to the procedurally generated worlds in Minecraft. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he developed work on a dedicated Minecraft server, creating a digital world that transforms the game into an expansive poem. His projects include "pixel rugs," generative digital artworks translated into hand-woven rugs, and "CRAWL," a video maze game featuring 512 distinct artworks. Smalley plans to release a book titled "Pixel Rugs" in January 2026 and encourages his students to use Minecraft as a medium for artistic expression.

AppWizard

October 3, 2025

Survival favorite Rust shakes up the meta with dramatic new patch to fix “stale” progression and “awful” loot

Developer Facepunch has released the Meta Shift update for Rust, which includes significant changes to gameplay. The update reintroduces blueprint fragments to encourage player engagement in world PvP, adjusting workbench level requirements to five basic fragments for level two and five advanced fragments for level three. Basic fragments can be found in green puzzle rooms and blue-card puzzles, while advanced fragments are located in hackable and elite crates. The update also redistributes loot across monuments, enhances loot quality from crates, introduces a new shore crate, and upgrades drones to carry items. Crosshair customization has been added, and various smaller updates include increased mission rewards, improved vehicle capabilities, and performance optimizations addressing VRAM usage. The update is live, with a Halloween event starting on October 23.

AppWizard

October 2, 2025

Minecraft New Update 3.20 Ushers in Bedrock 1.21.111 “The Copper Age”

The latest Minecraft update, "The Copper Age," is version 1.21.111 for Bedrock and 3.20/1.029 for consoles, released on September 30. Key features include: - Copper Chest: Players can summon a copper golem to acquire a copper chest, which can oxidize or be preserved with wax. It can be crafted from a standard chest and copper ingots. - Copper Equipment: Copper can be used to craft tools, weapons, and armor that do not oxidize. Copper armor has higher durability than leather but less than iron. - Copper Golem: Summoned with copper and carved pumpkins, it collects and sorts items from copper chests. It drops 1 to 3 copper ingots upon demise and can transform into a statue block when fully oxidized. - Copper Decorations: New items include copper torches, bars, chains, and lanterns that oxidize over time. - Shelf: A decorative block that can store items and connect with powered shelves for redstone functionality. - Accessibility: Updated dye icons for colorblind accessibility and text-to-speech support for dressing room pages. - Blocks: Fire-related changes to blocks and bug fixes for water placement and block destruction. - General Improvements: Corrections to grass color in swamps and enhancements for multiplayer experiences. - Graphical Enhancements: Updates to volumetric fog and particle textures, along with fixes for graphical bugs. - User Interface: Improvements to icons and display issues, including new icons for sale banners. Players can expect potential hotfixes in the coming weeks.

AppWizard

June 28, 2025

4 classic PC games that prove just how well pixel art can age

Pixel graphics emerged as a limitation of hardware capabilities but have been embraced as an artistic choice, especially in indie games. A criterion of at least ten years since release is used to define "retro" games. Papers, Please: Players act as a border checkpoint officer in a totalitarian state, balancing duty and family needs. The game utilizes pixel art for its static user interface and characters, maintaining its unique visual identity over a decade later. Platform: Steam. RollerCoaster Tycoon: Known for its iconic pixel art, the game features vibrant landscapes that complement its amusement park theme. Its late-90s aesthetic remains impressive even two decades after release. Shovel Knight: Launched over a decade ago, it pays homage to retro 2D platformers with an 8-bit-inspired aesthetic. The game blends nostalgia with originality, featuring backgrounds that enhance gameplay. Backyard Baseball: A late '90s arcade-style baseball simulation known for its distinctive art style and memorable characters. The pixelated character models are well-defined, showcasing impressive pixel artistry. Platforms: Steam, Nintendo Switch. PC games may not always match the pixel artistry of console games from the 80s and 90s, but there are many iconic pixel art games from that era and the early 2010s.

AppWizard

May 4, 2025

Tales of the Shire embraces a ‘clutter-core experience’ with grid-free decorating for your Hobbit house

Tales of the Shire is a life simulation game set to release on July 29, transporting players to the village of Bywater, inspired by Hobbiton. Players can engage in activities such as gardening, fishing, cooking, crafting, and home decorating. The game features a grid-free decorating system, allowing players to arrange items freely, creating personalized spaces that reflect individual tastes. This method is designed to evoke the whimsical interiors seen in the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films. Additionally, dynamic camera angles will enhance the decorating experience by providing a top-down view for easier navigation. The game will be available on PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch, and is currently open for wishlisting on Steam.

BetaBeacon

March 21, 2025

Epic Games Store now offers free Android games every week: Here’s how to claim free title

Players can expect new free games every week from the Epic Games Store on mobile, with the first titles being Super Meat Boy Forever and Eastern Exorcist available for free until March 27.

AppWizard

February 9, 2025

Exploring Minecraft Villager Jobs: What Each Role Offers and How to Use Them

Villagers in Minecraft have 15 distinct jobs, each associated with a specific job site block and offering unique trades. 1. Armorer: Uses a blast furnace to trade iron, armor, and chainmail, including enchanted diamond armor. 2. Butcher: Uses a smoker to trade cooked meats and rabbit stew. 3. Cartographer: Uses a cartography table to trade maps, frames, and banners, including treasure maps. 4. Cleric: Uses a brewing stand to trade magical items, Redstone dust, and Bottle o’ Enchanting. 5. Farmer: Uses a composter to trade food items and ingredients, including bread and golden carrots. 6. Fisherman: Uses a barrel to trade cooked seafood and enchanted fishing rods. 7. Fletcher: Uses a fletching table to trade arrows, bows, and crossbows. 8. Leatherworker: Uses a cauldron to trade leather armor, horse armor, and saddles. 9. Librarian: Uses a lectern to trade enchanted books, compasses, and clocks. 10. Mason: Uses a stonecutter to trade various stones, bricks, and quartz. 11. Nitwit: Has no job or trading function, existing only for aesthetic purposes. 12. Shepherd: Uses a loom to trade decorative items like wool and carpets. 13. Toolsmith: Uses a smithing table to trade tools like pickaxes and shovels. 14. Unemployed: Can take up any job when assigned a job site block. 15. Weaponsmith: Uses a grindstone to trade enchanted weapons and minerals. Wandering traders, while not classified as villagers, trade random items and arrive with trader llamas. Villagers acquire jobs based on the proximity of job site blocks, and unemployed villagers can be assigned jobs by placing the appropriate block nearby. If the block is removed, they revert to unemployment.