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Thanks Microsoft for taking away one of my simple pleasures (Minecraft)

8 points by dokument ↗ HN
I have an old laptop running Ubuntu 20.04 and after trying off and on now for over a year (life is busy) to get this game I used to enjoy playing so much working, I just can't.

Minecraft used to just work, sure there were issues but I could throw it on anything and get it working with very little fuss. I just had to go through 5 emails of various resets and one time codes, install dependencies onto my vanilla Ubuntu install not called out in your Ubuntu install pages. This is just upsetting and frustrating.

/rant

12 comments

[ 8.5 ms ] story [ 30.8 ms ] thread
Crosseye_Jack
Tried using an alternative launcher such as MultiMC?
khedoros1
I have Java and Bedrock running on my 2011 Mint machine. I don't remember any particular difficulty getting it running. Sorry that you are...
naruhodo
I'm still running Minecraft on my Fedora laptop, and I know my way around Ubuntu fairly well.

I recently migrated Minecraft from a Mojang login to a Microsoft one (as we are all apparently forced to do that now).

The only hassle was that Microsoft create a fake security alert in order to require me to provide them my phone number. I read elsewhere that's something Microsoft commonly do.

Perhaps you could share some details of your problem?

EDIT: it just occurred to me that you're probably lacking Java 17, which is the minimum for Minecraft 17 and later.

It should be just a matter of:

    sudo apt-get install openjdk-17-jre
    sudo update-alternatives --config java
and set Java 17 as the default JRE.

But if not, you will need a PPA from Matthias Klose, here:

<https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/focal/+package/openjdk-17-jre>

<https://askubuntu.com/questions/705072/is-the-openjdk-r-ppa-...>

Should be:

    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:openjdk-r/ppa
    sudo apt update
and then the aforementioned steps to install the package and set Java 17 as default.
julisox
Try Mineclone 2. It's an open-source libre Minecraft clone which runs on top of the Minetest voxel engine and has 99% (almost) feature parity with MC 1.12, can be expanded with hundreds of mods and it runs natively in Linux. You'll be surprised at how polished it is already. In fact, it's so similar to the original Minecraft 1.12 in both gameplay and appearance that it surprises me that Microsoft/Mojang hasn't threatened a lawsuit (yet). I downloaded it just out of curiosity some time ago and now I play it more often than Minecraft itself because of all the fun mods I can try.

https://www.minetest.net/downloads/

Alternatively you can try MultiMC as an alternative Minecraft launcher, never had an issue with it.

throwaway290
It is claimed that MultiMC will not work unless you have authenticated it with active Microsoft account at least once on a computer, even if you only want to use it in offline mode: https://github.com/MultiMC/Launcher/issues/4433#issuecomment...

This is probably related to the fact that MultiMC dev allegedly works for MS now.

So even if you paid your hard-earned $30 for Minecraft back in the day, now you apparently also have to pay Microsoft the PII tax in the form of an active phone number.

(Microsoft mines phone numbers via the shady practice of letting anyone quickly migrate their Mojang account, and then within weeks alleging suspicious activity violating ToS. Once it happens, you get a screen that offers none of your previously configured 2FA methods, such as backup codes or TOTP app, requiring you to receive a PIN via SMS. In the end, players submit their numbers voluntarily, because the alternative is to spend hours upon hours bickering with tech support without clear guarantee of success. Upon gaining access and inspecting this 'suspicious activity' players appear to inevitably find it to consist exclusively of their own logins from the same home IP they always use.)

julisox
Well, MultiMC is open source so you can always disable the account check. I'm sure there's a patched fork already somewhere, however I'm not sure whether this is legal or not.

>Microsoft mines phone numbers

This seems to be more or less standard practice now. Happened to me with several companies. They let you sign up with just an email address, then after a few days or weeks they block your account because of "suspicious activity" and ask for a phone number. Very annoying.

throwaway290
Don't you need a MS developer key to build it or something now? I imagine this all could be patched, but not sure how difficult.

Regarding other companies, Facebook for example allows getting code by email. This is very different. MS disables every recovery option you set up, and mandates a phone.

julisox
>Don't you need a MS developer key to build it or something now?

I built it myself a couple of months ago and I didn't need any key. I just cloned the source from GitHub and compiled it following the build instructions.

smoldesu
I still haven't bothered switching my account over. It's a pretty awful move, not sure if I'll ever create another Microsoft account just to play the game.

Thanks for keeping things simple for my 700-some hours I've put in since middle school, Mojang. Your barebones but respectful competency will be missed.

sieste
I can recommend minetest as a free and less resource hungry alternative.

minetest.net

alar44
This is a you problem, not a Microsoft problem.

Why in the fuck is this submission getting traction?