Multi-player gaming these days almost always involves playing against (and only occasionally with) strangers on the Internet. But there was a time, starting in the nineties, when multi-player meant getting together with friends and their computers in the same room. Like co-operative multi-player gaming, LAN parties are largely disappearing. Why bother schlepping around your PC, when you can connect with other players via the Internet? RockPaperShotgun takes a retrospective look at the LAN party phenomenon.

Minecraft 1.10 was released yesterday. Here's the list of changes from the announcement:

• Many bug fixes
• Added Polar Bear
• Added Husk and Stray
• An auto-jump option
• Improvements to some commands
• Structure blocks for custom maps
• Underground fossils made from bone blocks
• Added Magma Block
• Added Nether Wart Block and Red Nether Bricks
• Some huge mushrooms can be even larger
• A rare chance to find lonely trees in plains
• Find abandoned mineshafts filled with gold in mesa biomes
• Villages generate better paths between the buildings
• More variations of villages, based on the biomes they are built in
• Endermen have been spotted in the Nether

The JDRGaming Minecraft server is now running version 1.10.

The FH2: 2.5 COOP Map Pack is an attempt to make the new Eastern Front FH2 2.51 maps work in co-op mode. Sadly, none of the four Eastern Front maps works properly with a dedicated server, but the pack also includes a co-op version of Pegasus Bridge, and that map works fine on the JDRGaming dedicated server. I've added the 64 player version of Pegasus Bridge to the map rotation. To play the map, you need to download and install the pack to your BF2 FH2 mod folder. You can find the pack on this site's Files and Downloads page as well.

The FH2: Forgotten Maps Pack is a collection of maps from other mods that have been modified to support co-op play and work with the FH2 mod. About half of the 20 maps work with the JDRGaming BF2 server, and I've added those to the map rotation. The new maps are Operation Aberdeen, Siege of Tobruk Night v3, Mersa Matruh Coop, El Agheila, Sidi Muftah, Fort Capuzzo, Argentan, Carentan, Advance on Foy, Malmedy (Operation Greif), and Operation Nordwind. To play these new maps, you need to download and install four packages to your BF2 FH2 mod folder. You can also find the required files on this site's Files and Downloads page.

UPDATE: a play tester discovered the problem with several of the non-working Forgotten Maps (thanks, Andrew!) The following maps are now working as well: Beda Fomm, Bloody Gulch, Juin 44, Longues sur Mer, and Orscholtz Switch.

This morning I discovered that about a month's worth of Battlefield 1942 and Secret Weapons game logs had not been processed by the TPU stats system. I was able to locate the problem (a massive, corrupt log from a BG42 round started in April), fixed it, and re-processed the stats. Everything seems to be up to date and working again.

Sundays and Mondays have been quiet on TPU lately, so as of now, we are no longer running Battlegroup 1942 on those days. It's Battlefield 1942 24/7 now. See you on the Battlefield!

The JDRGaming Minecraft server is now up and running with the latest version, 1.9.4. The new version, announced yesterday, improves performance and memory use, and fixes a number of minor issues.

Given the crappy nature of the previous incarnation of minecraft.net, I was thrilled to hear that the site has just been upgraded. Sadly, while the site now works a lot better on mobile devices, the content still falls short.

There's still no obvious indication of the current version, no link to a change log, and the download links are actually buried deeper than before.

So I won't be retiring the JDRGaming Minecraft page any time soon.

On March 30, Mojang released Minecraft 1.9.1. Apparently 1.9.1 had major problems, which were quickly fixed, resulting in Minecraft 1.9.2.

The new version adds Elytra audio, which is apparently something exciting, but is a bit of a mystery to me. Maybe I should get on the server more often. There are a few other minor changes, and some improvements were made in server performance.

The JDRGaming Minecraft server is now running version 1.9.2.

You can find all the details on the Minecraft page on this site (jdrgaming.com).

 

The TPU stats are showing game dates incorrectly. I'm not sure when this started, but since it seems to affect even stats archives from previous years, I'm investigating the PHP component of the stats system.

Hopefully I can fix this problem without losing any stats data, but I can't make any promises right now.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

UPDATE: As of 2016Mar13 11:15am, the problem seems to be resolved.

Minecraft 1.9 was released earlier today by Mojang. The new version fixes a few bugs and adds a bunch of new features related to combat. The JDRGaming Minecraft server is now running version 1.9, and the Minecraft page on this site has been updated with the latest information.