As Spooktober marches on and the horror continues to surround, I find my thoughts turning to Minecraft. For the most part, it’s a pretty chill and lighthearted game. You just mine your stuff and build up whatever projects you can dream up. Sure, the nights are dangerous and the caves can be spooky, but otherwise there’s nothing downright fear-inspiring. Well, until you get to The Nether that is. Why exactly does this hellish dimension exist in my cute game about collecting blocks and building things??

Even though it’s portayed in a very cute way here, The Nether hardly ever feels like a fun place to visit. Everything about it is hostile to the player, right down to the material it’s largely made of: Netherack. The stuff is very fragile, which makes it easy to mine and clear. However, your pickaxe wears down more quicklyand the stuff can be shot out from under you without any warning!

Just like with Deepnest in Hollow Knight, The Nether makes you feel unsafe. No matter how well you plan your paths and tunnels, no matter how NPC-proff you try to make them and no matter how carefully you make your way through it, The Nether will get you.

Its ambient music and denizens only make this worse, too. Upon entering The Nether, the music shifts from the pleasant Minecraft themes we all know and love to these ominous low tones that immediately set you edge. This place is every bit as dagerous as it looks, and it wants you to know it.

Then there’s the mobs. They’re relentless. Skeletons, piglins and ghasts can all snipe you from across the map if you arent careful, and the melee-focused pigs and such charge at you unendingly until you manage to put them down (often at great cost to your health unless you’re wearing diamond armor). Heaven help you too if you happen to stumble upon a fortress and it’s large host of guards.

Lastly, we’ve got The Nether’s geography and unique quirks. Yes, the floor is lava, but even worse is that you’ll almost always spawn way, way above it, well past the point where a fall would kill you. Unless you’re super careful about how you go about traversing the place (and remember to bring a lot of sturdy cobblestone), you’re going to end up falling to your death sooner rather than later. And, chances are good that you’re not getting your stuff back either.

There’s no sleeping in The Nether since beds explode, and no saving yoursefl from longfalls with a bucket of water (it instantly evaporates). Yeah, it really seems like The Nether really doesn’t want to be explored, and I for one am just fine with leaving it alone.

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That’s it for me this week! Stay tuned for more Spooktober and more from Cary and TheDuckofIndeed as well! For now though, have you ever played Minecraft? If so, what were your experiences in The Nether like?

Image from the Minecraft Live 2022 announcement trailer