The fourth episode of Minecraft: Story Mode – Season 2 is now available for download! Grab it now! Or check out our behind-the-scenes interview below! Better yet, do both! You have the freedom to choose whatever you like!
There are countless ways to enjoy Minecraft: as a builder, an adventurer, an artist, and much more. There’s no wrong way to play! But how do these different types of players interact within Minecraft? And what conflicts might arise if they don’t get along?
The team at Telltale Games aimed to explore these questions in the fourth episode of Story Mode. To achieve this, they spent numerous hours playing in Minecraft PE, ultimately crafting some intriguing episodes.
To learn more about this episode, we reached out to designer Telltale Juan Vaca, who contributed to many wild, wonderful, and memorable moments that await you in the fourth episode, Under the Ground. Check out his responses in the video below, but beware of spoilers if you haven’t played this season yet!
So, the lower part is underground, but as we all know, there’s nothing beneath it. How was a world created that breaks some fundamental rules of Minecraft PE?
Juan: From the very beginning, we knew we were going underground. We wanted Jesse to explore the landscape, uncover the history of this world, and experience what it felt like to fall between Admin and his friends.
There’s a wrong way to play Minecraft, and we wanted the world to reflect on that. We aimed to showcase various styles of gameplay in Minecraft and give players a sense that they could easily connect with at least one of those styles.
Tell us more about the character known as the Admin.
Romeo, Hara, and Fred were friends; they even lived together! We wanted their friendship to evolve so that they began developing new towns and homes based on their own visions.
Romeo is an adventurous spirit who is quite selfish and always wants to be the best, focusing solely on that. It was important for his town, Romeoburg, to reflect his strong warrior spirit and attract citizens.
Hara is a brilliant engineer focused on creating new machines, thus interacting with the world. Hara’s city, Oasis, should represent all the wonders of Minecraft Pocket Edition.
Fred is a highly social individual. He enjoyed spending time with people from his world in MCPE. We wanted to ensure that Fred’s town would be safe, with a primary focus on community.
How did you make these communities feel authentic?
This was crucial for us—hence we infused personal stories into the narrative of Minecraft PE. At the start of the creative process, the lead writer of this episode, Nicole Martinez, and I played MCPE on our work server. There was a lake where other members of the Story Mode team also resided, allowing us to share resources and build our homes around those areas.
Stories emerged from our gameplay experiences. Nicole’s pet chicken went missing. We wanted to create parallels between our server, Jesse’s world, and the underground realm of the Admin. Our goal was for players of Minecraft Pocket Edition to feel familiar in this new setting.
How do you envision the story presented in the fourth episode?
Essentially, it’s a tale of friendship and harmony. The underground world is shattered and now represents a dark place symbolizing the end of the Admins’ friendship. We crafted an environment to illustrate the damage caused by Romeo.
The underground realm also foreshadows what may happen to Biktown after Jesse and friends face their challenges, but we’ll leave those decisions up to the players of Minecraft.
How will you manage your friendships and the fate of Biktown? There’s only one way to find out! Experience the latest episode right now!
