Notch’s wacky world-building adventure has finally arrived on the Xbox 360, bringing sprawling open worlds, hissing anthropomorphic time bombs, and a menagerie of other beasts to a brand new audience with cooperative play, leaderboards, and a bevy of features that should delight fans, both new and old.

Bringing Minecraft to consoles was certainly a fantastic move — functions that may have seemed difficult to understand for new players before or gamers primarily enjoying console adventures, unfamiliar with PC controls, have been optimized and simplified for console play.

Both creating worlds and exploring them feels natural and much like the sandbox-adventure game hybrid was built for the console in the first place. Whereas Minecraft on PC was quite often an intimidating and confusing experience — asking friends for help, viewing YouTube tutorials, etc. was usually a given if you wanted to progress. The XBLA edition is a quicker, more streamlined beginning with tutorials, helpful toolbars, and plenty of assistance to get things rolling.

From there, it’s easy to predict the backlash: seasoned crafters will claim this port is simply a “watered-down” copy, when that couldn’t be further from the truth.

You’re still able to choose which difficulty you’d like to submit yourself to, as well as variables that will determine the type of terrain rolled for your brand new adventure. The rules are still clear — as clear as they can be, anyway: keep safe from the various beasties that roam the landscape at night, and survive. All other rules and objectives come from you. If you wish to build an industrious empire that exists solely on a diet of pork and occasional delicacies, that’s your prerogative.  If it’s your goal in the world of Minecraft to create a gigantic slot machine powered by pigs, you can do that too.

For those with less “interesting” ambitions, living to survive is the basest of options, eventually culminating (if you choose) in a battle within the Ender to rival all previous scuffles. The world is literally yours to shape as you see fit. There’s no option now for creative mode, in which there’s no pressure to stay alive, but the main mode of play can still act as such, if difficulty is set to “peaceful.” Monsters won’t populate, and you’ll still be free to roam, build, and destroy as you see fit.

The only limits to what you can create are those you set for yourself. You can chop down trees for wood, shear sheep for their wool, mine for ore, and even reshape entire islands around your own personal whims. With the Xbox Live Arcade version, you needn’t even rely on guesswork.

Say you gather plenty of wood and cobblestone but aren’t sure of what you can do with it. An entire network of submenus is available that automatically lets you know which materials are needed for, say, a sword or a pick axe, out of the items in your inventory — even a crafting table, if you haven’t built it already, and it will be crafted for you. It’s a much simpler and less tedious process than stopping to consult a Minecraft wiki on creation and allows more time to assemble shelter and some semblance of a plan for survival. All potential options of possible equipment are laid out for you.

You know what you ned and what you want to work toward, giving you more time to explore and establish your own settlement. While it does, in essence, remove some of the trial-and-error exploration and pioneering veteran players were subjected to, in an avenue like Xbox Live Arcade where the focus has been shifted to accommodate new players and multiplayer sessions, who wouldn’t want to spend less time tooling around, confused, when they could be double-teaming creepers and Endermen?

But even still, it isn’t a perfect beast — there is still a fair amount of solo exploration and tinkering required before all the puzzle pieces start falling into place. You’ll likely still need to consult one of the many online Minecraft resources for ideas on what to try next, where to go, or how to react in certain situations. With all the assistance available, there could even stand to be more, coming from personal difficulties when getting started in the PC edition. A primer on what type of shelter best suits your needs or what certain beasts are capable of would have been welcome additions.

But the built-in toolbars and tips go a long way to make any player comfortable, and so does the interface. All, barring content (villages aren’t found in-game, as well as other Minecraftian content pieces,) is as it is in the PC version, save for some unusually sluggish rendering of blocks off in the distance. In a way, this port feels a bit more comfortable, like a modern Wolfenstein or similar game in terms of visuals. Camera work is smooth, as well placing blocks (mapped to the triggers) — it feels effortless. There’s the simple pleasure of not having to turn down the graphics to accommodate your laptop or older PC. Everything just works, and swimmingly.

So too does local cooperative and online play. It’s an absolute blast to erect new civilizations, power through stubborn rock, and team up on pesky monsters with a friend, as easy as inviting another Xbox Live user to play, or hooking up an additional controller. Local couch co-op with my father was particularly intriguing — something I hadn’t yet been able to try, and an absolute hoot. The situations that arise when tossing in another player to the equation always serve to improve the experience. You may have seen all there is to see in Minecraft before, but it’s always new again with friends involved, something this port does quite well.

This enhanced port may be devoid of some of the newer patched-in features (there’s more to come, the hints on the loading screens proclaim) and is intended to satisfy both new and old players, but it’s an excellent and full-featured version of Mojang’s smash hit that deserves all the praise its big brother gets, if not more, for bringing the phenomenon to a wider audience. Hopefully this means bigger and better things for the game in the future — and more for console players as well. Long live Minecraft!

Notch, the man credited with creating Minecraft may be working soon a brand new space game, inspired by cult TV show Firefly and under appreciated space trading title Elite. He described the project recently to PC Gamer.

He says that the game would be more about “being a guy on a ship, rather than just being the ship,” and will feature some realistic issues. “I want to run around on my ship and have to put out a fire. Like, oh crap, the cooling system failed.”

Notch hasn’t said if he would personally develop the game, or if there’s a release window, but  did confirm that he would be releasing it the same way he did with Minecraft.

Tim Schafer and Double Fine’s Psychonauts could be the most under-appreciated game in history, so naturally fans are no clamoring for a sequel, but even the most passionate fan doesn’t seem to hold a candle to Minecraft creator Markus “Notch” Persson, who is willing to at least partially fund a possible Psychonauts 2.

Apparently everything started when Schafer gave an interview to Digital Spy, saying that despite the studio’s switch to smaller, digital delivery games like Stacking, Costume Quest and Trenched The Iron Brigade, he would love to do a sequel to Psychonauts…if “a few million dollars would suddenly become available. That’s where Notch has seemingly stepped in. In a tweet directed directly to Schafer, the Minecraft creator said simply; “Let’s make Psychonauts 2 happen.” Notch later sent a follow-up tweet assuring Schafer, and the rest of his followers that he was in fact very serious about the proposition.

Trying…to…keep…fanboy urges…down…

So just what does Schafer think of all this? In typical Schafer fashion,  he played off the rumors to Kotaku. “”I just woke up, is something strange going on?” The developer did take to Twitter to comment on the rumors later in the day — sort of.

“Man, so many tweets,” Schafer tweeted. “I assume this is all people asking for codes toHappy Action Theater and Rise of the Martian Bear?”Oh wait,” he continued. “Hm. This is interesting.

Writing about music and new artists to watch for tends to be challenging at times. As a reporter you want to sound interesting so that “this artist is great” doesn’t become your tag line. But how do you write about a “new” artist who has spent years in the music industry, already forged his own fame in a group and has worked with the movers and shakers of the Latin music world?

I first heard of Notch by word of mouth after he did a performance in New England. “This guy is hot,” is what I heard, and apparently I should have heard it sooner. When researching for a press contact for the singer, who mixes Jamaican, hip-hop and Latin beats, I was greeted by Fan sites, YouTube videos, MTV profiles and an artist album pre-sale website.

The question: How did I miss out on this? Thankfully, here are the answers so you don’t have to.

The former lead vocalist for the hip-hop/reggae duo Born Jamericans, Notch joined the music scene in the 90s. The Hartford native’s racial background is a combination of African American, Cuban and Jamaican.‚ 

Always interested in music, he grew up listening to Bob Marley in a largely Latino community. As a boy, he learned the Jamaican dialect Patois, was immersed in Spanish and created his own little dialect (Spatoinglish) as a result.‚ 

“I got influenced by all the dancing, the dialects, the people. I just expressed myself by mimicking what I saw and sharing when it was needed the most, to entertain or to liven the day,” he said in a recent interview. “I learned to appreciate the beauty of a melody or the pain, and I created fusion words.’

His early success with Born Jamericans allowed him to fuse words with the passion of music to create a tool to connect to people.

Known then as Mr. Notch, Born Jamericans singles like “Boom Shak-a-Tak” and “Send My Love” introduced the artist as sultry, smooth-singing counterpart to his partner, Edley Shine, and his rugged rhymes.

For five years the duo grew popular and achieved international notoriety by offering dancehall music to American urban radio.

But with fame came commercialization. With more use of hip-hop and R&B, dancehall diehards began to turn on the duo as they became more mainstream and the group dismantled in 1998.

Notch decided to go solo, tap more into his Latin roots and make unique music.

In 2000 he jetted to Jamaica to record authentic dancehall and reggae. By listening to other bilingual artists, he experimented with his dialect and recorded Hay Que Bueno, a hip-hop/reggaeton song that is perfect for dancing. The multilingual hit became popular on both Latin-based and reggae mediums. With the success the singer moved to Puerto Rico and started to work with reggaeton producers.

The single started playing on Latin radio stations too and found its place on the Billboard Latin charts.

Shortly after, Notch was featured in the albums of Daddy Yankee, Luny Tunes, Beenie Man and even ska rockers Sublime and Thievery Corporation. The success lingered.‚ 

“A lot of Hispanics love reggae music and they sing along to it many times not understanding the words well or they decipher what is being said, but it gives them a chance to poke into their curiosity and learn about the reggae language and maybe their own language.” Notch explained. “I’ve come along and offered more of a window for people to procure their curiosity.”

Curiosity that can form bonds amongst people.‚ 

“We all got dropped in the western hemisphere and got shuffled as dominoes, but anyway I can find words that are close to the roots of our native people and use them I try to do just to show our historical commonality,” Notch said.‚ ”It puts more soul to the melody … and it’s helping Jamaicans learn Spanish too,” he added with a laugh.

In 2007 Notch released his first solo album, Raised by the People, making it on Billboard’s 14th Best Selling Reggae albums and 9th Top‚ Reggae Artist of 2007. The single “Dale “ËœPa Tra” (Back It Up) made Top 100 in Latin charts and Top 5 in Reggae charts as well. The production is a mix of merengue, cumbia and bachata in addition to urban-pop and hip-hop to his interchanging medley of reggaeton and dancehall. Songs like “Que Te Pica” and “Rosalinda” are as playable as the single and although not easily understandable to English speakers, still addictive.

“I’m making headway now, but it’s been really hard doing what I’m doing and I’m not playing clean or fair. I am able to cheat by bringing out the karate side of me and show all the things I can offer, but at end of day I believe music is the universal language,” he said. “I know melody is internal and can cross any lines. Anyone needs a song to pump up with in the shower, on the way to work or just to bring back the spirit in their lives.”

The road has been somewhat long and less than perfect after he left Born Jamericans. As the singer says, though, the ability to record music he is proud of is worth crossing any red tape.

“With the group there was a lot of pressure from the label to make R&B present to get more airplay, to be more amicable instead of cultural and ethnic which was harder to sell. We were a group and we packaged the product so I strayed away from what the label wanted and showed them my art can be different and that as an artist I can show other pallets,” recalled the singer. “When I was going back [to Jamaica] and learned about war and drugs, teenage pregnancy and school dropouts I came out with songs like Rosalinda and other songs that had social commentary that I felt needed to express the message and show things form my cultural bag of tricks.”

As he continues to remake his image and grow as a solo artist, Notch has the advantage of knowing what is like to be at the top. He can survive in the music industry jungle and take it one day at a time as well. He says that all these years he’s been dropping hints of his return and now the pieces are connecting through the Internet, through his album, through his music connections and through fan support.‚ 

“I have more optimism and look forward to taking this industry by storm and getting people to sing my songs; but I have to take it day by day because I may be the most popular person now and later you may see me at the post office working!” he said. “The most important thing I aspire to is getting people to mumble my name, keep me in their minds, and its like getting a portrait of me in everyone’s house.”

Notch is debuting a new official website, where fans can order his album, preview new tracks and vote for their favorite songs.

The clean shaven and attractive, 30-something, also established his own music label. As he puts it, he has to deal with paying taxes and hiring personnel so he does not see the need to have his nose, “up in the air.”

“When people make a big deal about the dialect or the music or my business and ask me what I am like, one thing people keep forgetting is that I eat Italian food and French fries; I get my hair cut by Dominicans, play baseball with my Black friends and chill out with my Asian friends,” he said. “I’m like everyone, but I take time unwrapping my gift of mimicking the beauty of the people around me.”

Whether he continues being an underground sensation or becomes the next Daddy Yankee, one thing is clear. Notch is an artist who made it to the top and back and is still able to stay human. His music, like his personality, is energetic and magnetic.