Include Tutorial subgame with Minetest

[Wuzzy2]

I suggest to include the subgame “Tutorial”, version 2.0.1 with Minetest by default. Subgame thread: https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=10192&start=150

Tutorial is, well, a tutorial which teaches Minetest basics.

If you heard of Tutorial before, please, read the updates for version 2.0.0, it came with a major change in architecture. The world is now generated automatically from a schematic and not directly included anymore. This makes it easier to do stuff like resetting etc.

However, the Tutorial subgame is special, you can not just drop it into the zip or whatever file and you’re done. There should be some sort of integration. I have written a plan here: https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=10312 (ignore my previous posts, they are outdated)

Justification:

• Makes life easier for newbies
• Minetest is hard to grasp, and there is almost no in-game help, so a tutorial would be an important starting point
• Mature and usable
• 25 votes (or so) in the vote thread (https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=9116) which makes Tutorial the current record holder xD. Compare this to Minetest NeXt which was included as Minetest Game (then known as “Minetest” or “minetest_game”) after just 5 votes or so.
• IMHO very well received by the community so far (former newbies often wished they had known the tutorial before)
• IMO it is kept subgame-agnostic enough, it does not appeal to any specific subgame (not even Minetest Game)
• Small file size (zipped archive takes 700-800 KiB)

As this discussion goes on, I will probably add features and bugfixes to the tutorial. You can follow development here: http://repo.or.cz/minetest_tutorial_subgame.git (HTML page) The relevant branch is mapgen.

[kahrl]

I think this is a great idea and would like to see this in 0.4.14. (Adding this issue to the milestone, since this most directly impacts people who download the release version.)

One thing I noticed is that I can't run the Tutorial subgame with mod security enabled:

2016-02-24 00:24:45: ERROR[Main]: ModError: Failed to load and run script from /home/kahrl/minetest/bin/../games/tutorial/mods/default/init.lua:
2016-02-24 00:24:45: ERROR[Main]: Attempt to access external file /home/kahrl/minetest/bin/../games/tutorial/mods/intllib/intllib.lua with mod security on.
2016-02-24 00:24:45: ERROR[Main]: stack traceback:
2016-02-24 00:24:45: ERROR[Main]:   [C]: in function 'dofile'
2016-02-24 00:24:45: ERROR[Main]:   ...hrl/minetest/bin/../games/tutorial/mods/default/init.lua:9: in main chunk

Can this be fixed?

[kilbith]

:-1:

Seriously, such a tutorial is rooted in the presupposition that our users are likely braindamaged morons who doesn't know how to use a video game in general.

And even if that's the (fictional) people you're targeting, do you really think that they will bother to read your soporific and overly verbose tutorial to learn how to move and climb a ladder while the keybindings dialog is already straightforward and effective ?

That's pointless in all cases.

Besides of that, including your tutorial implies to maintain more content (team is already understaffed and constantly overwholmed) and the mods you bundled are of low/middle quality or not mainstream enough.

[est31]

@kilbith it will be maintained by @Wuzzy2 . If it turns out to be low quality, or @Wuzzy2 doesn't maintain it, we drop it again.

[C1ffisme]

I'm nuetral on this. It didn't take me too long to figure out how minetest worked when I started back in 0.4.1. The only things I didn't know much about was commands and modding, and those are relatively easy to learn for anyone over the age of 11.

[kaeza]

braindamaged morons

...

[Wuzzy2]

Seriously, such a tutorial is rooted in the presupposition that our users are likely braindamaged morons who doesn't know how to use a video game in general.

Well, the whole idea behind a tutorial is to help newbies who don’t know anything about the game before. And, well, this includes showing basic things. Each game has its own rules. Yes, sure, basic stuff like walking/jumping/etc. is similar in many games, but the devil lies in the details. That’s why pretty much every tutorial for every game starts at 0. Also: Did you know how crafting works without the wiki? If yes, would you have figured it out without Minecraft? ;-) Also, players would not be forced at all to use the tutorial, obviously. If they feel so smart, they can simply ignore it. ;-) But seriously I am a bit surprised to see opposition to the mere idea of a tutorial. And IMO it does not make sense.

For you everything seems obvious and don’t see need for a tutorial. That might be true for you, plus, you already know how everything works. From this standpoint, it is a bit hard to judge whether someone who does not know all this stuff needs it, isn’t it? Just because you don’t need a tutorial does not mean others don't.

There were some people who wished the tutorial existed before they started with Minetest so this shows there is definitely demand for it. (25 cough votes cough)

while the keybindings dialog is already straightforward and effective ?

I disagree, the keybinding dialog is VERY incomplete, there are a couple of things which you cannot rebind like camera and minimap (unless you edit minetest.conf ...), also you can't rebind mouse buttons (like attack etc.) at all, there are many key combinations which you can only know by reading the wiki. Sneaking key is very weird. The Esc pause menu only lists very few key bindings, plus these are just the default ones anyway. Long story short, keybindings overall are a big mess. Don’t blame it on me, please. :p

Besides of that, including your tutorial implies to maintain more content (team is already understaffed and constantly overwholmed)

Answered by est31. Also, I am not sure if maintenance work would be that much. If new major features emerge, they need to be included, obviously. Then bugfixes and that's it. Or do you think other tasks would be required as well?

and the mods you bundled are of low/middle quality or not mainstream enough.

Please elaborate. And why do mods have to be “mainstream” to be included in a subgame? o_O

Oh, and to kahrl: I will look on the mod security issue. Thanks for testing.

[sofar]

I'm strongly in favor, as well as adding more "showcase" subgames like this. This tutorial is - even for experienced players - a total worthwhile playthrough (I've played it, and when I showed my son it he at first had kilbith's attitude, but afterwards totally loved playing it, and learned some new things, too).

[kilbith]

@Wuzzy2 About newbies, they either :

• Learn best by experiments and trials-and-errors in regular playing.
• Have at least a small idea of the Minecraft's gameplay, and they found their path to Minetest by typing "Minecraft alternative" in the search engines.

This is quickly assimilated even for a kid. I never heard say that Minetest is too hard to masterize except for installing mods. It's been >20 years I play video games and I never seen such a tutorial except in games involving a particular gameplay (like strategy or RPG). The basics you learn in your tutorial are already universal and self-explanatory.

I'm pissed off to add 1.5 MB (zipped) just for that.

25 cough votes cough

Votes on the forums are pretty futile. History demonstrates that people who aren't deeply involved in the project tend to accept everything and lets add more content without a minimum of thinking to the whole of factors. Minetest Game would be a terrible game if it we complied to the votes on the forums.

Please elaborate. And why do mods have to be “mainstream” to be included in a subgame?

OK I will develop a non-exhaustive list of problems about the Tutorial itself :

• Default nodes are outdated (old textures or drawtypes).
• creative mod is outdated.
• Some node textures does not respect the convention about size : 16px, and they're 64px or so. Some others contain too much nodeboxes (bad for performances).
• Mods like castle, cottages or darkage add decorations for the map but they're not necessary (some of them are even identical or close to Minetest Game's nodes). It should be more standardized by using exclusively nodes in Minetest Game (e.g. lanterns -> meselamp; cottages's straw -> farming's straw; darkages's bars -> xpanes's bars).
• Formspecs are badly designed : strings in textarea are oftenly clipped and not broken to newlines. Labels in buttons are clipped as well as simple labels by the size limits of the formspec.
• French translations indicate to use a QWERTY keyboard (whilst we use AZERTY here).

[Wuzzy2]

25 cough votes cough

Votes on the forums are pretty futile. History demonstrates that people who aren't deeply involved in the project tend to accept everything and lets add more content without a minimum of thinking to the whole of factors. Minetest Game would be a terrible game if it we complied to the votes on the forums.

So, what you are basically saying is, what the actual players have to say about Minetest is completely meaningless? Just a reminder: Minetest and any other game is nothing without players. Yes, there are players who make stupid suggestions. Ignoring stupid opinioins is okay because they're stupid. But not listening to the players at all, well, downright demonizing them is a stupid idea. I also want to remind you that former newbies actually wished they had known the tutorial. You did not reply to that point. If this is not a compelling reason for you to add a tutorial, then, well, I guess nothing will convince you. (If I understand correctly, you not only oppsed to the Tutorial subgame, but also the whole concept of it.) Also, if it is true what you are saying, that is, the vote thread doesn't mean shit, then its existance it very dishonest. It should be closed instead of keeping the illusion that the votes mean anything.

Learn best by experiments and trials-and-errors in game.

Crafting as well? Currently, there is no way a newbie can figure out how crafting works (let alone how it really works) by trial-and-error alone. Without the wiki or previous knowledge, you are completely lost. Players probably figure out how to kinda play this game, but as I said, the devil lies in the details.

From my experience as a Minetest noob a long time ago, Minetest (and Minetest Game in particular) was impossible to play for me without consulting the wiki first. That's especially because the crafting system is so WTF. It is not obvious at all and the chance that you figure out all the recipes by trial-and-error is also pretty low, you die of boredom first. ;-) There are just way too much possible combinations in a 3×3 grid. Also there are group-based recipes. This is a very unique concept in Minetest. Do you want to know how I figured out that it even exists? No, not by reading the wiki. By reading the goddamn source code! xD Back then the wiki made no mention of group-based crafting recipes. If I wouldn't have dug it out, the wiki would probably make no mention of this feature even today. That's just one example for “the devil lies in the details”.

Other examples for non-obvious features:

• Combat damage: You make more damage when the weapon is fully “retracted”
• Sneaking makes you jump higher
• Repairing recipes
• Minimap and camera (not mentioned in Minetest, keys can't be changed in Minetest)
• Radar mode of minimap (what the green and black colors mean, that it changes when you change height)
• Listrings
• Liquid sources (they behave a bit weird sometimes)
• Smelting and fuels
• The list goes on …

And believe it or not, there are actually players who start playing Minetest without being exposed to Minecraft first. I am such a player. :-)

It's been >20 years I play video games

Well, others don't have that much experience, that's why tutorials exist. Do even you realize your obvious bias when you say that other people don't need a tutorial? It seems you are just reflecting here. You don't need a tutorial, but it doesn't mean others don't. To back up your claim that we don't need a tutorial at all, you should look at the community and especially newbies and former newbies. Because newbies are the only people for which the tutorial is designed. It is not designed for you. That's why I think support from the community does matter here and your dismissing it is unjustified. And when I look, I see huge support from the community, not rejection. And with >20 years of playing video games you are hardly a newbie anymore, of course. ;-)

I'm pissed off to add 1.5 MB just for that.

First, where did you get that number? Second, what size would be acceptable to you?

And why is this so important? Minetest is super-small, I don't get it why I now have to bargain about every single byte now … For comparison, Minetest Game is about 4 MiB (not sure)t, also pretty small. I get it that Minetest wants to run on old computers but do we really have to aim for absurdly small disk sizes as well? (That's a serious question.)

---

Now for your concrete criticisms:

Default nodes are outdated (old textures or drawtypes).

Sorry, that alone is not an argument in itself for me. What you mean by “outdated”, is, if I understand correctly, is that it does not use the exact same textures as seen in Minetest Game right now. The goal of tutorial is not to hunt after every change of Minetest Game. It happens to use some (old) textures from Minetest Game, but Tutorial is never intended to be a Minetest Game tutorial. I see the tutorial as an independent subgame, not as an extension to Minetest Game. The fact that it uses Minetest Game textures was simply because I thought they were a good starting point. I could have used any other texture pack from any other subgame. Also, the problem with this idea is that it needlessly increases maintenance work, since you would have to change 2 subgames to change just 1 texture.

If you would say, “the texture XYZ looks like shit” or “drawtype of ABC is bad” that would be a better argument IMO.

The change would be easy of course but I really don't see the point of duplicating everything exactly like it is in Minetest Game.

Mods like castle, cottages or darkage add decorations for the map but they're not necessary (some of them are even identical or close to Minetest Game's nodes). It should be more standardized by using exclusively nodes in Minetest Game (e.g. lanterns -> meselamp; cottages's straw -> farming's straw).

So what? What's the benefit of just putting everything into default other than having different internal names? I could change it, of course, but I really don't see the point of if why it matters so much if it is called farming:straw or cottages:straw. Also, many of the nodes did not exist in Minetet Game in 2014. The tutorial does not interact at all with Minetest Game, also I want to remember that the goal is not to allude to a certain subgame, including Minetest Game. It just happens to use some of its (old) textures.

Again, would be an easy but pointless fix IMO.

creative mod is outdated.

Right, people are going to edit Tutorial World every single day, so this is a huge problem. ;-) Alright, alright, I am putting it on my TODO list, but it is of low priority.

Formspecs are badly designed : strings in textarea are oftenly clipped and not break to newlines. Labels in buttons are clipped as well as simple labels by the size limits of the formspec.

This is an issue I fully agree with. Yes, formspec texts are a problem. Sadly, as far I know there is still no sane way to create multi-line text labels which wrap around automatically. Every line break has to be done manually which is just a pain in the ass. I made an issue about that somewhere. And the tutorial is in desperate need of multi-line labels.

Probably this problem is fixable with manual line breaks but probably not fun at all to fix. xD

Also french translation indicates to use a QWERTY keyboard (whilst we use AZERTY here).

Sorry, I don't understand the problem here. Can you give an example? The tutorial makes no mention about keyboard layouts. Or do you want to say, the default keys to use on Minetest in French are different? Like, you have to press A instead of Q to drop items? If this is the case, then the keybinding problem in Minetest is even more serious and I have no idea how tutorial can fix it other than demanding from translators to also “translate” the key names, not for the language, but for the keyboard layout. WTF?

Some node textures does not respect the convention about size : 16px, and they're 64px or so.

The 16px convention comes from Minetest Game afaik and I want to remind you once again, Tutorial is not Minetest Game. Is there a reason why all textures have to be the same size at all costs? I tried to keep textures over >16px to a minimum but for some it could not be avoided. The crafting images in the crafting room are 32px×32px because a smaller size would not have worked. But I certainly won't change all textures to be 32×32. But maybe I can look into some textures where I actually can scale them down. But really this seems to be a minor issue.

Some others contain too much nodeboxes (bad for performances).

Really? I am surprised to hear this. Is there a suggested “limit” for nodeboxes? Also, I doubt that this is actually so bad for performance that it matters; I heard Minetest is able to efficiently render meshes, so this should be also totally the case for nodeboxes. Right? I need to do more research on this. But I may look into nodeboxes later and see if I can simplify them.

[kilbith]

Learn best by experiments and trials-and-errors in game.

Crafting as well?

Yes, crafting as well. You once start by putting an item inside the grid, you notice an output, try putting a second one, another output, etc. Overall, you underestimate the capacity of the human brain to do relations between elements to decide new actions and familiarizing with something.

Also does ever Minecraft needed to explain that in a tutorial ? Do its users massively complained about it ?

I feel like your Tutorial is just momentarily over-hyped in the Minetest community.

Formspecs are badly designed : strings in textarea are oftenly clipped and not broken to newlines. Labels in buttons are clipped as well as simple labels by the size limits of the formspec.

This is an issue I fully agree with. Yes, formspec texts are a problem.

This issue is a no-go for a Tutorial by itself. How could I learn if the text is partly missing and/or untranslated if I'm not an english speaker, honestly ?

Also french translation indicates to use a QWERTY keyboard (whilst we use AZERTY here).

Sorry, I don't understand the problem here. Can you give an example?

I'm talking about the first sign ("Introduction") where the keybindings for moving is detailled. And yes, default keys are inapplicable on a french layout.

The 16px convention comes from Minetest Game

It was choosen for a good reason : consistence. Having different resolutions into a world look messy. Saying "it's sometimes unavoidable to use >16px" is an excuse for incompetence. Good pixel artists can do detailled items with 16px whatever it be (see PixelBOX as example).

Also, yes, I expect the elements of your game to be standardized alongside with Minetest Game if you want to be "official". The latter is a quality referencial where things are largely discussed and verified by competent people so the game conventions are naturally emanating from it.

Some others contain too much nodeboxes (bad for performances).

Really? I am surprised to hear this. Is there a suggested “limit” for nodeboxes?

Yes, frustum culling does not apply on nodeboxes and it's more vertices to render, since models have internal/hidden faces. You should ask @RealBadAngel or @paramat about the snowy forrests...

[rubenwardy]

The tutorial should read the key bindings to suggest the key which is currently binded.

[sofar]

Seriously, such a tutorial is rooted in the presupposition that our users are likely braindamaged morons who doesn't know how to use a video game in general.

The tutorial is meant to be educational. You can't do "education" and skip over any parts, that is not what education is. You don't learn how to read by picking up an encyclopedia and start at the beginning. You don't learn how to drive a car by stepping in a driving car on the highway. Education means checking that you have the required knowledge for a certain part before progressing to the next concepts. Education means rehearsing concepts. Yes, it can and should feel awkward to someone who has played the game for years, and who knows how to play many games already.

A tutorial should be as inclusive as possible. And it should assume that the player may not have ever played a game before. That's its purpose.

[kilbith]

[...] You don't learn how to drive a car by stepping in a driving car on the highway [...]

I agree completely, but here we're in the same situation when someone feels obsessively necessary to learn us how to defecate whereas this is an instinctive predisposal. I exaggerate, but not so much.

[est31]

learn us how to defecate

wow this debate reaches lower and lower levels.

[sofar]

@kilbith really?

[Wuzzy2]

For the record, I will work on the following issues (non-exhaustive list) for the next Tutorial version:

• Tutorial fails when mod security is enabled (very important)
• Bad texts in formspecs (important, too)
• Keyboard layout issuse (I need to do more research on this one but I fear there is no easy fix)
• Use 16×16 textures everywhere (kilbith convinced me on this point, I was actually too whiny on this one ;-) )
• Outdated creative mod

I am still not convinced that Tutorial should go after Minetest Game textures. Why Minetest Game? I could as well as any other texture pack, there are pretty good ones. Whatever, IMO this discussion could go on endlessly since it boils down on matter on taste. But if you really have problems with the textures, feel free to redesign them, you can probably do it better than me. But I also want to know the opinions on others on textures and if you think it is an important issue. I don't want to change all or most textures based on a single opinion. But I'll do the 16×16 texture conversion for sure.

Feel free to complain about more issues here. But if you want to help, I suggest you write about a concrete issue like the mod security failure. ;-)

[nerzhul]

:-1:

[PilzAdam]

:-1:

Some remarks (non exhaustive list of reasons for my decision):

• You claim to be "subgame-agnostic", but you teach stuff about furnaces and boats; these are game-specifc, since they are not engine features
• The layout is very confusing and I got lost and confused a lot
• Displaying all text on signs is very annoying; ideally I want to be able to try the things while still reading the text
• I had a lot of fun figuring stuff out on my own when I first played Minetest; going to the wiki and researching is part of the experience (and don't say "but you don't have to use the tutorial"; if there was a tutorial like this when I started playing I would have had a lot less fun)
• You teach a lot of stuff that is not important at all (e.g. third-person camera is one of the first signs, although its not important)
• It would be more useful if this was a minetest_game specific tutorial; learning one game is more useful and teaches the engine basics, too.

[sofar]

Displaying all text on signs is very annoying; ideally I want to be able to try the things while still reading the text

This could be fixed by adding a text HUD element that displays the text while inside a certain area. This would keep it translatable as well.

[ObaniGemini]

I made myself a new idea on this. :+1: @PilzAdam : this should be more a tutorial map for Minetest_game :+1: @kilbith Not important. Boring to read tons of signs. Tutorial are usually boring. We should better learn on the field. Too much work for what it brings :-1:

I think it would be better to develop a real adventure game that would enable the player to learn step by step by himself (like MC finally does, without having a map).

[Wuzzy2]

You claim to be "subgame-agnostic", but you teach stuff about furnaces and boats; these are game-specifc, since they are not engine features

I made no mention about boats in the tutorial at all. I used a furnace as an example to demonstrate fuel, which is an engine feature. I thought using a furnace was the best way to demonstrate fuel. Anyways, this can be easily fixed by removing the smelting section.

Also, my attempt was to be as agnostic as possible (I said “IMO it is kept subgame-agnostic enough”) but I fear it is not always perfect.

The layout is very confusing and I got lost and confused a lot

Really? Oh, man, that's a bummer. Would you think the tutorial would have been better if it were linearly designed?

Displaying all text on signs is very annoying; ideally I want to be able to try the things while still reading the text

That's an interesting idea. sofar's idea on implementing this sounds reasonable. Of course this would need a major overhaul of basically all texts and I'd instantly lose a large chunk of translations. But the change might be worth it.

On the other hand, I fear this is simply not possible everywhere with the current engine. What about crafting? Any HUD text would be hidden as soon as the inventory is opened. :-/

I had a lot of fun figuring stuff out on my own when I first played Minetest; going to the wiki and researching is part of the experience (and don't say "but you don't have to use the tutorial"; if there was a tutorial like this when I started playing I would have had a lot less fun)

Okay, this is your personal opinion and I can accept it. The tutorial is clearly not designed for people like you who like to read wikis and research stuff. For my part, I did not have fun to research every tiny detail in the wiki. What should matter here is what the community says.

You teach a lot of stuff that is not important at all (e.g. third-person camera is one of the first signs, although its not important)

Is this a bad thing? Also, I think it is still useful to know. I wanted to make a little tour through the engine features as well. I wanted to show the full thing, enabling the player to see how Minetest works, not just how it kinda works. Not showing how to use the camera just feels incomplete to me.

Anyway, it could be “fixed” pretty easily by removing the “offending” texts or sections.

It would be more useful if this was a minetest_game specific tutorial; learning one game is more useful and teaches the engine basics, too.

I am sure your opinion has nothing to do with you being a Minetest Game developer. ;-) Jokes aside, I guess our opinions just differ here. My reason for being subgame-agnostic was because of my fear of fragmentation. If there was a tutorial for Minetest Game, then this instantly leads to the question where the tutorials for Technic, Carbone, etc. are. The result would be a giant mess of tutorials which all would boil down to the same basic rules anyway. So I decided the simplest way would be to make one tutorial which just teaches the Minetest basics, this should be a good starting point already. Also, Minetest Game really does not have that much features which are so unique. And, so way my idea, if there is a subgame which is very complex and unique, it could have its own little tutorial or something and this one can built upon on the basic knowledge already taught in the “main” tutorial so at least it does not have. But most other (simpler) subgames could probably be understood very well without additional tutorials. The actual issue about subgames is often not how to play them but to get to know basic values, capabilties of tools and blocks, etc. Something to look up stuff quickly. This is already possible, but you have to use the Community WIki which is a nightmare to maintain when you have a lot of nodes. Maybe this could be done by an ingame documentation system to look up things quickly. Anyways, I don't think most or even any subgame does need an additional tutorial if the basics have already been taught. And this led me to the conclusion that a subgame-agnostic tutorial was the best way to go.

Also, do you realize you just contradicted yourself? In your first complaint, you complained about my claim Tutorial being subgame-agnostic being false but it should not matter to you if you want a subgame-specific tutorial. So what kind of tutorial do you want?

[sofar]

Any HUD text would be hidden as soon as the inventory is opened. :-/

Add a formspec element to the inventory/chest/furnace displaying the same text as a side-text?

I'd instantly lose a large chunk of translations

why? the HUD can display arbitrary text, so you can just translate with the intllib stuff.

[sofar]

I had a lot of fun figuring stuff out on my own when I first played Minetest; going to the wiki and researching is part of the experience (and don't say "but you don't have to use the tutorial"; if there was a tutorial like this when I started playing I would have had a lot less fun)

I've heard this argument before, and I think it's a valid observation/experience, but it shouldn't preclude or prevent the existence of a tutorial in (a) minetest (bundle/end-user distribution).

The same arguments are being thrown in this thread: https://github.com/minetest/minetest_game/issues/869

"I don't want a crafting guide" / "I don't want (a/this) tutorial"

Is being proposed as a reason to support that

"I don't want *anyone* to have this"

However valid your experience is, it is "anecdotal". My 5 year old son played minetest before he could read well, and he certainly could have never learned minetest through reading online wiki pages. Of course, that's anecdotal as well, but it obviously pokes a big hole in your suggestion that a wiki should replace a tutorial. It just can't for some players. There are other reasons (connectivity, no localizations) as well.

I think this is still the best argument for "a tutorial" (perhaps not this one): there should be not be anything against educating players who want to be educated. Especially if it's out-of-the-way like this tutorial, and doesn't even impact normal gameplay.

i think this is the first time Wuzzy is getting a ton of full-frontal critique, as on the forums he's getting nothing but positive and constructive comments, and so it's clear that perhaps it's a good time to re-evaluate some of the methods and concepts that are part of the current tutorial.

But, let's not kill the idea of a tutorial shipped as part of the default bundle? Everyone who is opinionated against tutorials aren't going to likely ever use them anyway.

[Dragonop]

:+1: but only if you remove the "filling" inside your subgame, things like using your own nodes, your own textures, and putting mods that don't do anything other than decorating looks good, but I don't think it's worth the megabytes.

[0-afflatus]

A lot of the arguments I'm seeing are matters of taste and gameplay style. In my experience players learn differently - some like to watch videos, others will read the wiki while others prefer in-game tutorials or learn from other players, it's best to cover all bases. Some players are very young or not particularly bright and often end up mindlessly griefing because they don't understand what the game is about. A small amount of briefing makes the game more fun for all concerned. If we're worried about file size, perhaps we shouldn't be considering bundling any sub-games.

It actually does make sense to make this a leaner minetest_game specific tutorial, as it limits the scope and would make it much easier to maintain. Sub-games should provide their own tutorials or not at all.

[tenplus1]

The Turorial game in itself is a good guide to show players how minetest works and what is available, but I would like to see a GAME tab in the minetest main screen where you can list and download games to play with Tutorial being on top...

[ObaniGemini]

@tenplus1 + 1 (12)

[PilzAdam]

Really? Oh, man, that's a bummer. Would you think the tutorial would have been better if it were linearly designed?

A linear tutorial might be too annoying for players that already know some stuff and only want to focus on new things.

An interesting idea would be to design a formspec with buttons to teleport the player to the specific areas. That way the player can still choose the order without the hassle of searching for it.

I am sure your opinion has nothing to do with you being a Minetest Game developer. ;-) Jokes aside, I guess our opinions just differ here. My reason for being subgame-agnostic was because of my fear of fragmentation. [...]

A game-specifc tutorial is more useful for new players. If there was only an engine-specific tutorial, then the player would spawn in a new world and still doesn't know that they first need to get wood and craft sticks and picks. Having both, a generic and a game-specific tutorial, would be bad, too, since new players have to do 2 tutorials then.

A mt_game-specific tutorial would still teach the players engine features. It also equips them with knowledge to learn "smaller subgames" (as you call them), since they tend to be similar to mt_game. Bigger games still need their own tutorials, whether there is a mt_game tutorial or not.

Also, do you realize you just contradicted yourself? In your first complaint, you complained about my claim Tutorial being subgame-agnostic being false but it should not matter to you if you want a subgame-specific tutorial. So what kind of tutorial do you want?

That does indeed sound like a contradiction at first, but it really isn't. The first complaint is targeted at your specific implementation, while the last one is targeted at the general idea.

[C1ffisme]

If there was only an engine-specific tutorial, then the player would spawn in a new world and still doesn't know that they first need to get wood and craft sticks and picks.

Um... If it was engine specific, this would not be the case. My own subgame requires you to create ingot molds and use a hammer to bang an ingot into a pick-head shape (A bit like TerraFirmaCraft).

I can imagine even more different subgames popping up, such as ones where you survive on Mars, or maybe you don't even use tools at all other than a hoe and a scythe, and farm.

But the point is, an engine-specific tutorial would have to teach about modding (Not possible in-game), controls (very obvious and easy to learn, or reset to be more convenient.), or commands (probably the only thing worth teaching, and a small subject for an entire map).

I would support a tutorial for MTGame, but only if/once there is anything worth teaching. Maybe if we added some kind of technological system worth learning...

[gaelysam]

The opponents say that it teaches useless things. So I remember my first playing on Minetest on october 2013. I had never played Minecraft before, so I've discovered the game from the very basics. And I feel that the opponents are mostly experienced gamers or developers, as @kilbith says by "It's been >20 years I play video games". Many players haven't been playing for a long time and needs that. They are not forced to read all, they're even not forced to play the tutorial. A tutorial like this one would have helped me.

EDIT: typo

[est31]

As a personal story, I was pretty new to first person video games when I started playing minetest. I have built several houses already before I found out how to climb down on a ladder. Before I just climbed up and jumped down.

[Wuzzy2]

This discussion tends to revolve more and more about justification of having a tutorial in the first place rather than the issues of the Tutorial itself.

So, let's settle this, please: Can you, the core developers, please let me know whether you intend to include the tutorial in Minetest (assuming the bugs and problems get fixed, of course) at all? I need to know if it makes sense to continue work on the tutorial or if I have just wasted my time.

Just a quick “yes” or “no”, please. And please be honest. Thanks.

[Ekdohibs]

To my mind, there should be a tutorial included in Minetest.

[est31]

Include a tutorial in the official engine? No. If it gets added it should be treated like a normal subgame.

Ship a tutorial together with mtgame as subgame in official minetest windows builds, and encourage packagers to package it inside the minetest package? Yes.

Its development should remain independent from the engine IMO, and best it would happen on a VCS managed place like github (whether inside minetest org, or under wuzzy account, idk).

Note that I haven't tried the tutorial yet.

[Wuzzy2]

Of course, I am talking about adding the Tutorial subgame. But I also proposed to make some main menu changes to make the tutorial easier to use. These are mostly suggestions for the front-end; I don't know if this counts as an “engine change”.

Tutorial's project page with Git repo is here: http://repo.or.cz/w/minetest_tutorial_subgame.git (current interesting branch: mapgen)

[C1ffisme]

I think I agree strongly with @est31 on this one. A tutorial for minetest game would be nice, but a tutorial for the engine, really wouldn't cover everything.

Maybe a slightly modded (Not mesecons or technic, maybe xdecor or something?) tutorial just to teach people how mods work, and to show how easy it is to modify the game.

[Fixer-007]

Will be nice to have in MT for noobs.

[Wuzzy2]

I just released version 2.1.0 with a couple of updates which have been requested, and some bugfixes. Changelog:

• Clone new creative inventory from Minetest Game
• Use 16×16 textures for all items (including nodes)
• Tutorial now can be played with mod security enabled.
• Commands to save tutorial map and entities are disabled when tutorial mod is not trusted
• Fix broken water textures in dev version of Minetest (weird …)
• Clean up bad overlappings in formspecs; texts should now work in small resolutions as well
• Minor refactoring and textures cleanup

There are two important bugs remaining, see here: https://forum.minetest.net/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=10192&start=150#p210209

Also, you don't need to wait for official Tutorial releases, I try to push any change as soon as possible on my repository, so if you want to follow development, just watch this repo. :) Here is the project page: http://repo.or.cz/minetest_tutorial_subgame.git

Note the relevant branch is mapgen

[Ferk]

Honestly, when I first heard of Minetest I initially thought that while the idea was nice, it was always gonna lag behind Minecraft. Then some years later I heard about how it turned into more of a game engine and I downloaded a bunch of subgames to give it another chance.

Tutorial was the one subgame that actually made me realize that Minetest can be awesome. It showcases some features of the engine that don't exist in Minecraft and that don't receive much exposure for newcomers in other subgames. Like the differences in viscosity of liquids, the custom blocks you can't jump in, the shift+jumping, tools being able to increase your reach, etc. Seeing all these things made me think that there was a whole world of custom games and mods that made use of all of this in innovative ways.

And it's not just a tutorial but also a minigame where you have to collect hidden tokens, it's not something that only newcomers could enjoy. You are not even forced to go through all the signs and read every detail, an experienced player can just skip through that and try to exploit every corner of the map, doing parkour and trick jumping in search for all the hidden diamonds.

@PilzAdam frankly, If the tutorial was limited to the small set of functionality only available in "Minetest Game" I'd rather not have it, because that one would actually be a boring tutorial. Specially if you want a menu-based teleporting that doesn't reward exploration… or a linear one with tons of hand holding. If I want to learn "Minetest Game" in particular then I'd play "Minetest Game" in particular, it's orthogonal. The things you will learn experimenting in the vanilla game (recipes, particular nodes/items, building) are not really exposed in the general tips and quirks the tutorial teaches (besides some extremely basic ones). I don't see the problem for there to be more than one step in the learning curve. Moreover, you probably will still want to learn some things of the specific games in your own way (or in the way the creator of the game might have prepared for you), so I think not going game-specific is good. Particularly for a tutorial game (not a tutorial mod).

I also find interesting that unlike the default game you are exploring a castle that someone has made explicitly for you to explore, it's an interesting change vs the virgin random landscape, specially if you already are an experienced (Minecraft?) gamer who won't really be surprised by the mapgen.

You claim to be "subgame-agnostic", but you teach stuff about furnaces and boats; these are game-specifc, since they are not engine features

This might seem like a contradiction at first, but it really isn't. A common tutorial would explain common elements that appear in multiple games. If an element is a common and important enough mechanic that the engine allows and that deserves explanation then it might be worth showcasing. I doubt "subgame-agnostic" means "subgame-avoiding", otherwise the game would be an empty singlenode mapgen.

It's nice to have a small game sandbox that showcases what the engine can do. This is something that can help "sell" Minetest and it's useful not just for complete noobs but for those gamers who want to understand the general mechanics better by experimenting directly with it in-game, instead of (or in addition to) reading a wiki page.

[paramat]

I doubt there's time now to include the tutorial plus the engine changes you request, devs are already busy with other milestones. I disagree with engine integration for the tutorial, as the tutorial is very MTGame-specific. I feel it should, if added, simply be a subgame that is shipped alongside MTGame. This way the tutorial subgame icon will sit there in-view like a 'help' button does, available, but also ignorable for those who prefer to learn by jumping right in. Whether a tutorial subgame should be included (without engine integration) i feel too neutral to vote either way, and haven't tried the tutorial.

[kilbith]

I just tested the last update. It still has serious technical issues : spawning in the dark, poor translation support, wrong keyboard layouts, etc.

But I don't really care to give further testing because I'm deeply opposed to the idea (as well as other people).

[Wuzzy2]

Spawning in the dark is not a serious technical issue, it's a matter of taste you disagree with. Or do you want to tell me that the lighting is broken at the spawn? That would be new. Poor translation support: Originally I never intended to add translations in the first place. The current solution with intllib is a hack, I agree. But as far I know, it works pretty well already. There are no issues with German translation as far I know, so I don't see the serious technical issue here. It's just a pain in the ass to maintain. The real fix for this would be if Minetest adds translation support for mods (#2270). Until this happened, probably every mod-based solution like this will be hackish, so I think this is not entirely my fault. Wrong keyboard layouts: If someone could explain me how to fix this, I could try to fix this. Also, there are still the two bugs from my previous post, for which I have no idea how to fix them. Any help for me there?

In general, I do not care if you are deeply opposed to the idea. Many players obviously do care about having some tutorial and a few opponents will not stop me. I do the tutorial because I think this is what is desperately needed and players do want it. Also, the tutorial will be entirely optional, nobody will be forced to use it. So what do you have to lose when something is added to Minetest? Do you maybe want to argue that having a tutorial might make things worse? I simply don't understand.

paramat: With “engine integration” I basically meant just some main menu tweaks, nothing more. About specificness: Well, it looks similar. But that's not really Minetest Game specific. Everything is explained in a neutral manner. At least I hope so. The only thing that I could understand would be the furnace, but even this is only shown as example to demonstrate fuels. Fuels are an engine feature. Do you have a better example to demonstrate fuels? It would be helpful if you can be more specific to what elements of the tutorial are too Minetest Game-specific in your opinion.

I feel it should, if added, simply be a subgame that is shipped alongside MTGame.

That's not a good idea. If the tutorial is just added as-is, how is the newbie supposed to know how to start the tutorial properly? The tutorial must be started in a very spefic way, failing to do so breaks the tutorial. Damage must be enabled and creative mode must be disabled, only singleplayer mode is “permitted” and the player must even manually create the world for it. At least there are warnings when the tutorial was started incorrectly (e.g. creative mode). But still, that's not a good “Welcome!” to Minetest newbies. Maybe, do you think it is okay to add Tutorial first, then maybe tweak main menu later?

Here is a rough outline I have for Tutorial now:

• Forget the 0.4.14 milestone. Sorry, I think paramat is right (sadly), it is too late.
• Fix remaining serious Tutorial bugs
• Include Tutorial
• Tweak main menu to make it more useful to newbies

What do you think?

[gaelysam]

When you see some players in public servers, that stay in the same place during 15 minutes, trying to punch rock with hands, flooding in the water, etc, and then… very often ragequit, I think that a tutorial could be useful.

@kilbith the quality of this tutorial is not the same question. In fact we're asking 2 questions:

• Does the game need a tutorial?
• Is this one good enough?

You can't say no to the first by criticizing THIS tutorial, simply because @Wuzzy2 has all the time he wants (WIP label should be added imo) to work on it before adding it, since it's not for 0.4.14 (rather 0.5 if it comes one day…)

About tweaking the main menu, here is an interesting experiment by @celeron55: #3818.

[C1ffisme]

When you see some players in public servers, that stay in the same place during 15 minutes, trying to punch rock with hands

To be fair... I don't think I have seen anyone do this. I'm not sure what people think they can punch stone, except those who accidentally turn on creative mode by mistake.

[gaelysam]

I've seen it many times, especially on minetest-france (when it was the first server of the list), or on MTZ-Basic (idem). Yes that's not always punching stone, but we see many players that obviously can't play (more frequent example: a player stuck in a 2-blocks hole that don't know the use of the sneak key).

[Esteban-]

From the few years that I helped servers as a moderator, I've encountered a significant amount of players who joined servers, yet had no idea about anything, even things we considered basics such as mining or picking items up. And I mean as daily thing, where we had to give a short explanation of how to do some stuff and refer them to MC/MT wikis in order for them to understand. I don't know if some servers still struggle with this, but many guests accounts joined time to time. I met many good players that didn't that there was a thing called "username", that didn't knew they looked to others as "GuestXXXX". Then add in the young players that have never touched a PC game. That they don't have the "AWSD" internalised as we do...Any ways, I believe any server owner and Admin can confirm these.

It's a fact that there people that arrive here looking for an MC clone, but that does not mean they do know how the game plays or works. I know because I was like that back when I first started playing in 4.6. I had to read the outdated wiki and constantly refer to craft guides.

So, yeah...we need not only a tutorial, but one that prompts players to view before joining servers.

[ObaniGemini]

I think the tutorial is not a bad idea, but a good singleplayer mode would be preferable to a good tutorial imo.

[C1ffisme]

@Esteban- Well, if you have seen these people, then I would gladly accept some tutorial.

[DonBatman]

I ran Minetestville for over a year. I have seen many players that did not know the basics. Even whenI started playing the tutorial would have been a big help. I think a tutorial should be included. Many new players are kids. They are not experienced gamers. Many want to play because their friends play minetest or similar.

[paramat]

The fact that many players are useless at first is irrelevant and obvious, everyone is at first, i was too as an adult. Minetest has been a case of jump in and learn through trial and error, and by finding advice on the internet. If a player gives up on the game too quickly by not having the patience or will to learn then we are probably better off without them. I'm not opposing a tutorial but let's not spoon-feed too much, just have it there as a subgame acting as a help button, not imposing itself on every new player.