Duluth, MN, in Minecraft

 Hey, if you found this it's either because I linked you to it (more likely) or you searched Duluth in Minecraft or LawyerSpintext. In the case that you searched it, you're probably coming from my YouTube channel and wondering if this project is even still alive; Good news, it is, and a lot has changed since October. In the case that I linked you, please keep reading.

I run a YouTube channel, but making videos takes a long time and I give myself high (for me) standards of quality to meet. So, I'm starting this blog to post the stuff I want to without... I guess- the effort? Sounds bad when I put it that way post the smaller stuff not worthy of a full video, but nonetheless interesting. 

 What's changed since October then?

Superior Street

Superior Street has grown dramatically since the Medical Arts timelapse. Every single block on Superior Street from 5th N/S West to 4th N/S East has at least a wire model of a building on it. Most of them in fact have full 100% complete buildings on them. To name a few notable buildings I've finished: The Fidelity Building, Lowell Building, Hunters Block, Sellwood Building, and the Freimuth Building are all standing proud.

The Fidelity Building, and the Freimuth Building to it's right.

The streets are filled with pedestrians, as can be seen in the above screenshot. Not every block has streetlights or decorations yet however. That will be added at some point in the near future, probably around the time I finish downtown Superior St. In total, 70 buildings have been completed on Superior St. The number is closer to 100 when 1st is included, and over when wire-frames are counted.
 

Standing at the edge of East Superior St. and Lake Avenue.

Hamster tubes.

 Superior, WI

 I added Superior, WI to the world file. I thought I would do this after I completed Superior Street as a reward, but I got impatient and did it anyway. The thing about Superior, and parts of Duluth too, is that part of it's grid is on the cardinal directions. If you remember my first video, I talked about how I rotated Duluth went against the cardinal directions, and so to avoid building at a 45 degree angle all the time, I rotated the map. But this means now that downtown Superior has to be built at 45 degrees because it was already cardinal. My solution will be to make another version of Superior, but rotated 45 degrees, placed a few tens of thousands of blocks away from the main map. Players will then be teleported there when crossing the Bong or High bridge. When they cross into the section of Superior that was in alignment with Duluth, which inconveniently is half of it, they will be teleported back into the main map. Now, the bridge idea works fine because it's a choke-point players have to go through to get to Superior (unless they fly). But when you're in town, you can cross the grid change from many points, so this becomes a challenge. But I wouldn't have started this project if I didn't like one.

You can see how downtown Superior has been effected by my rotation.

Maybe I'm just not as brave as Build the Earth, but I think if I can pull this off it'll be something else.

 About the NorShor

 One of you might remember (comment below if you do) my teasing of a video on the NorShor. I don't want to say the NorShor is cancelled, but I had a factory reset during the middle of production which was highly demotivating. Why didn't I back it up? Good question. I was just glad I had my Minecraft worlds backed up on Google Drive. You can see what progress I made on the NorShor here. 

Watching the video again, I find it funny how I went "Goddamn... this is gorgeous." I had the exact same reaction a month ago when I visited the building for the first time to see a preview. I think I might've used the exact same words.

 What's Planned in the Future?

Trolleys

I'd like to eventually add a trolley system. In my replica of Gary, Indiana, I added a bus system so roleplayers could get around without flying. In that map, using the bus was very abstract, you teleported into a room that looked more like an abandoned warehouse with buttons you'd press to teleport where you wanted to go. That was dumb (actually it was a necessity because the server it was hosted on only allowed 20 warps on a plot, and I needed to be conservative with them). For this system, which won't be dumb, I'm going to have trolley stops throughout the city with buttons you can press to be teleported into a trolley. The trolley interior will be 2:1 scale, and have windows with, if I'm feeling ambitious, moving scenery. Buttons will be located throughout which allow you to pick and be teleported instantaneously to your destination. Transfers will of course be necessary, and for that I will put together a detailed map and book describing how navigate the system.

Modern yellow trolley, the same color that the Duluth trolleys were too.

False Interiors

All buildings will have the appearance of interiors through their windows. Many of the buildings already do this with curtains, but that's bound to get repetitive and unrealistic after a while. Perhaps putting maps up against the windows with pictures of interior could work, though I can't imagine that looking good during night. That's another thing too, I want buildings to light up at night, which is tedious and drains the life out of me, but it's another part of realism building I just have to do.

Interiors

What map doesn't benefit from interiors? When it comes to 1:1 building though, it can be difficult to fit a detailed restaurant into a 4 block space. To solve this, I think I'll start making the interiors below the buildings and have the player teleport to them. I could probably build them at a greater scale too so they feel even less cramped.

The Jolly Fisher was the inspiration behind this idea.

That's about all I can think of. If you've got any questions or just have something you want to say please leave a comment. I love reading comments.