Year 9 students at Epping St John’s Church of England School have made excellent use of the technology at their fingertips, using the game Minecraft to help prospective Year 5 and 6 pupils choose which school they’d like to go to during lockdown restrictions.

According to the Epping Forest Guardian, the school was compelled to find other ways of advertising because it was unable to hold open events for incoming students - and with great success, it would seem.

The layout of the entire school was recreated within Minecraft so that students could walk their avatars through the various corridors and get a feel for what the school is actually like. 

Joseph Rochester was the Year 9 student in charge of the project, explaining to the news source: “We would not have finished without everyone working as a team. I enjoyed the project and building the school.”

Excitingly, the official Minecraft Twitter page got wind of the news as well, and shared a tweet about the project, describing it as amazing, according to deputy head Sahbi Benzid.

Minecraft itself involves exploration of a blocky 3D world with infinite terrain, where players can build their own custom structures, fight computer-controlled mobs and work with or play against other users in the same world. Fun fact - Minecraft is widely lauded as one of the greatest video games of all time!

There are different game modes to play in, including survival mode where you have to gather natural resources to build blocks and items, adventure mode so you can experience custom maps and adventures, and hardcore mode, locked to the hardest setting and featuring permadeath, where if you die you are no longer allowed to interact with that world.

Check out our Minecraft modding online course today.