A Beginner’s Guide To Minecraft Mods

Minecraft is a game all about building, exploring  and in general being creative. Naturally, players have gotten pretty creative with the game outside of the game itself and made many additions to it in the form of game mods.

Game mods range from ones that change the look and feel of the game to ones that completely alter it so you can never really get bored playing Minecraft. Whether you want to just spice things up or simply add some extra features to enhance your experience, there’s bound to be a mod or Minecraft recipes list out there that gives you exactly what you need.

The Minecraft Forge

To start things of, you’ll need to know how to install those mods. In the early days of Minecraft modding you had to install mods manually which could end up being quite a hassle. To make everyones job easier, modders have released an API called Minecraft Forge that makes it very easy to install and try out different mods.

These days it’s required for pretty much any mod.  So first you’re going to have to download and install Minecraft Forge. During the installation choose install client and you’re good to go.

Installing mods

To install mods, you need to download the mod and put it in your Minecraft mods folder. The easiest way to do it is to select Run from the start menu and input %appdata%\.minecraft\ and click Run.

That will take you to your Minecraft files and you should find a folder called Mods and place your mods in there. When you start Minecraft with the forge profile selected you can click on the Mods button in the main menu and it will show you a list of mods you have installed.

This covers the boring part. Now to give you a good place to start, here are some mods for you to try out that will hopefully get you immersed into the wrold of Minecraft. We will start with some mods that add new stuff to freshen up your game and round up the list with some life improvement mods.

Minecraft Comes Alive (MCA)

Ever get tired of the bland and boring villagers in Minecraft? Well, if you do, then MCA is exactly what you need as it brings new villagers and over 500 skins so each one looks unique and has a unique name. It also adds new ways to interact with villagers ranging for simply talking to even marrying and having children with them which grow up to have families of their own. So if you want to have more immersive NPC characters MCA has got everything you need.

LotsOMobs

LotsOMobs is a mod that adds  more than 25 new creatures to minecraft which include, but aren’t limited to, birds, lions, mammoths, penguins and even dinosaurs. It is a great way to breathe more life into the vast worlds of minecraft.

Oh, and if you often find yourself venturing into the oceans, just add the Oceancraft mod which does the same thing but for underwater life.

Decocraft2 and Mr_Crayfish’s Furniture Mod

These two mods do for props what LotsOMobs does for the wildlife. Furniture Mod adds more than 30 pieces of furniture for you to use to decorate you home while Decocraft2 adds a bunch of props suchs as light fixtures, chairs, beds, sound systems, storage systems and so on. It even includes a special Decowand item for you to craft that allows you to change colors of items to fit your decorating style.

Tinkers’ Construct

One of the more complex mods, Tinkers’ Construct adds an entirely new way to craft tools and items for you to use. By combining patterns, tools and materials you can modify and create special tools that suit your needs and name them as you want.

Whether you want a pick that mines gold faster or a shovel specifically for sand, this is the mod for you.

Inventory tweaks

Now this is a mod every avid Minecraft player loves to use as it expands and improves your ability to use the inventory. It automatically replaces your broken tools and sorts your inventory and chests. On top of that, it provides you with shortcuts for moving items with ease. All in all, it gives you a much smoother play experience.

JustEnoughItems

On the other side of things, JEI helps you use all those items you have collected by adding a useful interface for crafting recipes. Whereas previously you had to go to a wiki site to find how to craft something and what resources you need to use, now you have that information at your fingertips, or search for recipes of what you want to craft without leaving the game.

JourneyMap

If you ever played Minecraft before, you know it’s all to easy to get lost. JourneyMap revamps the minimap in the game by updating it in real time as you explore and allowing you to view it fullscreen. You can access it directly in  the game or in your browser. It can also be used for mapping of caves and interiors.

But wait, there more. The last neat thing it allows you to do is to place waypoints so you can always find your way back home.

Waila

Last mod I wanted to mention today is the Waila mod. Waila stands for What Am I Looking At and it does just that. It tells you exactly what you are looking at, what item or block it is and even from which mod it came from (in case you forget what mods you have installed – since that can quite easily happen 😊 )

Hopefully, this guide and list will help you get a grasp of the endless possibilities of minecraft mods and you’ll have a ton of fun trying them out.