We’ve had a ton of comments over the last month in our previous articles outlining some of the upcoming features for the next Minecraft: Pocket Edition update regarding when the update would actually be arriving. Well we finally have a bit more of a solid idea as to when 0.7.0 will arrive as well as a lot more details regarding the official multiplayer functionality that will arrive with this update. It isn’t exactly what you may be thinking it will be.
Multiplayer isn’t going to run like it does traditionally with the PC version of Minecraft in terms of hosting your own server, at least not at first. Initially players will need to get onto a whitelist to connect to the Mojang online servers that will be available for Minecraft: Pocket Edition. These online servers however will be available for people to set up for a fee should you want to run your own Minecraft: Pocket Edition server. In other words, home-based PC servers (or hosted servers through companies) won’t be supported right away but if you want to host a server you will be able to through Mojang for a fee.
All of those servers will be whitelisted, as we just mentioned, so to connect to any of them you will need to apply to get on that whitelist and be accepted. For those of you looking to host a server, there will be no OP commands. Instead everything will be done through a UI through the game which is rather cool, especially if you don’t want to memorize all the commands.
You do not need a PC Minecraft account to use the Minecraft: Pocket Edition multiplayer but if you do have one, you will be using the same name as is on that account. Also, there will be nameplates in multiplayer so you will actually know who is who.
When all of this arrives, it will be in the form of an Alpha version for Mojang to test out and make sure everything works. A full release of the multiplayer functionality will then arrive a few weeks later and the amount of servers online will continue to scale up.
So when will all of this arrive for Minecraft: Pocket Edition? Well Johan Bernhardsson also confirmed that the 0.7.0 update should arrive sometime in April 2013. So we really don’t have too much longer to wait until we get full multiplayer and you all will be able to connect to our official Minecraft: Pocket Edition server and play with each other and us!
Many thanks to Smint on the Minecraft Forums for getting these answers.
Website Referenced: Minecraft Forums | Johan’s Twitter
