Skyblock is a downloadable world and

minigame A minigame (also spelled mini game and mini-game, sometimes called a subgame or microgame) is a short game often contained within another video game. A minigame contains different gameplay elements and is often smaller or more simplistic than th ...

in the

sandbox video game A sandbox game is a video game with a gameplay element that provides players a great degree of creativity to interact with, usually without any predetermined goal, or with a goal that the players set for themselves. Such games may lack any objec ...

Minecraft ''Minecraft'' is a 2011 sandbox game developed and published by the Swedish video game developer Mojang Studios. Originally created by Markus Persson, Markus "Notch" Persson using the Java (programming language), Java programming language, the ...

''. The original world consists of a small island floating in the air, on which a player must survive on and complete various tasks with limited resources. It was originally created by a user named Noobcrew, who published the official version of the map to the Minecraft Forum on September 4, 2011. Being one of the first pieces of

user-generated content User-generated content (UGC), alternatively known as user-created content (UCC), emerged from the rise of web services which allow a system's User (computing), users to create Content (media), content, such as images, videos, audio, text, testi ...

for ''Minecraft'', Skyblock has become iconic and has been used on various ''Minecraft'' servers. It has also inspired various ''Minecraft'' mods and maps, as well as

derivative In mathematics, the derivative is a fundamental tool that quantifies the sensitivity to change of a function's output with respect to its input. The derivative of a function of a single variable at a chosen input value, when it exists, is t ...

game modes for other games.

Gameplay

In the original Skyblock, the player spawns on a tiny L-shaped grassy island suspended in the sky, populated with just one oak tree and a lone chest. The chest contains a limited amount of materials that must be strategically used with the main goal of surviving, expanding the island, completing challenges, obtaining food, and continuing to stay alive. Depending on the version selected, an additional sand island, access to the Nether, or the materials in the chest may differ, which can ultimately change the objectives a player can achieve. There is typically no end goal with Skyblock.

History

According t
skyblock.net
Skyblock and all of its original versions (version 1.0, 1.1, 2.0, and 2.1) have been downloaded over 12.3 million times. Since the release of the map, various

YouTubers A YouTuber is a content creator and social media influencer who uploads or creates videos on the online video-sharing website YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006 ...

have made videos about the map, which greatly increased its popularity. One of the first YouTubers to review the map was CaptainSparklez, who started a video series about Skyblock on October 2, 2011, just 29 days after the map's release. Variations of Skyblock have been created on several ''Minecraft'' servers, such as

Hypixel Hypixel Network, or simply Hypixel, is a ''Minecraft'' server that hosts minigames. It was released on April 13, 2013 by Simon "hypixel" Collins-Laflamme and Philippe Touchette, and is managed and run by Hypixel Inc. Hypixel is only avail ...

, the most popular server in the game. Skyblock on Hypixel was released on June 11, 2019. Skyblock has its own official ''Minecraft'' server. On September 24, 2024, Noobcrew posted a public statement regarding their legal issues with Microsoft and various Minecraft Marketplace–related companies since 2019–2020. Noobcrew claims that he tried to stop the commercialization of "Skyblock" branded products within the Minecraft Marketplace without his permission. Despite being the original creator and having provided Skyblock for free on his platform since 2011, the involved companies are attempting to invalidate his intellectual property rights. Noobcrew describes how some of the companies have provided Skyblock products for purchase, often labeling them as "Skyblock" directly with no secondary meaning, or names such as "Original Skyblock", and have generated substantial revenues from hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars. Despite backlash from the Minecraft community in favor of Noobcrew, the situation seems to be ongoing as of April 2025.

Clones

Minigames similar to Skyblock have been created in other video games, such as ''

Terraria ''Terraria'' ( ) is a 2011 action-adventure sandbox game developed by Re-Logic and published by 505 Games. The game features exploration, combat, crafting, building, and mining inside a procedurally generated 2D computer graphics, 2D world. ...

'', ''

Roblox Roblox (, ) is an online game platform and game creation system developed by Roblox Corporation that allows users to program and play games created by themselves or other users. It was created by David Baszucki and Erik Cassel in 200 ...

'' and ''

Fortnite ''Fortnite'' is an online video game and game platform developed by Epic Games and released in 2017. It is available in seven distinct game mode versions that otherwise share the same general gameplay and game engine: '' Fortnite Battle Roy ...

''. On July 14, 2020, Skyblock was created as a minigame in ''

'', which become among the most popular games on the platform, with over 40,000 players. After a

DMCA The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or ...

request by Noobcrew, however, the game was shut down due to copyright issues. The developer, Easy Games, changed the game's name to "Islands" and was allowed to continue operation. On November 22, 2023, Skyblock was re-created as a minigame on

, and achieved over 20,000 players. Due to a

request by Noobcrew, the game was shut down temporarily, and the developer, VisionCreatesFN, later changed its name to "Block Tycoon". Various user-made Skyblock-style maps were released for ''Terraria''. In August 2023,

Re-Logic Re-Logic is an American independent video game developer and publisher based in Floyds Knobs, Indiana. Founded by Andrew Spinks in 2011, the company is best known for developing and publishing the 2D action-adventure sandbox video game ''Terr ...

announced in a blog post that a Skyblock mode is being added into the game officially in a form of a

map seed In video games using procedural world generation, the map seed is a (relatively) short number or text string which is used to procedurally create the game world ("map"). This means that while the seed-unique generated map may be many megabytes in ...

that makes the world generate islands floating in mid-air. Lead developer Andrew "Redigit" Spinks stated that he spend a lot of time working on the seed to ensure that it isn't "as hardcore and grindy" as the community maps.

References

{{Minecraft Video game mods Minecraft servers Internet properties established in 2011