‘Minecraft’ news: ‘Minecraft Realms’ going on beta for Android, new achievements added to the game

“Minecraft Realms” will soon be officially coming to the “Minecraft Pocket” and Windows 10. This is the next step that developer Mojang is trying to take the game so that it can better expand the blocky world of “Minecraft” to more platforms.

Announced via the official Mojang blog, the developer confirmed that “Minecraft Realms” will have cross-platform play support between the iOS, Android, Windows Phone and Windows 10 editions of “Minecraft.”

There is a catch however, in that the current login method would be via Xbox Live. This is because most “Minecraft” players access the Xbox Live since the “Minecraft Xbox 360 Edition,” which supports multiple platforms. This will also be applied to “Minecraft Realms,” a sound decision considering that “Minecraft” has been purchased by Microsoft.

For those who do not have an Xbox Live login can still create one for free. Even with this, it appears that Mojang is not planning to make an Xbox Live Gold subscription as a requirement to play “Minecraft Realms.” It is, however, planning a pricing plan for the service, though this is not yet detailed to date.

Currently, “Minecraft Realms” is available as a free alpha experience for Android devices. Players can opt to try out the early build via Android. They would need to purchase a copy of “Minecraft: Pocket Edition” via the Google Play Store to do this.

For those who do not know what “Minecraft Realms” is all about, this is a service that lets gamers play “Minecraft” together online. It is a relatively safer way to do so, especially for kids, since access is given only to people approved within the group.

In related “Minecraft” news, the recently released “Minecraft Story Mode” skins also reportedly brought in some new achievements worth trying for. PressA2Join reported that a new content update has given six new achievements.

These achievements will require a couple of activities, like spawning a Wither, killing a Wither, creating and fully powering up a beacon, eating a Notch apple, dyeing all four unique pieces of leather armour and bouncing 30 blocks upward off a slime block.