Welcome to GamesBeat’s Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition guide. Below you’ll find information on how to unlock all of the game’s achievements, as well as some extra tips and tricks for making Minecraft your subservient drudge. As we noted in our review, part of the magic of Minecraft is figuring out the basics for yourself, so we recommend you consult this guide only after you’ve already played a little bit. Or don’t, whatevs.
Getting Wood (10)
Punch a tree until the block of wood pops out.
When you first start the game, find a nearby tree and punch it (with the R trigger) until it produces a block of wood. Notice that if you stop punching//mining a specific block or look away at a different block, your progress towards that block will be reset.
Also keep in mind that tools such as shovels and pickaxes have durability, meaning the more you use them the more they’ll wear out and eventually break. You can create stronger versions of each tool using rarer stones (gold and diamond being the best).
Taking Inventory (10)
Open your inventory.
Simply press the Y button on your controller at any time during the game.
Benchmarking (10)
Craft a workbench with four blocks of wooden planks.
After you’ve collected four blocks of wood, go into the Crafting screen and turn the wood into wooden planks. Then create a workbench with your new wooden planks.
Time to Mine! (10)
Use planks and sticks to make a pickaxe.
You’ll need two sticks and three wooden planks to craft a pickaxe. Unlike in the PC version, you don’t have to figure out how to make these — you just provided the materials and select what you’d like to create in the Crafting menu.
Getting an Upgrade (15)
Construct a better pickaxe.
You’ll need three cobblestone blocks (instead of wooden planks) to create the next tier of pickaxe (the same applies to other tools as well).
Note: The game assumes that you’ll naturally progress from a wooden pickaxe to a stone pickaxe, so crafting an iron, gold, or diamond pickaxe beforehand won’t unlock the achievement.
Time to Farm! (10)
Use planks and sticks to make a hoe.
A wooden hoe requires two sticks and two wooden plans to craft. You’ll need this tool to farm wheat for the bread and cake achievements.
Time to Strike! (10)
Use planks and sticks to make a sword.
A wooden sword requires two wooden planks and a stick. Link would be proud!
MOAR Tools (15)
Construct one type of each tool (one pickaxe, one spade, one axe and one hoe).
By now you should have everything but an axe, so gather three wooden planks and two sticks to craft your final tool. The achievement will pop instantly.
Also, in case you’re wondering if “MOAR” is referencing anything special, I’m just going to leave this right here.
Cow Tipper (15)
Harvest some leather.
Find a cow and beat it to death, then pick up the leather. Not all cows drop leather when murdered, so keep at it…you psychopath!
Monster Hunter (20)
Attack and destroy a monster.
Set the game to Easy, Normal, or Hard, and monsters will spawn at night. Kill any monster in any way and the achievement will pop. Creepers also spawn during the day, but explode when you get close to them.
Leader Of The Pack (30)
Befriend five wolves.
Wolves can be found roaming in the wilderness, usually in forested areas (for some reason I always find them swimming). To tame one, you’ll need a bone, which you get from killing skeleton archers (sometimes). But giving a dog a bone doesn’t guarantee you’ll tame it, so you’ll very likely need more than five bones to tame the whole pack.
My suggestion is to play on Easy early on and just grind for bones. 10 should do the trick, but 15 is safer, and any leftovers you can use to create Bone Meal. Then just carry the bones with you whenever you’re traveling the overworld and you’ll eventually run into wolves.
Any wolf you’ve tamed will follow you around and attack enemies for you, or you can tell it to “sit” and it won’t move, no matter how far you go. This is good if you want to leave all your wolves at your home so you can explore without them getting in the way or barking all the time.
Hot Topic (15)
Construct a furnace out of eight cobblestone blocks.
Cobblestone is probably the most common block in the game, especially when you start digging underground. However, you can also find plenty on the surface. Once you have eight, go into the Crafting menu and create a furnace.
Acquire Hardware (15)
Smelt an iron ingot.
After finding iron blocks underground and mining it, you’ll need to bring the raw iron to a furnace. Place the iron ore in the top slot and coal or wood in the bottom slot, and in a few seconds whoever smelt it dealt it… or something.
Dispense With This (20)
Construct a Dispenser.
Dispensers require seven cobblestone, one bow, and one redstone. You should have an abundant amount of cobblestone, especially from mining for redstone. Redstone is found underground, quite often near lava sources.
To create a bow, you’ll need three sticks and three strings, the latter of which require you to kill spiders in any mode other than Peaceful.
The Dispenser seems to be more of a novelty item, though, so don’t feel bad if you don’t find any great use for it.
The Lie (40)
Bake a cake using wheat, sugar, milk and eggs!
To bake a cake you’ll need one egg, three wheat, three buckets of milk, and two stacks of sugar.
1. Egg: Chickenducks lay eggs every few minutes, but it can be pretty annoying trying to follow them around waiting for their coveted white droppings. If you can, it’s best to barricade them into a small area or cause them to fall into a hole that they can’t get out of. Then it’s just a matter of time….
2. Wheat (3): Search for tall grass (you won’t have to look very hard) and attack it. Usually seeds will come out. Using a hoe, plow dirt blocks to create soil and then plant the seeds. It’s important you have a water source nearby, and that the seeds get lots of sunlight. Within a couple of in-game days, the seeds will have turned into fully-grown wheat and can be harvested.
3. Milk (3): Craft three buckets (each one requires three iron ingots), then go find a cow. Before slaying the filthy beast and wearing its skin as a trophy, use the empty buckets on it to get milk.
Note: Buckets can also be used to pick up water and lava, which is especially good for making obsidian, decorative waterfalls, or impenetrable moats around your home.
4. Sugar (2): Sugar cane looks like reeds and can be found around lakes. Bring the sugar cane to your crafting table and turn it into sugar.
Once you have all the ingredients, go to your crafting table and construct your cake in the “Food” tab.
Bake Bread (20)
Turn wheat into bread.
Now that you know how to farm wheat, getting enough to make bread shouldn’t be an issue. You need the same amount (3) for bread as you do for cake.
Note: If you save your game before making either the bread or the cake, you can get one achievement, then reload and craft the other item for the second achievement using the same ingredients.
Delicious Fish (15)
Catch and cook a fish!
To catch a fish you’ll need a fishing pole, which requires three wooden sticks and three strings. The string you’ll need to get from spiders in Easy mode. You might as well get six while you’re at it, since you’ll need the rest to create a bow.
Once you have a fishing pole, throw the lure in any large body of water and wait until it gets pulled under. Immediately yank it back with RT and you should catch a fish. Then take the fish to a furnace and cook it for the achievement.
Into The Nether (40)
Construct a Nether Portal.
To create a portal you’ll need a minimum of 10 obsidian blocks. Obsidian is created when water hits a lava source block. If you’re lucky, you’ll find underground rivers near a lava bed, and can lead one to the other.
The other catch is that you’ll need to mine the obsidian with a diamond pickaxe. Diamonds are the rarest material in the entire game, and are only found deep underground (if you’ve discovered lava, you’re usually around the right depth).
Once you’ve managed to collect enough obsidian, you can create a Nether Portal in one of two ways (see image). Then use a flint to ignite the area within the doorway, and the construction is complete.
To enter the Nether, stand in the portal for four seconds and you’ll be transported to a fiery inferno of flaming death and stuff.
On A Rail (40)
Travel by minecart to a point at least 500m in a single direction from where you started.
This is undoubtedly the most time-consuming achievement in the game (with the wolves and pig saddle close behind). 500m is a lot, it turns out, and it all needs to be in one direction. Each block is considered a meter, so you’ll need to construct a track that travels at least 500 blocks.
From x360a: “…in total, you will need 3 redstone, 34 sticks, 18 gold bars and 186 iron bars. Use these to make a total of 18 powered rails and 496 normal rails via the “minecart” tab in your inventory. Minecarts can also be made in this tab with 5 iron bars. Once you have all this, simply build the track in one straight direction with one powered rail to every 31 normal rails.”
When Pigs Fly (40)
Use a saddle to ride a pig, then have the pig get hurt from fall damage while riding it.
Saddles are rare items that can sometimes be found in dungeon treasure chests. Dungeons themselves are small, rare areas hidden underground that you may or may not come across in your travels. I had only encountered three in my 20+ hours of mining, and all I got was some cocoa beans.
If and when you obtain the saddle, find any pig and put it on them to make them rideable. For the achievement, you’ll need the pig to fall off a high enough location to where it receives fall damage (if you’re really motivated, you can put a saddled pig on a minecart, then drive both of them off a cliff for a sure-fire method). You can’t control the pig, nor can you recover the saddle after you’ve placed it on the animal, so this can be a little tricky.
Note: If you want to skip looking for a saddle altogether, enter the seed 888 when creating a new world and there will be a nearby dungeon on the surface with a saddle in the treasure chest.