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Comment by navbaker | Hacker News Reader

My kids are just getting into Minecraft on the switch and I am a bit confused by the options for hosting a server. I’d love to hop on and play with them on a self-hosted server, what’s the current best way to do that or is that level of cross-play between PC and Switch on a self-hosted solution even possible?

Edit: I don’t currently play, which is why I’m not familiar with what’s out there

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There's actually two completely separate games (Java edition and Bedrock) that can't cross-play with each other. You can buy a Bedrock edition Minecraft for Windows that should be able to cross-play with the switch.

Java Edition is the original game and it's fairly easy to either host your own server (The dedicated server is just a .jar you run) or pay for a server ($10-40/mo) using a game server host.

Unsure about bedrock, there's some instructions here (https://www.reddit.com/r/Minecraft/wiki/bds/#wiki_bedrock_de...).

FWIW with the Java version you can easily create a LAN Server in game, by joining a world and then opening it to LAN.

https://help.minecraft.net/hc/en-us/articles/4410317081741-H...

EDIT: I just realized this works on Bedrock too, but don't know how the support on the Switch is

https://help.minecraft.net/hc/en-us/articles/4410316619533-H...

Bedrock has self-hosted servers available too: https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/download/server/bedrock

They're pre-compiled Windows and Linux binaries, but if I'm remembering correctly, I think they're statically linked, and I had no trouble running the Ubuntu one on my Fedora system.

I used to keep a Bedrock server running on my desktop, and my son and I could pop in from a phone, tablet, or laptop whenever we wanted to.

There are extensions/plug-ins to the standard Java server, allowing Bedrock players, and xbox accounts to join:

https://geysermc.org/

(Plus Floodgate so they don't need a Java account)

I just setup a new family minecraft server last week and have successfully hosted java and bedrock players simultaneously (one coming in from a Nintendo switch, another from their phone and several from Java clients).

There are also plug-ins allowing older (or newer) client versions to connect to your server as well (ViaVersion, ViaBackwards).

Oh that’s awesome! I’ll have to try that.

Cross-play between the PC "Java" edition and the console "Bedrock" edition is not really possible, so the best option is to play it on Bedrock on both platforms. On Windows you can download the Bedrock edition and play it there, it seems technically possible but a little complicated to play Bedrock edition on Mac / Linux too. (Some Google searching suggests you'll need to run it in a VM on those OSs)

Easiest way to get a server is to pay Minecraft (Microsoft) to host it for you via realms: https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/realms

But self hosting is supported too, there are official server binaries you can download from Minecraft here: https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/download/server/bedrock

There are actually cross play solutions such as https://github.com/GeyserMC/Geyser, there are some limitation, but not too many. Basically disabling the features that only exists in one version.

Do you always speak so confidently?

I think options are limited from the switch. You can't connect to arbitrary servers from the console version - just some curated public servers or by paying for Realms. You can hack around this with a DNS server that redirects the curated servers, but starts to get sketchy.

You also need the paid switch online for any sort of network play.

Check out minetest open source too, which is similar but separate game like minecraft. You can self-host the server.

or, as the kids like to call it, the "We Have Minecraft At Home" version.

Tell them they can just call it "Luanti" now ;-) [1]

It's also becoming more and more "not just Minecraft". For instance this entry from the latest GameJam, which is a nice little shooter [2]

[1] https://www.luanti.org/

[2] https://content.luanti.org/packages/Sumianvoice/extra_ordina...

I got a Java server running on my ubuntu machine in the basement, but the child prefers to play on XBox.

Rather than spend my time fucking around with setting up a server, I just gave Microsoft $3 a month to use Realms.

I've got enough chores.

You have to play the Java version on pc to connect to your own server software.

That is incorrect. There are several bedrock compatible servers available. See the official one here: https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/download/server/bedrock

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