4 creepy things about Minecraft Alpha

Minecraft alpha is a pre-production stage of Mojang's sandbox, from October to December 2010. While the game has countless features in 2025, back in the alpha stage, it barely had any features and was filled with game-breaking bugs, due to which it evoked weird, eerie feelings.

Here are a few ways in which Minecraft's alpha versions felt creepy.

Note: This article is subjective and solely reflects the writer's opinion.

---

4 eerie aspects of Minecraft Alpha

1) Heavy fog

The alpha version of Java Edition mostly had a heavy fog option (Image via Sportskeeda Gaming || Mojang Studios)

One major reason why the Minecraft alpha stage felt spooky was because of the heavy fog. Though the game had an option to cycle through fog's density, players usually played in the default setting, which added lots of fog to the game. Because of the fog, the game felt a lot more eerie than it actually was.

Even during the day, players were not able to see far and had a weird paranoia that something could emerge from the fog and kill them. Even today, playing the alpha versions at the highest fog level evokes that exact feeling.

---

2) Extra dark caves

Caves were extra dark in alpha versions (Image via Sportskeeda Gaming || Mojang Studios)

Minecraft alpha versions had an extremely dark cave system. Of course, if caves are so dark, it will automatically up the horror aspect of the game. Heading down into the caves to find valuable items was not a walk in the park.

Players had to bring loads of torches to light every single part of the cave, and also had to deal with jumpscares of finding hostile creatures suddenly attack them from the dark.

Alongside the darkness, players who experienced alpha versions were the first to learn about the sudden sound effects that played when they were in the caves. These effects made dark caves quite scary.

---

3) Glitched terrain and textures

Some texture and terrain glitches were extremely unsettling and confusing (Image via Sportskeeda Gaming || Mojang Studios)

Minecraft alpha had loads of bugs and glitches. While they are common during game development, they felt scarier and more cursed than usual in Mojang's sandbox. Some terrain generation bugs resulted in mysterious holes, exposed underground structures, and weird floating islands.

On the other hand, some block textures did not render properly, resulting in major graphical glitches that surprised players who played alpha versions back in the day.

---

4) Stories of Herobrine made Java Alpha scarier

The story of Herobrine played a massive part in why alpha versions felt spooky (Image via Mojang Studios || Minecraft Fanon Wiki)

Herobrine is a mythical creature that plagued the Minecraft community during its early development stage. From 2010 to 2013, it was strongly believed that Herobrine was a mysterious creature that dwelt in every single-player world. This creature had all the power that a player has of breaking and placing blocks, and of attacking players in unique and deadly ways.

The story of Herobrine started as a creepypasta on the 4chan forum, where players started discussing a Steve-like character in a single-player world that had white eyes.

Because the rumor of Herobrine was so influential during the Minecraft alpha phase, many who played the game at that time had a weird, eerie feeling of being watched or followed.

Since one of the first sightings of Herobrine was through the fog, this in-game graphical feature became even spookier. Furthermore, any weird terrain glitch was immediately connected to the creature.

---

Check out our latest articles on Minecraft:

• What does resin do in Minecraft?
• YouTuber's 14-year journey to the Minecraft Far Lands is about to be completed
• How to make waterfall in Minecraft