Late: A Minecraft Horror Map

With Halloween just around the corner, I felt like playing something scary. Something spine-chilling and knee-knocking. Something so terrifying, it'd make Resident Evil 7 look like Barbie Horse Adventures.

So naturally, I decided to play Minecraft! Because irritatingly, there's still no HD re-release of Barbie Horse Adventures. Am I not sending enough letters demanding one? I'll send more letters.

Normal Minecraft is plenty scary, as anyone who's gotten lost outside at night will attest. But for extra thrills and chills, I decided to play MineMakers' new horror map: LATE.

A terrifying title! Because what could be scarier than being LATE for work? Apart from turning up on time and then having to do a full day's work (ARRRGGGHHHH!) Luckily, that's never happened to me. Phew!

The Nightmare Begins

The map starts with you sat at a typewriter, happily typing away. They used to use typewriters to make Minecraft.net too, way back in 1806, when internet pages had to be thrown into the sky by hand and you had to play Minecraft down actual mines. What a rubbish time to be alive that was.

After writing for about ten seconds, I get bored and decide to wander off (just like in real life). I explore and find some oil paintings on the walls. Lots of bookshelves full of books. A floating screaming ghost lady. Ooooh, these carpets are quite ni- OH GOOD GOSH WHAAAAAAAAAT?!?!

I try to act brave and tough, which isn't easy when you're crying like a baby.

Just when I think I can't take it anymore... I wake up! It was all a dream! Oh, thank heavens! Hopefully, me crying like a baby at my desk while everyone laughed at me in the Mojang office was just a dream too.

Well, at least I'm safe! In my swanky Minecraft apartment no less. I enjoy some cereal, listen to the news on the radio (all in French, annoyingly – I wonder what 'lâche pleure comme bébé' means?)

I head off to work! I ride the train, cross the street and enter a huge office building, one that's apparently made the irredeemable mistake of hiring me.

The lady at the front desk tells me my boss, the friendly sounding Mr Krueger, is waiting for me upstairs. Oh goody! He probably wants to promote me or to ask me to help him find a copy of Barbie Horse Adventures on eBay or something.

I wander further into the building, trying to guess what I'm actually meant to be doing here.

Sometimes I worry I'm bad at my job working for Mojang. But then I see people like this janitor here, and I feel confident I deserve my job.

After all, no matter how bad I am, at least I'm not fast asleep:

I wake him up, and ask if he can let me into the building, as I've forgotten my security card.

He's more than happy to let me inside!

Dunno what this company does but I hope they don't sell security systems.

Now I'm in the employee hangout area, I decide to eavesdrop on some hot gossip.

Two fellows are chinwagging about some haunted mansion, but I get distracted from my listening in when I look through the window and see the janitor is already asleep again.

Not getting enough sleep seems to be a company-wide problem. Check out the eyes on this guy:

Sick of hanging out with these judgemental jerks, I take the elevator up to Mr Krueger's floor. I'm about to head into his office, but can't resist snooping around to check out my co-workers cubicles (I'm sure lovely ol' Kruegy-boy won't mind waiting a little longer for his favourite employee/BFF/soulmate 4 life).

Wuss or no, you gotta admit that MineMakers and NewHeaven have delivered a brilliantly detailed map.

The offices are full of nice touches, like the drawings by employee's children on the walls, spilt coffees, and the fact that no one appears to actually be doing any work. They've really nailed the office vibe!

My snooping side satisfied, I head into Mr Krueger's office.

“Yo, Mr K!” I say merrily. “What's the happy-haps?”

Oh dear. I think I've made a huge mistake. Turns out Mr Krueger isn't my new best bud after all, but is actually King of the Jerks™. He's FURIOUS that I'm late and demands an important report RIGHT NOW.

I run frantically to my office. I switch on my computer and smack the PRINT button with a desperate please-don't-fire-me fist. At least, that's the button I thought I pressed. Turns out I must have actually hit the FALL ASLEEP LIKE AN IDIOT button.

Because that's exactly what happened next.

When I wake up, it's night time! I'm all alone in the office! Everyone's gone home without me! This game is way closer to my real life than I'd like.

Still, no biggie. I'll just take the elevator down to reception and let myself out. Nothing to worry abo-

Two coughs. I definitely just heard two coughs.

Is someone else here?

Oh, it's probably just my imagination!

I get in the elevator, chuckling at myself for being such a Paranoid Pete. I whistle happily as it descends. Hmmm. That's funny. Usually the music they play in elevators is quite upbeat. But the weird song in this elevator sounds more like the snap! of an elevator cable breaking. How odd.

“Oh, I'm sure it's nothing to worry about!” I laugh to myself, as the elevator hurtles down at dizzying speeds, soon to crash and become my metallic tomb. Wait – WHAT?!?!

Crash!!!

When I wake up, I'm lying on the floor in another room.

What. The. Heck.

I walk through the dark office, wondering why none of the doors seem to work. I know! I'll pop into the security room and check the security cameras! I'm bound to find a way out in the footage.

G-g-ghost? Must be my eyes playing tricks on me! Must be. Aha! I see a ringing phone on someone's desk – I'll use it to call for help!

I run to the desk, snatch up the phone, and the game asks me if I want to Call a Friend or Call the Police.

Oh I see your game, game. Implying I don't have any friends, are you? Just because I spent my weekend playing this instead of going to the stupid Mojang Halloween party that I didn't even want to be invited to because it's for jerkfaces. Well I'll show you! I chose to Call a Friend. Ha! Take that, game!

Anyway, no one picked up. Shut your face.

I'm about to try calling the police instead, when I hear them. Footsteps. Very nearby. It's too dangerous to make a noisy phone call now – I have to get out of here, fast.

But first I take a few selfies, fire off a few Tweets, update my Facebook status and read a few brilliant pages of my favourite blog to read on Halloween (www.bloggerbeware.com). Er, what was I doing again?

Oh, yeah! The ghost!

I mean, oh no! The ghost!

I creep back through the office and try the emergency exit door. But it doesn't work (does anyone do their jobs around here?).

There's the elevator, but after what I went through earlier, I'm never going in another elevator for the rest of my life! Unless there's more than two flights of stairs.

I know! I can escape through the air vents.

Actually, crawling around in a cramped air vent isn't as much fun as I thought it'd be. More cramped, cold,and creepy. This thin metal tunnel just keeps leading me to other locked vent covers, making escape impossible.

What if I'm trapped? I can't perish up here! IDIOT DIES IN VENT is a humiliating way to go! People will be giggling through my funeral.

I hop out of the vent and land in a bathroom. But the doors to the bathroom are locked. I'm still trapped!

Trying not to panic, I search the tiny bathroom for an exit. That's when I notice something in the mirror. Actually, a lack of something. Didn't I use to have a reflection?

Suddenly, the bathroom doors swing open. All right! Freedom, here I come!

I'm back on the floor of my office. After quickly stopping to spit on Krueger's desk, I focus on finding a way out.

I search my co-worker's cubicles, but they've all been mysteriously trashed. Eerier still, they now contain creepy mannequins. I don't know what's worse – the way these mannequins creep me out or that my colleagues apparently went creepy mannequin shopping without me.

I find a map, showing me a series of switches. It looks like they have to be activated in a certain order to get the electricity back on. Who did we get to design this building, The Riddler?

The first switch is in my office, along with this doll which shall now star in all my nightmares until the end of time.

I search around in vain, but I just can't find the switch. In the words of every parent doing last minute shopping in a video game store this Christmas Eve: “WHERE THE HECK IS THE SWITCH?!?”

Oh, wait, there it is. Just three more to go!

Switch Two is in the room next to the bathrooms. Because when you want to put a component that powers up the electricity somewhere, you'd naturally want that as close to the room full of running water as possible.

Switch Three is in Amy Graves' office. I thought Amy's surname was a little morbid, until I remembered that my name is literally one letter away from being the word 'TOMBSTONE'.

Switch Four would have to wait until I'd finished screaming, because when I left Amy Graves' office, these fellows were waiting for me:

Swallowing my fear, I creep past these mannequins and activate the fourth and final switch. Success! LET THERE BE LIGHT.

Now the lights are back on, the mannequins have all disappeared too! Maybe the darkness was just making me see things?

Yeah? Yeah! That must've been it!

Free at last, I run through the (now working) emergency exit door and-

NOOOOOOOOOO!

I plummet through the air, screaming loud and falling fast. What happened to the stairs?!? SERIOUSLY, HR, WHAT HAPPENED TO THE STAI-

I hit the ground and pass out.

And when I wake up... I'm back in the office. Trapped as ever.

Back where I started. All alone. Trapped in the nightmare. You know what? Next Halloween, I'm just gonna stay in and marathon Gravity Falls.

With no other choice, I get up and start searching. More creepy mannequins. One is posed as if it's giving a presentation. They never let me give presentations at work. Can't believe a mannequin got promoted over me. Again.

I try another room and find this guy:

But it's not all bad – I also find a keycard! And if games like Doom and Resident Evil have taught me anything, it's that nothing ever goes wrong when you find a keycard.

I use it to get a door open, letting me inside a room filled with metal shelves, stacked high with files. And also... YES! An open window! Salvation is in sight!

All I have to do is get through this maze of files, and I'm home free!

I happily skip through the rows of files when- OW!

One of the files fell off the shelf and hit my delicate frame! What a jerk!

OW! OW! OW! They're all falling! What a bunch of jer-

Oh.

Oh no.

I sprint screaming through the rows of free-falling files. They whack my spine, bruise and bash my arms and even (no!) mess up my hair.

But nonetheless, I make it to the window! I triumphantly leap out, laughing at the stupid files. Ha!

Alas, it's only as I'm leaving said window that I remember which floor of the building I'm on.

I don't remember landing, but I must have passed out again. Knowing me.

When I wake up, I'm in a musty room full of bins. Not the fanciest hospital I've ever woken up in, but at least I'm finally free of that haunted office. Now I appear to be in an underground car park! And if horror movies like Every Horror Movie Ever Made have taught me anything, it's that nothing ever goes wrong in an underground car park.

Drip. Drip. Drip. It echoes through the car park.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

I am safe now, right?

Yeah! Course I am! I'm just being paranoid and superstitious and oh good gosh that's the ghost isn't it.

“Stay calm, Tom,” I scream.

I stealth my way through the car park. I stick to the shadows. Crawl underneath cars. Dash only at opportune moments.

I also debate what's scarier – the ghost, or some of the worst 'parking' I've ever seen?

Unfortunately, I'm not stealthy enough. Now there's a horrifying ghost/monster/thing chasing me. Terrified, I run through the car park. If it catches me, I'm doomed. But on the plus side, I'm getting lots of great exercise!

Maybe I should print out this article and repackage it as a dieting book? Then I could retire to a lovely tropical island in the Bahamas, instead of having to spend all my time in haunted car parks. With this guy:

With that monstrosity giving chase, I bash several crates out of my way and sprint up a staircase. Reaching the top, I throw open a door and – no! I'm trapped on the roof! And I can't (at time of writing) fly! How am I supposed to escape now?

But then, a miracle.

The police show up! And, er, the fire department too for some reason! I'm saved!

I celebrate by performing my signature move: passing out.

And when I wake up, I'm fine! Back at home, safe at last! I decide to kick back with some TV to celebrate. Wait... where is my TV? Or my Playsta- er, I mean, my Xbox One?

Come to think of it, where's all of my stuff?

Hey! They locked me up in a padded cell! They must think I've gone crazy! When I call Mojang to explain what's happened – that I've been wrongly imprisoned in a mental asylum – they tell me that's no excuse for being late for work and so I'm fired.

Well, great.

On the bight side, all this luxury padding sure is comfy. And this is still better than what happened to me when I visited that Haunted Hotel or that time I tried to go skiing.

LATE was developed by Minemakers, with help from NewHeaven, and is available as part of the recent Java Realms update. Why not see if you can do better than I did?

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to say hello to my new cell-mate!

Howdy new BFF! What's your na-OH NO NO NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO