Frenily
| Running eras | |
|---|---|
| First era | 2010 |
| Second era | 2011 |
| Third era | 2012-2016 |
| Fourth era | 2021-current |
| Company Profile | |
| Parent company | MrPlantPlant |
| Predecessor | FreeCraft MC Server |
Frenily is a MrPlantPlant company, currently occupied with hosting a Minecraft Java Edition server. It was previously known as FreeCraft MC Server, or FreeCraft for short. Throughout its existence it's been focused on building a strong community and allowing its users to play in both survival and creative gamemodes. In the fourth era of FreeCraft and continuing in the Frenily era, a focus on creating a unique playing experience has been started. This unique playing experience would be reflected in the solid and strong community to start, but also to create a somewhat realistic representation of the world. This includes the division of the map into states, the existing of cities and highways linking them and the existence of certain companies providing goods and services. The interaction between this world and the players would be expanded on by allowing the players to create their own towns and organisations. Additionally, around the world, NPCs will be able to interact with you, as well as give you certain quests in return for some rewards.
History
Frenily has run in different forms over the years, known as eras. The eras were split by time and had different people responsible for the proper running of it. Before 2023, Frenily was known as FreeCraft.
First era
FreeCraft was founded by Adrian in 2010, when he decided together with some friends that it would be fun to open up their private Minecraft server to the public. Whilst it was very successful in the first days based on new player count, the physical server running it was not capable. After just a month, it was decided to move to another server. Due to various other events in the lives of the owners, this new server was never purchased and therefore the first era died out, having ran for 33 consecutive days.
Second era
Lessons were learnt from the first era, and Adrian found another co-owner to run the server with. This time it was chosen to run FreeCraft off a game-hosting service. Although the setup of the server had improved - there was more capacity and plugins were chosen with a certain intent, rather than just considering the fun-factor - a fallout between Adrian and the other owner caused this era to end after mere weeks.
Third era
In 2012, Adrian decided to give FreeCraft another go. Teamed up with yet again other co-owners, it was decided that a standalone dedicated server was necessary to run this server properly. This gave the owners full flexibility about how the server can be run, without a game-hosting service minding their business. The setup was to have a spawn-world, in which players could not build. It was however possible to buy plots of land in this world, which would automatically be protected from people with malicious intentions. Additionally, a survival-world was put in place, in which members could freely roam and build. Rules were put in place preventing people from destroying other people’s properties. Lastly a build-world was provided. In this world, which was a basic rendered flat world, all players had creative mode and could build wherever they wanted.
In the third era it was decided to focus on building a strong community. A form of effort was required from any potential visitor to become a part of this community. This took shape in the form of having to register on the server’s website before becoming a Member. Only Members could access the various worlds, while unregistered Guests were only able to roam around in the Spawn-world. To a certain extent, this ensured that any potential members had some form of commitment towards the server to become a good member.
Over the years, Colin took up the role of in-house developer. He created custom made plugins providing functionality that was either only provided by heavy plugins that offered a lot of functionality left unused, or not at all. Colin also created the Webclient, allowing users to log on to the server’s chat system, without having to use the Minecraft client. This allowed a further integration of Members into the community.
Following months of dropping activity levels, in September 2016 it was decided to call an end to FreeCraft. It was no longer worth the effort of upkeep and costs for a server that was virtually empty most days. In the 4 years of running FreeCraft, the server had accumulated over 7.000 members.
Fourth era
Following the pandemic-induced rise in payer activity figures in Minecraft, the old management team of the third era got back together to discuss a relaunch of FreeCraft. A simpler approach was chosen, ditching the Spawn-world, making the Survival-world become the spawn point for new players. The new Survival-worlds would become the main focus and priority of the server, while still providing a Plot-based Build-world for those who want to experiment or simply express their creativity.
Frenily
While not an entirely new era - by it's own definition eras are split by time and/or a different team responsible for running it - starting in 2023, FreeCraft was due to be rebranded as Frenily. Reasons for the rebrand were to completely detach the server's name from anything Minecraft related, including the -craft appendix and MC in the name. This enabled the company to branch out into hosting servers for other games, should there be a demand for it. Additionally, it allowed for a shorter domain name, which in turn made the usage of subdomains more feasible. The rebrand was also an opportunity to create a properly designed logo and accompanying style guide for consistency. The rest of the server's running were left the same in the rebrand.
Features
Frenily offers semi-realistic gameplay, within the boundaries of the Minecraft game. With the use of custom plugins, a couple gameplay mechanics have been created, like the arcade system.
Survival World
The Survival World is a free-roam world sporting, as the title suggests, the survival game mode. It is expanded with cities and highways, aiding in roaming around faster. A new player spawns in the city of Durness. The airport system allows a player to travel faster between existing cities.
Build World
The Build World features a plot based creative game mode for registered members. The plots have certain restrictions to ensure the fair division of server resources. For instance: once a player leaves their plot, any active redstone circuits or clocks automatically get disabled.
Arcade system
In the major cities in the Survival-world, the Craft Royale allows access to Frenily’s arcade games. Here one can play games like Blackjack, Roulette and get a free slotmachine try per 12 hours. Unlike a casino, the winnings are not performance based and users are restricted in amounts of games they can play per day.
Future developments
In the fourth era, the Frenily management team has set out to consistently keep developing new features.
RP mechanics
In the near future, a first part of roleplay-style mechanics will be launched. This allows registered members to interact with certain characters and play through missions to earn money and walk through a story line.
Town system
So far, there are a few towns that have been built by Frenily staff. These are referred to as Server Cities. With this development, all members that fulfill a handful of requirements will be able to set up their own town. The system offers protection, a member recruitment system, tax collection possibilities and more.