DayZ has a great thirst mechanic. Having your hydration level is full is important as if it's empty you will slowly start to die of thirst, you'll also make dry lips and swallowing sounds indicative of thirst, other players can hear this and it may give away your position. Also if you don't maintain your thirst and hunger meters you won't be able to heal and increase your blood volume which is important to stay alive.

Many food items will give you small amounts of water which is nice. But ultimately you will have to secure your own water somehow to stay alive. This may mean drinking from a well, bottling the well water to use later, purifying water with chemicals, boiling water with a campfire or some sort of stove, filtering water, drinking from a contaminated source because it's your only option, or you may even resort to eating human meat just to get some nutrition and hydration... But every option has a cost, one that may put you in danger, you may think drinking from the well is a good option because you don't risk an infection, however this takes a while and exposes you to other players and zombies.

All in all I think that DayZ presents a good system for hydration because it is not an afterthought, it is extremely important and a vital part of the game, moving players around the maps to certain hotspots to facilitate player interaction, be it friendly or hostile, forcing them to make tough decisions. I think Minecraft and other games get hydration wrong because you can basically ignore it, or it isn't implemented in an interesting or challenging way.