Microsoft bought the video game development studio Mojang, responsible for Minecraft, for $2.5 billion on Monday, September 15. Three of its founders, Carl Manneh, Jakob Porsér, and Markus “Notch” Persson, are leaving the company following the sale. In a statement released on Mojang’s blog, fans were told not to worry about the future of Minecraft, and Mojang is impressed with Microsoft’s size and ability to support Minecraft’s growth in a way it deserves. In regards to Notch’s sudden departure from the game development community, the blog post revealed that he’s “decided that he does not want the responsibility of owning a company of such global significance. Over the past few years, he’s made attempts to work on smaller projects, but the pressure of owning Minecraft became too much for him to handle.” Later, in an interview with IGN, Notch dismissed claims of hypocrisy after he’d been a vocal opponent of the Oculus VR sale to Facebook. Instead, he reasoned that he simply wanted out of this thing he’d created. “I don’t consider myself a game developer,” he said. “I don’t try to… change the world… I don’t want to be a symbol… It’s not about the money, it’s about my sanity.”
In a way, the sale makes sense. Minecraft came to consoles for the first time last year exclusively on Xbox 360, so they’ve clearly been courting the founders for some time now. Microsoft’s strategy going forward will depend heavily on its Xbox brand, the real public face of the company to its younger consumers. In the last four years, Minecraft has seized the gaming habits of kids from 6-12, and Microsoft will want to leverage this for attracting a younger consumer base. There’s currently not a great value in parents purchasing an Xbox One for their kids when there’s nothing really for them on the console. Perhaps Microsoft will now be able to change this.
Additionally, this gives Microsoft a stronger cross-platform presence. If you look at the platform distribution of Microsoft’s software products, it’s all over the place. Office, Skype, and SkyDrive are available on all major computing platforms, including mobile platforms. Since Minecraft is now on PC, consoles, and mobile operating systems, this acquisition will give Microsoft an even stronger presence on those platforms. And that’s not even mentioning the exclusives that the Xbox and Windows Phone versions are likely to receive.
Besides Minecraft being good for Microsoft’s brand, there is also the fact that Mojang hasn’t done anything truly interesting with Minecraft since the introduction of Adventure Mode two years ago. Notch himself famously moved on from the game around that time to focus on development of a new game called Scrolls, which is yet to be released (regarding the status of Scrolls at this point, Mojang states, “we aren’t sure”). Mojang, the studio, released one game, Minecraft, and proceeded to incrementally update its features while increasing its price by $10 per new version. If anything, Microsoft should be able to kickstart the further development of Minecraft and truly reinvigorate the franchise.
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