Category: Minecraft

Wow… didn’t see this coming and thought the rumors of it were out in left field. It was announced today though on Mojang’s website that Microsoft has purchased all of Mojang (mainly Minecraft, but the Mojang name and stuff as well) for a whopping 2.5 billion dollars.

So the big question is – what does that mean? Well nothing right now. According to the announcement, the majority of the team will probably continue to work on the game as usual. Updates will continue as usual. They don’t know the distant direction Microsoft will want them to go in, but for now there’s not much likely to change. So that means we won’t be seeing microtransactions or a metro-interface in Minecraft any time soon *snicker*. Notch has said though that he’s leaving Mojang after the purchase is finalized. His letter sounds a lot like Curt Cobain’s letter about how he didn’t want to become some big name and be famous and just wanted to make music because he enjoyed making music – except with video games.

It will be an interesting thing to watch post-acquisition. It’s either going to go down in history as an example of how a huge company can buy an indie gaming studio and not ruin their games, or it’s going to be the biggest example of big companies buying out indie studios and ruining them and everything that they make that people enjoy from a small indie studio.

Minecraft will be getting a huge terrain generator overhaul in version 1.8. Under your world type selection there will be a new Customized option and in the settings for this world type you’ll find 16 sliders which can be used to affect various aspects of Minecraft’s terrain generator, but you can also type in values directly. You also have complete control over things like the sea level and what structures you want to generate. Pretty sweet, eh? Check out this video by the Mojang team showcasing some of the presets and sliders you’ll have.