Minecraft sold to Microsoft.

[EvilOwl]

Minecraft sold to Microsoft.

 

• minecraftcpw (Forge team) just quit, more from him here, more comments

• head of XBOX on the matter

• notch is quitting

• asiekierka (Computronics, the dev that started helping porting BC to use Redstone Flux) said he's quitting (he has a drama tendency - he'll be back), he also fears for future Forge

• CovertJaguar (Railcraft and Forestry) on the matter

• ProfMobius (Waila and Opis) comment_1  comment_2

• CEO of Sony fears that this can lead to the same thing that happened to Rare

• RWTema (Extra Utilities) commented.

• blackdew (NEI Addons / Gendustry) blames Mojang

• Microsoft CEO welcomes the community

• mDiyo (Tinkers Construct) just left,  confirmed, why?

• LexManos (Forge team) is figuring out stuff while the community is preparing the LexFAQ, LexManos answered

• pixlepix (Thaumic Tinkerer) had the final motivator

• KingLemming is.... trolling

• FyberOptic (Hopper Ducts) made a statement >below

• article about modders on re/code

• Minecraft youtube videos

• mDiyo chooses boni as a replacement and he's doing pretty good from the start, his contribution to TiCon is already big

• some kids are very concerned about the whole deal.

 

I'm closing the updates on this topic for now. More in Modding News.

Edited October 11, 2014 by bochen415

[Munaus]

Moved, this had nothing to do with Tekkit modpack

[Nitus]

So, is this the time where people start grabbing the pitchforks and the torches? I already have a shed full of them, all I need is a reason to use it.

 

On a more serious tone, I'm actually interested in the modding community's response. Everything's chill when it's just a rumor, but when said rumor becomes true, it's like throwing nitroglycerin into a fiery pit.

Edited September 15, 2014 by Nitus

[Kezr]

Hopefully this doesn't mean that all 'old' versions will no longer be available.

Hopefully Microsoft won't kill the modding comunity and try to replace it with paid DLCs.

Hopefully Minecraft won't soon be covered in a mile-thick layer of DRM.

That's what I hope, but it seems damn unlikely.

 

If they had to sell, they should have sold to Valve.

[expletives]

[Munaus]

• Jadedcat changed her twitter avatar. OMGHHH!! What is this world coming to!?? Change is scary!!!

[EvilOwl]

• Jadedcat changed her twitter avatar. OMGHHH!! What is this world coming to!?? Change is scary!!!

 

You really are Captain Obvious

[NaRoon]

If you look at some of the press releases you may have caught that MS thinks that they will break even by the end of fiscal 2015. The next thing to think about is HOW? $2bil. in less that 12m when the game generated ~$125M clear profit last fiscal year. There are a few whys to generate that kind of cash flow.... none of them WE are going to like .

 

[Nitus]

I'm pretty sure they are gonna kidnap Creeper Babies and sell them to the Steve Market. That's a great way of making Minecraft $.

 

...what the fuck was in that drink I took?

 

Anyways, it's to early to start running around like headless chickens. Whatever happens, happens, and we can't do anything yet but wait. And I'm sure that if (and this is a big if) Microsoft bring down the blade onto our necks, then the Technic team, the Forge team, the modding guys in general, are more than skilled enough to deliver us new things (maybe a new game *hint hint*).

 

Let me end this with a wonderfull quote that has been in my "Quotes ready to use" list for a long time:

"We will not go quietly into the night!

We will not vanish without a fight!

We're going to live on! We're going to survive!"

Edited September 15, 2014 by Nitus

[toric5]

my worries are that , even if they don't drown it in drm, (TBH, I'm not to worried about microtransacions, at least its not EA) is whether it will still be available on alternate OSs in the future. (i own a mac that i bootcamp to linux, i personally don't like windows.)

[Kalbintion]

Here's my thoughts on this entire thing summed up into three tweets:

 

Those of you who are bitching about buying and Mojang need to just stfu and wait to see what happens. I'm not (1/?)

— Kalbintion Kier (@Kalbintion)

happy with mojang and minecraft, etc being sold to microsoft, but I am not going to stop what im doing just because of essentially (2/?)

— Kalbintion Kier (@Kalbintion)

back-end changes that are going on. Time will tell what the future is. Just wait it out and do what you enjoy. (3/3)

— Kalbintion Kier (@Kalbintion)

[Curunir]

I just read the official Mojang statement. It is quite understandable that Notch and the other founders don't want to lead a billion-dollar enterprise, even if it's built around their original concept. Cute as it once has been, the game has become a phenomenon and an extremely powerful force in our modern attention economy. Just look at the sheer number of Minecraft videos on Youtube and other video platforms.

Being responsible for something this huge can be daunting, and coping with that responsibility will slowly transform the ones who are doing it into corporate execs. Notch doesn't want to be like that. There are others who have already demonstrated that they are good at it, and handing over to them is a reasonable decision.

 

As for the game, it could use a little more focus. Currently, most of the (interesting) gameplay is happening in the modpack world, and the infrastructure for that could be better. I would like to see the hard-working people behind Forge and the other essential tools having secure, well-paying jobs. I would also like to see Minecraft base development to be more in sync with mod architecture and resource pack development. The MS deal could provide some of that.

 

On the other hand, MS could just be too corporate to see the actual point in Minecraft, and turn it into a DLC hell. I don't think they are that stupid, but you never know. We shall see what happens. All we can do now is wait.

[EvilOwl]

Well... KingLemming almost gave me a heart attack moments ago.... first post.

Edited September 16, 2014 by bochen415

[Kezr]

Untill I hear an official statement from Microsoft on their plans for the future of modded Minecraft, I'm bracing for the worst. But then, I am a rather pessimistic creature.

[KakerMix]

Notch "sold out" a long time ago and hasn't had anything to do with Minecraft in a long long time. 'Losing' Notch is a complete non-issue to Mojang and Minecraft. 
What I AM salty about is how Notch went about it. It's all rumors now, but apparently there were only three share holders and Notch had 71% of those shares. Nobody else at Mojang is going to get anything from this, nothing at all and to me that's unforgivable. Notch could have given some shares to his employees a long time ago but chose not to do it, and instead writes a little note about how he's sad he's a 'symbol' now and doesn't have a connection with his fans.

The hell man, you could at least have a connection with your employees, pay them a livable wage, maybe pay for their relocation and possibly give up a small slice of your literal billion dollar buyout deal to them. But nope, Notch took the money, didn't share it with anyone, and left the people he had working at Mojang high and dry. Like the dude has no actual humanity. 

[FyberOptic]

I really thought I would have more dislike towards Notch if the rumor proved true, based on everything he's ever claimed to stand for.  But after reading his post I mostly just shrug.  We've all seen how people react to him over every stupid little thing, and the amount of restraint he's shown is commendable.  I can't blame him for leaving it all behind at this point.  I don't know if we can fairly assume that he didn't leave anything for Mojang's employees as Kaker suggests, since we know that he gave them all a tidy sum of money in the past.  But I would agree though that it would be a bit of a dick move if he didn't.  Other than that, yeah, I just kind of shrug to it.

 

There's obviously things to be concerned about regarding things like the game potentially getting paid DLC rather than the free updates we're used to, and of course the whole modding aspect.  I've never assumed that Mojang's API will be a replacement for Forge, but them finally putting one out (if that's even a possibility anymore) could be their justification to go after the unauthorized modding.  Not that that's going to stop me, but it would hurt the community that's grown from Mojang's relaxed stance on it.

 

cpw quitting isn't a big deal.  Neither is mDiyo.  It's all open-source in both cases, and both have hinted at leaving before.  And there's more than enough talented people in the community to fill the roles and/or make alternatives.  Even in the worst-case scenario where MCP is shut down, there are even people who can still deobfuscate the game.  I've been doing it myself, even, and I don't pretend to be an expert.

 

It's a disappointing day, certainly, but I think there's just a lot of overreaction.  They can't take Minecraft away.  Certainly not the existing versions which are still plenty fun and plenty moddable.  The worst they can do is fuck up future versions to the point that we have to unfuck it for them, for as long as that's viable.  Modders have already been fixing Mojang's bugs for years, after all, so it's just another challenge.  And that's if it ever even comes to that.

[Stone Rhino]

Although the news is troubling, its also somewhat promising. Who knows, we might even get some much needed thread optimizations. As viral as MC is, I dont think M$ is going to just kill it. At least not right away.

 

*EDIT*

 

Maybe we'll get a kinect version!

 

trolololjk

Edited September 16, 2014 by Stone Rhino

[Munaus]

Notch keeping the money

didn't he share a 1mill with his employees once?

[EvilOwl]

3 millions

Edited September 16, 2014 by bochen415

[KakerMix]

didn't he share a 1mill with his employees once?

He did yeah, and as it was pointed out it was 3 million.

He now has *over a billion dollars* on top of everything he already had as well, and unless he peels off some to share with his very tiny, very profitable company I'm going to call him an asshole. Maybe he's just weird and can't connect with people Not doing stock options for his employees though, especially with such a massive buyout, on TOP of the wealth he already have, that's a dick move. 

[Nitus]

Here's the thing I don't get. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't Notch simply sell some of his stocks inside the company and then try the outside market? And why the hell did he sell to Microsoft? I'd expect him to at least search around and not just go "Oh, hey, they answered the call, they get to buy every share I have!" I mean, there are way better companies other than Microsoft, for example, Valve wouldn't change a thing about it and I doubt Take Two would change much.

 

Also, a question for the Technic team. Imagine that the worst happens and that Microsoft puts an end to modding. What will happen to Technic and the community? Do we have a backup plan? I'm more afraid about what's going to happen to this neat thing we have going on here then about the game itself.

[Munaus]

Technic has plans to expand to other games, which games that'll be is still open

[Neowulf]

In notch's defense, I suspect the guy is having the same issue many lotto winners have. The idea of being obscenely rich is so alien to him his brain is incapable of comprehending what the money actually means and has defaulted to something it could handle.

 

Every couple of weeks some lucky schmuck in the US wins $40-300m and is presented a choice, take a lump sum that cuts off somewhere between 30-50% of the jackpot, or get it all as an annuity over 30 years. What they decide is a good indication of how their brain is confusing the situation.

Lump sum: Their brain sees a big number and it just keeps going, all the way to infinity. They cannot comprehend ever using it all up so the choice between infinite now and much less than infinite every year is a no brainer.

Annuity: It can't be happening, because big numbers like that exist for other people only. So there's no difference between what they currently make and that number with a couple wrongly placed zeros, and they need to maximize it and keep it as tightly guarded as possible because one wasteful decision cans end you right back to the poor house.

 

I'm guessing notch falls into the second group, he just cannot comprehend how much he actually can do with this money and sees it as less than it actually is.

I get that idea from a quote they had of him on npr. Apparently the guy took the deal because he doesn't want to be part of the big game biz and plans on using the cash to make a couple more small games.

The guy could hire his old team with million dollar salaries and putz around with any game idea they felt like, dedicating as much as any AAA title out there, and still not dent his cash reserves for decades. And he expects it will let him personally make a couple games...

 

 

Personally I find psychology interesting. It's what keeps me with minecraft, the drama it runs on is just ripe with all flavors of neurosis, complexes, and full on delusions.

 

 

As for the future, I know KSP could use a good mod installer/manager and minetest looks like it just needs some love for it to completely replace minecraft.

[Nitus]

As for the future, I know KSP could use a good mod installer/manager and minetest looks like it just needs some love for it to completely replace minecraft.

 

...the map is a little bit short of -31000m bellow sea level...it's free...it has a Modding API and texture packs...my god, I'm not going to see the outside world again...

Edited September 16, 2014 by Nitus

[dwwojcik]

...the map is a little bit short of -31000m bellow sea level...

Wait what

 

Holy crap.

 

That's... awesome.

[FyberOptic]

Given that there's nothing actually wrong with Minecraft at the moment, I don't see the point in switching to clones.  Terasology, Minetest, TUG, you name it, they all have significant performance problems that need to be ironed out.  Ironically, so does Minecraft 1.8, but even with its problems it's still the much better choice.  Especially for modding.