

Microsoft buys Minecraft for 2.5B - ropiku
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2014/sept14/09-15news.aspx

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ghc
Even if Mojang might as well be Notch's child, if I were him I'd be laughing
all the way to the bank at that acquisition price.

And I really hope he's making a lot of his employees rich in the process.

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Mithaldu
> Microsoft’s investments in cloud and mobile technologies will enable
> “Minecraft” players to benefit from richer and faster worlds, more powerful
> development tools, and more opportunities to connect across the “Minecraft”
> community.

Sounds like they intend to use it as a killer app for microsoft phones.

~~~
giancarlostoro
Sounds like they're either going to port it to C# or add Java development to
Visual Studio? Though I doubt the latter is the case... Given the history of
Java and Microsoft...

~~~
3g4sg4
From first hand experience, there is quite a bit of active Java development at
Microsoft. And no, it's not done in Visual Studio.

~~~
giancarlostoro
Interesting, I never really gave it much thought. I always wanted a Java
plugin for Visual Studio personally. Oh well. I guess IntelliJ is good enough.
I guess it makes sense, if I remember correctly some of their download
managers use Java themselves, or used to.

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kissickas
| Minecraft fans are loyal, with nearly 90 percent of paid customers on the PC
having signed in within the past 12 months.

This is unbelievable to me. Anyone have stats for other games to compare with?
Or does the constantly-developing nature of the game set it apart?

~~~
on_and_off
It is a very specific game that caters to an almost abandoned niche :
Minecraft is a sandbox. Unlike most other games where you either have a story
driven experience, or a match focused one, Minecraft gives you a sandbox and
let you build things in it. You can pretty much have an infinite game length
that way. It is no wonder that it has a lot of success with kids.

~~~
giancarlostoro
Or as me and my uncle describe it: it's like legos.

~~~
on_and_off
haha, that's not a bad comparison ! Lego with an infinite number of blocks.
Well, not infinite, only limited by your your resource grinding ability, at
least if you play in adventure mode (probably the weakest part of the game
btw).

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jwn
While Mojang may have taken a relatively hands off approach to modded servers
of questionable legality (Spigot, Bukkit, MinecraftForge), I have a feeling
Microsoft may not be so benign.

I'm not one to usually throw FUD, but in this case I feel it's most likely
warranted.

I predict an unhappy ending to the unofficial mod community, with it being
replaced by an official plugin API. It's been promised for years, perhaps it
will actually come this time...

~~~
gagege
I disagree. I bet MS will improve mod support. Minecraft mods are a huge pain
right now.

------
crad
> Microsoft plans to continue to make “Minecraft” available across all the
> platforms on which it is available today: PC, iOS, Android, Xbox and
> PlayStation.

While they say it will be available across all of the platforms available
today, noticeably absent in the enumerated list are OSX and Linux.

~~~
funkyy
I dont see any reason why Microsoft would like to share Minecraft with Apple
unless they will test the game, new revenue models and will be able to deliver
product that after release to IOS will bring more pros than cons.

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sharpneli
I have a hunch that we'll see a rewrite to C# and no more Linux support.

I'd love to be proven wrong though.

~~~
kcbanner
Why?

~~~
sharpneli
Currently it's Java. WP doesn't support java.

And it's not a big jump from having to make C# version anycase to moving the
main development to that port.

~~~
numo16
Pretty sure the every version outside of PC is not Java, so there is already
an existing minecraft codebase that could potentially be ported to WP (Xbox
version seems mostly likely for porting since it will already be using directx
for rendering).

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nly
Tech valuations continue to get curiouser and curiouser

~~~
nilkn
Minecraft is actually extremely profitable, though. It's rumored that Notch
already has a personal income in the realm of $100M/year derived from real
revenue, not funding. This is very, very different from, say, Snapchat.

~~~
nly
From what I can tell they still depend almost entirely on Minecraft, which, if
I've followed gaming correctly, has as many registered players as WoW but pay
no recurring subscription fee. Rough calculations seem to indicate MS are
going to have to double year on year profitability for ~4-5 years to break
even.

~~~
LanceH
There is also merchandise as a revenue stream.

The interesting aspect of the purchase is the mindshare. I have kids in
elementary and middle school and as far as I can tell, all their friends play
it. When my kids went as Steve and a pig (from minecraft) for Halloween last
year, they were drawing shouts nonstop from all the kids. Most parents had no
idea.

How you turn that mindshare into money is math I don't understand.

------
bru
Already posted there:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8318506](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8318506)

~~~
kiyoto
They are different links (this one coming from the acquirer Microsoft). It's
interesting to see how the two sides spin the acquisition.

~~~
jacquesm
Yes, but that will fragment the thread.

~~~
davidw
> Yes, but that will fragment the thread.

Offhand: doesn't that sound like something from an 80ies barbarian movie?

OLD WITCH: "You have fragmented the thread! You will all die!"

SORCERER: "There is but one hope - you must travel through the broken lands to
seek the ARC, and take it to the valley of the tall tree where the threads can
be reunited!"

BEASTMASTER: "UUUURRRRRGGGHHHHH"

~~~
krapp
What is best in life?

To derail your threads, to see their context driven before you, and to hear
the lamentation of their moderators!

------
Torgo
How much is this after Swedish taxes?

~~~
idlewords
Probably enough to buy one bottle of vodka at Swedish prices

------
holri
good news for [http://minetest.org/](http://minetest.org/)

~~~
watty
I don't know, one look at the site tells me that this will not be a Minecraft
killer.

I don't doubt something will succeed the current version of Minecraft but
Microsoft has all the cards, it's up to them to lose it.

~~~
holri
Free software's purpose is not to kill someone, but to give users the freedom
to use, share, understand and improve software. Something Microsoft can not
offer.

~~~
zanny
They could, but they won't, because $$.

------
progx
Congratulation Notch !

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heropotato
Good luck.

------
nether
FML

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imrehg
Well, I vowed never to give a cent to Microsoft again, so there goes any
Minecraft upgrade I've considered. Not that they will be aching, but
nonetheless...

(edit: thanks for the downvotes, I'll stand by it, though)

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Opinion like this is valuable commentary (IMO!) - people's attitude towards
Microsoft mean that the Minecraft community just changed, split.

[http://www.google.co.uk/trends/explore#q=skype](http://www.google.co.uk/trends/explore#q=skype)

Skype seems to have gone from a rising trend to a falling one (now at 65% of
the 2011 "interest") following the MS acquisition. Yes, that's partially with
WebRTC, Hangouts and other outside influences but MS's actions (further
centralising control) put many people off who wouldn't be simply put off by
the name.

~~~
smeyer
How much of a role do you really think that plays in Skype? Honestly, Skype is
so widespread that I'd bet the average Skype user (a) doesn't realize it's
owned by Microsoft and (b) hasn't really cared about the changes Microsoft
made post-acquisition. I could be wrong, but from my perspective it seems that
the average Skype user really doesn't think about these things.

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cliveowen
I never heard of this game, but a quick search shows it's an 80s looking video
game with very basic graphics (maybe there's another game with the same
name?). Anyway, I can't understand what could possibly justify that price.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Try Google'in it for half a second and come up with 10 million hits. Of course
its not the game they're buying; its those millions of enthusiasts' attention
and buying power.

