
$250,000-a-day Minecraft strikes indie game gold - starnix17
http://texyt.com/minecraft+persson+notch+indie+game+success+00127
======
MrFoof
Having picked it up a few weeks ago, the game is an odd blend of open-ended
creative sandbox, epic-scale exploration and survival horror. It taps into
that feeling of opening up a bin of Lego and not having a specific model
instruction booklet. Its feature-set is still very fluid. Yet it seems to out-
do Civilization's "one more turn". This is a game where if you picked it up
tonight at 7PM and started out, you'd hear your alarm clock going off in
another room as morning rolls in.

The game has essentially gone viral at this point. Multiple webcomics are
covering it. There's decent coverage on social news sites. Industry rags have
picked it up. Industry veterans (I have a friend at Disney Interactive, and
another at BioWare) have absolutely taken notice, Valve in particular. Some
review sites are seriously considering it as their "game of the year"
candidate. This weekend the website (and authentication service) collapsed
under load. With some outside help it's up and fine after some refactoring and
offloading things to S3. Today he cracked 25,000 unit sales for the day, or
about $340K USD in gross revenue.

Yes, he. Until very recently, it was basically a one-man show. There's a few
dedicated folks coming on board now, but that's what's humbling. Today, Markus
eclipsed my day's compensation in just 88 seconds.

~~~
mambodog
What I think is interesting about the free-to-play period (due to website
collapse) is that it may actually be a massive boost, because it gets the game
client onto a lot of machines. That doesn't sound like much, but here's where
it gets interesting: the client auto-updates itself, bringing in new content
and features as they are built. To continue to get updates (AFAIK) you must
log in with your paid credentials. You can continue to play the 'free weekend'
version without doing so, but you won't get any updates. Thus people can
continue to play and be addicted, and that 'Register' link is there waiting on
the main menu when the urge for the _new hotness_ overcomes them.

Also, kudos to Notch for supporting Mac and Linux. I guess we're getting to a
point where, for indie games at least, a very compelling experience can be
built using a less-than-optimal platform (in this case being Java, which
heretofore hasn't been used for games a whole lot).

By the way, it has even had TV coverage here in Australia:
[http://www.abc.net.au/tv/goodgame/video/default.htm?pres=201...](http://www.abc.net.au/tv/goodgame/video/default.htm?pres=20100920_2030&story=5)

~~~
TeHCrAzY
The free weekend was horrific for the community.

I run the (I think) main public server in Australia: the server ended up being
a war ground, with impersonators causing havoc. Only now is the normal
community of users reappearing, the normal fun state of affairs being
restored: the "free" users wouldn't have had a fun experience :/

~~~
mambodog
To be fair, I think this is also a reflection on the state of the multiplayer,
which is obviously still in relatively early days in terms of both design and
balance (compared to the SP game).

~~~
kd0amg
A lot of public SMP servers I've been on had anti-griefing mods that seem
prone to breaking on updates. Combine that with removal of the paywall and
(from what I hear) username validation, and there is a lot more potential for
disaster.

~~~
TeHCrAzY
Username validation was down.

------
matthew-wegner
Minecraft has been a huge success, but $250,000-a-day is a little misleading.
The site was down for the last few days due to mentions from Penny Arcade and
elsewhere (PA ran two comics on Minecraft, which is insane exposure to a huge
gaming audience). Notch turned the downtime into a free-to-play period, but
you couldn't _buy_ Minecraft while things were down. The $250k/day number
actually represents a few days of sales pressure, but it's still awfully
impressive...

~~~
RossM
To add: in order to continue playing Minecraft after the free-to-play period
you have to buy a subscription, however I agree with the idea there have been
recent spikes as people do buy it.

I read somewhere that Notch had accrued at least two million in PayPal but
can't vouch that it's accurate.

~~~
ptomato
Certainly not two million in PayPal all at once, but if you want to know how
many copies he's sold the numbers are right here
<http://minecraft.net/stats.jsp> and I don't think the price has been below
€10.

------
teej
I spent 12 years waiting for Starcraft II. I bought the collectors edition. I
played to Diamond rank and beyond. But the day I started Minecraft was the
last day I played Starcraft II.

This game is really good.

~~~
wizard_2
Same dam story for me too - I'm not a big gamer, I don't have time to play
normally and minecraft has won over starcraft 2 for the past week.

------
sbierwagen
I attended MinecraftCon 2010 in Bellevue back in August.

[http://bbot.org/blog/archives/2010/08/31/wherein_bbot_gets_r...](http://bbot.org/blog/archives/2010/08/31/wherein_bbot_gets_rained_on_with_nerds/)

It was scheduled maybe a month ahead of time, and _located_ days ahead of
time, and _held_ in the middle of a field, in the rain; and still a about
hundred people showed up. Just to see Markus.

Minecraft fans are dedicated, I'll give them that.

------
InclinedPlane
A few minecraft related comics:

<http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/9/17/>

<http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/9/20/>

<http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=292>

~~~
tome
<http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/9/17/>

Can someone please explain this one to me?

~~~
sbierwagen
Half the game-- _more_ than half the game is the crafting system. You make
sticks out of planks, out of raw wood. You then make a hoe out of sticks and
stone, plow some dirt, plant wheat seeds, water the wheat, harvest it when
it's full grown, bake it into bread in a furnace out make out of stone and
fueled with wood...

There's a lot more in this vein. Gabe has a well known weakness for stuff like
this.

~~~
eru
If you like this stuff, you can also have a look at Dwarf Fortress, a game
that inspired Minecraft.

------
rsaarelm
The initial game with the day cycle and the monsters coming out at night is
genius. Really taps into a primal light-and-shelter instinct. Also the light
management with cave exploration is great.

However, once I figured out a wooden shack with a door built in a couple of
minutes completely thwarts the AI enemies, I lost most interest. The setup is
player against the world, but the world doesn't know how to do anything you'd
need a huge stone castle or a massive trapped dungeon to fight against, so the
great build system feels a bit pointless now.

Got to hand it to the author for making excellent core mechanics from a very
simple set of ingredients. I hope he can keep up working on the style and
figure out enemy mechanics you actually need serious constructions to fight
against.

~~~
swombat
_... but the world doesn't know how to do anything you'd need a huge stone
castle or a massive trapped dungeon to fight against..._

Yet.

~~~
rsaarelm
Yes, based on the author's plans, it looks like he's intending to add
interesting in-game challenges:

 _Free building mode is fine and dandy, but for many people it will ultimately
become boring once you've got it figured out. It's like playing a first person
shooter in god mode, or giving yourself infinite funds in a strategy game.. a
lack of challenge kills the fun. For survival mode, I'd rather make the game
too difficult than too easy. That also means I'm going to have to include some
way of winning the game (or some other climax) to prevent it becoming too
exhausting._

<http://www.minecraft.net/about.jsp>

------
shajith
Here's something that illustrates the sort of thing you can do in this game: a
12x5 LED display built in-game[1]. Reminded me of the Dwarf Fortress
Computer[2].

[1]
[http://www.minecraftforum.net/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=24213](http://www.minecraftforum.net/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=24213)

[2] [http://www.geekosystem.com/dwarf-fortress-turing-machine-
com...](http://www.geekosystem.com/dwarf-fortress-turing-machine-computer/)

------
ctkrohn
"Perrson cites games such as Dwarf Fortress, Dungeon Keeper and Inifiniminer
among key influences on Minecraft's anything-goes nature and blocky 8-bit
style."

Blocky 8-bit style? Those graphics would have been cutting edge in 1993,
almost a decade after the heyday of 8-bit systems.

~~~
sbierwagen
Additionally, they are cutting edge _now_. The textures are so small for
budget and performance reasons. When generating new terrain, my i7 920 system
with a HD 4850 drops to 40 fps. You can download higher-resolution third-party
textures, and they turn the game into a slideshow.

~~~
Gormo
That may be more to do with the Minecraft running in Java and not making full
use of the GPU.

There's no reason that graphics of Minecraft's quality shouldn't be blazingly
fast on current hardware.

~~~
sbierwagen
I like how you apparently came to that conclusion based on the language it was
implemented in, and without any knowledge of its internal structure.

I just fired it up with the ATI Catalyst panel open, and it said a maximum of
53% GPU utilization. Which isn't bad, since Minecraft wouldn't be using any of
the shader units.

Well, _presumably,_ since I know as little as you do about how Minecraft is
designed.

~~~
astrodust
The rendering engine is pretty primitive by modern standards, and shows signs
of being implemented by someone new to OpenGL. It displays all the performance
issues that a typical first OpenGL implementation does like significant lag
when turning around quickly where objects are swapped in and out of memory in
a blocking manner.

It could benefit from significant optimizations in terms of algorithm and
these would probably make it perform an order of magnitude even faster than
porting the same code to C++ would ever do.

The OpenGL layer is not being utilized effectively. I think the game is
currently CPU/VM bound and simply can't keep up with the GPU.

More aggressive use of the GPU, like through OpenGL or OpenCL calls, would
improve performance considerably. I'm not sure how viable the OpenCL angle is
on Java, though.

------
crux_
Of note: Notch seems to be a regular in the LD48
(<http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/>) competitions.
(<http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/author/notch/>)

I'm, um, an irregular. (Entered twice, finished once.)

Here's his screen-capture timelapse for the last one, which was a bit over a
month ago: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1629810>

------
slay2k
Holy. Shitballs.

My hat's off to this man. Perhaps the thing I envy most here is the fact that
this guy's achieved this doing what he loves. According to his personal page,
he's been building games for many, many years, and has entered dozens of small
competitions. He seems to genuinely love building games, and would almost
certainly continue doing it regardless of money.

------
ugh
A word of warning: Highly addictive, and not in a good way.

~~~
clofresh
can you explain?

~~~
thorax
The best I can sum it up: I can barely remember anything that has happened in
real life since I started playing Minecraft on Saturday. All I have are
Minecraft memories and I can't believe the clock now says it's Thursday.

Very dangerous if you want to stay productive. But I'm happy because I just
made my first lava fountains outside my home (after spending an hour scouring
the land trying to find where I had left my huge mine/home).

About the only hope I have is that Minecraft doesn't yet have a compelling co-
op mode for anything other than massive building. The "survival" aspect seems
not to work multiplayer yet, but if it did, my wife, kid, and I would be
playing in there all the time. Because it doesn't work, I have to come up for
air to spend time with them.

~~~
Sukotto

      after spending an hour scouring the land trying to find
      where I had left my huge mine/home
    

1) build a structure at your initial spawn point that points to your castle.

2) make a compass with 4 iron, 1 redstone (it always points to your spawn
location)

    
    
         I
       I R I
         I

~~~
thorax
Yeah-- I've been very paranoid about getting lost and had only died once
before (but found it quickly somehow).

So I determined that I wasn't going to have that worry again. So I set off on
a little quest after a lot of mining. I built a compass and was using it to
dig tunnels and place markers all the way back to my spawn point.

About half-way there I got assailed by two spiders which I dispatched after
they jump-kicked me down to 3 hearts. Of course, afterwards, a creeper had
secretly locked onto me and dropped on my head, blowing me and my supplies and
compass to smithereens.

So I respawned and my worst fears were realized... I was then hopelessly lost
and couldn't find my way back to my town. I "found" some absolutely gorgeous
rock formations and lavafalls in my travel.

Eventually I gave up, downloaded cartograph and drew a map of the level so I
could get an idea of where my towers were. That worked out well and now I know
the route back home. But I'm going tonight to finish the route markers.

tldr: I had a compass and a plan to mark my respawn route, but I got killed on
the mission. I'll try again. :)

------
charleso
I really hope the fellow behind Dwarf Fortress sees this success and starts
charging a small amount for his releases.

I think the following DF has (despite its rough state) would provide
impressive revenue and allow him to bring on employees to help build his game
while earning him a comfortable living.

~~~
wlievens
DF makes about $30k in donations per year.

It's insane to see MC make more than that per day. Poor Toady.

~~~
z0r
Just donated to Toady. Dwarf fortress is a masterpiece in progress, thank you
for reminding me of his financial woes

------
DrStalker
It really does feel like Minecraft has made a new genre of game here,
something that genuinely deserves the name "sandbox" because other than the
bedrock way down below every single piece of the world can be dug up and
manipulated.

It manages to tweak every single one of my addicting-game buttons, and even if
no new features get added I'd happily rate it my Indie Game of the Year or
possibly even Game of the Year.

------
joshu
So, uh.... anyone for an HN SMP server?

~~~
kd0amg
Might be enough to get me back into SMP. I haven't played in a few updates,
but I usually get intimidated by a long-running server that already has a lot
of large scale construction projects finished (not to mention frustrated at
trying to find a good build site for myself).

------
codexon
Can someone explain the appeal? I normally enjoy indie games with low-end
graphics like Dwarf Fortress or Adom.

My first impression as I logged into a server was a giant landscape of
multicolored blocks devoid of any meaning whatsoever. There was no survival
horror element I could make out in 30 minutes of playing.

I decided to try building something only to be bored of drawing something
block by block, like being a pixel artist that had to waste 10 seconds every
time you wanted to zoom out. Then I tried following someone around who was
also not doing anything interesting. I attempted to dig a bottomless pit under
him until he presumably logged off, and at that point I also logged off due to
boredom.

~~~
ZachPruckowski
Unless it's changed in the last week, Multiplayer Survival mode is bugged
(it's an alpha) so that monsters can't damage you. So most multiplayer servers
are in Creative mode, where you just build stuff.

Single player survival still works, and is a lot of fun. The first day cycle
is about getting a pick, a shelter, and some coal for torches before nightfall
and zombies/skeletons come out. Then you spend the next few day/night cycles
building up, and people usually start exploring around Day 5-10. And get
horridly lost and have to construct shelter as the sun is setting to avoid
monster attack.

And to get the good resources like iron and diamond and gold and redstone, you
have to go spelunking in caves, where monsters can spawn in any dark spot.
Even coal is only available in small amounts on cliff faces, so you have to
either mine or spelunk for that too past the first few pieces.

------
godDLL
Looking for a comment that has "is Sims for men and hackers" in it.

------
invisible
I think it is inaccurate when it says "sales grew to over 6,000 a day during
this period." The sales when the Paypal account was locked HAD to have been
~$44k/day (or around 4,700 sales per day after taking fees imposed into
consideration) as he said he had around $800,000 (USD) on September 10th
(starting around the week of August 22nd).

------
endlessvoid94
I just paid $13 and discovered the 'classic' game has been suspended?

I downloaded the alpha and it's....pretty basic. I understand that it's just
an alpha and shouldn't expect anything fantastic, which is fine.

But I'm unable to play the game (I think, unless I've overlooked something).
Any ideas?

~~~
Groxx
Unable to _play_? Or unable to _find things to do_? (serious question)

~~~
endlessvoid94
The latter. It's totally possible I'm missing something, but I checked the
site's wiki and can only seem to pick up flowers, beat cows to get meat, and
pick up tiny little trees.

How does one actually PLAY?

~~~
Groxx
An utterly massive part of the game is through crafting:
<http://minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Crafting>

You can't get _anywhere_ without it, and yes, it's very boring if you're not a
_total_ -sandbox-fan playing multiplayer. And the game does utterly squat to
inform you that it exists. It took me an hour of poking around before I found
that page, and then it all clicked.

So maybe I should warn you: it gets _way_ more interesting when you start
crafting. You start planning. Exploring. Fighting back against the zombies.
Some caves are _massive_ \- light them up and find veins. Earning the ability
to build your floating fortress is strangely rewarding.

It's also an oddly beautiful game in its simplicity - your lit caves are
visible from a long way off with a soft glow, and you'll quickly find that
light means safety... until the spider-riding skeletons start chasing you when
you venture too far. And it's kind of creepy how quickly you start to feel
ownership over what you've made.

~~~
endlessvoid94
Yeah, I found that page.

The problem is, I don't see any zombies. All I see is terrain and flowers. And
the occasional cow/sheep.

Do I just need to keep looking? What am I looking for? How do I get the
different types of blocks? I found some by hitting the sheep (or whatever they
are) but the same thing didn't seem to work on trees or terrain.

Gah. I do enjoy the freedom of the game. But I need to do something soon or I
just lose interest and quit.

~~~
Groxx
Playing... infdev? or alpha? I think only Alpha has enemies. Or whatever the
free weekend played.

edit: With only exploration I didn't get any real interest. Personally, I'll
probably get hooked when larger mobs come out, and when you start having to
_defend_ during the night from mobs which _damage_ your fortress. Otherwise
your investment is always secure, and there's no real threat that can't be
solved by boxing yourself in and getting a sandwich.

~~~
endlessvoid94
alpha

~~~
Groxx
And no mobs at night (edit: single player?)? Not sure, there might be a
glitch, or you've got an old version. It's pretty easy to get killed the first
night.

Another possibility is that you're too high up. They seem to cluster in the
valleys, the "mountains" sometimes almost empty.

~~~
endlessvoid94
Wait, so I need to kill enemies to obtain something besides flowers, meet?

I just need a HINT. I have no idea what to do! I've seen one day and one night
and I am in the same place. Am I looking for something?

~~~
Groxx
General starting point: punch some tree trunks to get wood, press "i" to open
your inventory, and turn it into planks => wood. Build yourself a sword and
some basic tools (arrangement of items matters), and start digging around in
the stone areas / exploring to find caves. Digging _totally_ randomly is
unlikely to be too productive, so find caves to start. Find stone blocks with
black specks, and use your pick to get coal - combine with sticks to get
torches. Enemies spawn at night _anywhere_ it's dark, so lighting caves is
important to your safety.

Beyond there, it's mostly an exploration / building / sandbox game. It's not
an appealing game model for everyone, though, so it _may_ just be that it
doesn't click for you (though give it a bit of time).

~~~
endlessvoid94
I'm starting to think I'm running a buggy version, because punching trees does
NOTHING.

Unless i have to punch it 10000 times, in which case, fuck this.

~~~
endlessvoid94
Wow, it was NOT obvious that I needed to hold down the mouse button.

I have a macbook so I just kept clicking. Doh!

~~~
Groxx
Sorry! I should've thought of that; that one took me a minute too.

~~~
Groxx
Should probably clarify, as that came out partially wrong (a bit tired at that
point). It took me a minute to figure out because I found out entirely by
_accident_ when I noticed sand going through multiple stages during a
particularly disinterested click.

He really needs to make a tutorial before it gets released :) I suppose it's
not surprising in a quickly-changing alpha build, however.

------
adlep
Great idea. Kudos to the creator. I've heard about the game few weeks back,
but assumed it is some sort of a viral copy of a Starcraft hack. Also C64
graphics > New "photo realistic" games...

~~~
ido
Nothing on the c64 looks even remotely like minecraft... You'd have to get to
the late 90s to get close.

------
swah
After reading it is written in Java, I remembered Yegge's Wyvern and how he
wished he had written it in Python or something.

I wonder how many lines of code this is...

------
Rickasaurus
My only worry is that the newly rich author won't work on this fantastic
project anymore.

