The rumour has become reality: Microsoft bought Mojang, makers of Minecraft. Being that Minecraft is such a huge game, people have a lot of feelings about this $US2.5 billion deal.
Some folks are upset. Some are confused. Some people are incredulous. It makes sense: the question on everyone’s mind is, what does this move mean for Minecraft? Of course, as easy as it is to be cynical, and as easy (and perhaps unfairly) as it is for some to assume that Microsoft will ruin things, there are many people who see the move in a positive light, too. Now that Notch isn’t at Mojang, he can do his own thing without as much pressure. That’s a good thing.
All of these things are topics that people are reacting to now that Minecraft is owned by Microsoft. Let’s take a closer look, shall we?
Farewell @notch youve given us all such a great life away from life. I thank you humbly and respect your decision. 🙂 take it easy man. <3
— Gabe (U_U)z (@roboticbunny1) September 15, 2014
Notch is the smartest dude in the industry
— Dank Souls II (@TheGingerSouls) September 15, 2014
Microsoft: We’re buying Mojang! Notch: I’m leaving Mojang. Microsoft: What did we just buy?
— Cokelogic (@cokelogic) September 15, 2014
Farewell @notch. http://t.co/lU19khTRoq
— PC Master Race (@MasterPCRace) September 15, 2014
What’s this stuff about Microsoft buying mojang xD nice prank
— Trunks (@DarkTrunksMan) September 15, 2014
Psst to the people mad about the Mojang buy-out: MICROSOFT HASNT PLANNED OR DONE ANYTHING YET SO CAPM YOUR ASSES
— Ethan/IronWeasel (@IWRGaming) September 15, 2014
No no no no no no, Microsoft is not allowed to acquire Mojang. NO NO NO NO NO!
— Harvey Critchley (@dinomonkey101) September 15, 2014
Microsoft buys Mojang! Expensive but if they play their card right could be a priceless acquisition.
— Matt (@GaymerUK) September 15, 2014
Imagine being responsible for Minecraft. All of it. Imagine being defined by that. Now imagine not having to be that any more.
— Ed Stern (@EdStern) September 15, 2014
I just hope Microsoft will keep Minecraft a fun, easy-to-use experience like they did with Windows, Microsoft Office, Xbox Live, and god no.
— Mike Drucker (@MikeDrucker) September 15, 2014
Microsoft owning Minecraft worries me
— ҡıṡṡѧɞȗṅı♛ (@kissabuni) September 15, 2014
So, minecraft 2 next year ? And only on Xbox ?
— Lord Jonathan (@Boogalord) September 15, 2014
RIP Minecraft
— Jack Watson (@Jackdor99) September 15, 2014
He was already sick of being famous. Now he’s sick of being famous AND hearing about Psychonauts 2. 🙂
— Tim Schafer (@TimOfLegend) September 15, 2014
You can already tell that Microsoft bought Minecraft… pic.twitter.com/JNBniWHdq8
— THE INSPIRATION (@_theinspiration) September 15, 2014
THEY RUINED IT MINECRAFT IS DED!!!! http://t.co/3fXqRTz9gA pic.twitter.com/UcOQzcaaCG
— Tyler Glaiel (@tylerglaiel) September 15, 2014
*Microsoft wakes up in a destroyed Vegas hotel room next to mountains of coke and a tiger* “Oh god what the fuck did we buy last night?”
— Chris Person (@Papapishu) September 15, 2014
It’s incredible that, at $US2.5b, Mojang (not including Notch) sold for 62% of what Lucasfilm and the entirety of Star Wars sold for.
— Chris Remo (@chrisremo) September 15, 2014
Looking forward to a Minecraft “triple XP weekend.”
— Joe Fourhman (@fourhman) September 15, 2014
Just be careful kids: one day you’re having fun playing Minecraft. The next day you’re setting Internet Explorer as your default browser.
— Aaron Levie (@levie) September 15, 2014
Microsoft bought Minecraft for $US2.5B? Man, I remember when I bought it in alpha, it was only like $US12
— Bill ‘Super’ Zoeker (@BillZoeker) September 15, 2014
Notch has made enough money through Minecraft to spend the rest of his life making small games and being happy about it. Good for him.
— RiotJentendo (@RiotJentendo) September 15, 2014
If MSFT buys Minecraft for $US2.5B, they’d need to sell @ avg cost of $US16 156,250,000 units to break even. Game has sold 54 million units.
— Erik Kain (@erikkain) September 15, 2014
when is minecraft announced for smash bros
— Paul Mode7 (@mode7games) September 15, 2014
The most effective way to get an entire generation of young gamers to passionately hate Microsoft’s guts would be to screw up Minecraft.
— Dan Stapleton (@DanStapleton) September 15, 2014
if microsoft renames minecraft to “Microsoftcraft” or “Microcraft” I’ll sue!!!
— Astriya (@AstriyaEmilys) September 15, 2014
the mojang deal is cool because it means video games now has a benevolent eccentric billionaire with the scene’s best interests at heart
— Nick Robinson (@Babylonian) September 15, 2014
The decision to leave a company like Mojang at peak popularity seems like a mature act of self-preservation. Curious to see what’s next.
— Chris Plante (@plante) September 15, 2014
Lol I lied, here’s your Minecraft thing of the day: http://t.co/soekHfepZn
— Neville Park (@neville_park) September 15, 2014
“Why’d Microsoft pay so much for Minecraft? It’s a fad past its prime.” TELEPORT TO: 1999 LISTEN: “Pokemon’s a fad that’s past its prime”
— Nadia Oxford (@nadiaoxford) September 15, 2014
This may be a national day of sadness and you may not know it. Ask your 11 year old for details. #Minecraft
— Erin Peterson (@dotnetcowboy) September 15, 2014
If the Minecraft community knows what’s good for it, they will immediately start an open source clone of it and point every modder to that.
— JP LeBreton (@vectorpoem) September 15, 2014
I hope Microsoft dosen’t waste Mojang’s talent, or ruin what makes them special. It can happen, but it’s pretty Rare.
— CEO Kaz Hirai (@KazHiraiCEO) September 15, 2014
Folks are making tributes in Minecraft to Notch, as a farewell:
Actually, it’s quite heartening to see people tweet at Notch, too. While there are some arseholes, lots of people are thanking him for creating Minecraft — and wishing him the best in his future endeavours.
Still, there’s scepticism about what Microsoft will do with Mojang…
What about you, how did you react to the news that Microsoft bought Mojang? Let us know in the comments.
Comments
26 responses to “The Internet Reacts To Microsoft Buying Minecraft”
I reacted by not caring, Notch had barely any involvement in Minecraft anymore, the lead developer jens is still the lead developer so nothing much will change, even if it does the mod community is huge and microsoft cant change that. So, if they screw it up the mod community can take over
Im happy for the guy……so long as he remembers he really did luck out with that minecraft thing and does not go thinking he is a awesome genius or anything.
Everything he’s ever said on the subject indicates that this is the case. Assuming he ever does strike it big with an amazing new game idea (which he seems to doubt) he’ll probably abandon it in favour of doing something else.
Well said. Minecraft was not the result of some super savant cracking the code to what people want, it’s more the case of a guy driving for oil and finding the mother load. Minecraft is a really incredible, but unoriginal idea. Like Angry Birds, he just got their first. And good on him, everybody loves a rags to riches tale. I just don’t like it when someone strikes gold and then becomes self-important.
Should have been Google that bought them..
While I agree, they’re both as rotten as one another. But better either Google or Microsoft than Apple. What a bunch of fucktards.
Edit: Double post. Sorry.
Ending soon: playing minecraft on all sony consoles, end of all hopes it will appear on nintendo consoles & hello to the increase in price to australian versions of the game
They’ve said they will still support the Sony versions, including Vita. Which is probably the only reason I have to get a Vita down the line (plus Persona 4: Golden, Danganronpa and Freedom Wars)
Well you’ve seen what they did with Rare, so just imagine the possibilities with Mojang!
With respect to Mojang, they are definitely not Rare. I honestly don’t think this was a good decision by Microsoft, I can’t imagine future IPs being anywhere near as competitive.
It really irritates me with all this negative attitude towards Microsoft
Look at what they did for Bungie and Halo as a business and franchise respectively, they have a decent track record
And it could certainly be worse, Sony could of bought them… if any company is evil it’s them, slanderous liars who promise a console for gamers but then it has no games, and certainly no exclusives
Bungie was successful before Microsoft bought them. It’s arguable that Bungie and Halo did more for XBox than vice-versa. Halo was originally lined up as a PC/Mac release.
The PS4 has a decent set of exclusives, including quite a few “indie” style titles that are quite cheap, and a bunch of quite exciting exclusives forthcoming.
The negative attitude to MS arises from a substantial history of putting the dollar before their customers, and in many cases use of monopoly power to drive other companies out of business. Their attitude to releases on their online store (they refuse to release any title that already been released for a different console) is one example.
That’s not to say that Sony lack flaws – their smug publicity for the PS4’s policies has been somewhat wearing – but there are good reasons why many people dislike Microsoft.
To be fair, the Rare thing was different.
I mean, a lot of the founding members left when MS purchased Rare.
Wait.
Shit.
People act like MS bought Rare then ran the into the ground. But the truth is the two founders and the brains behind Rare decided to quit so they sold their company (they offered it to Nintendo first, but they turned then down). So, really, MS just bought the remains of Rare and their licenses.
Another company Microsoft bought was Bungie, but in the race to be all hyperbolic and snarky about this acquisition, I doubt this example will be used much.
The most interesting part of the whole thing, is that Microsoft will be publishing the game on rival platforms. Very interesting. Could this be the first step in a more competitive software market. You prefer PlayStation, but still like Halo? Love Xbox but want some Naughty Dog goodness without buying another console? Mmmmmh…
It’s not the first time that’s happened. Rare still put out Banjo-Kazooie: Grunty’s Revenge, Banjo Pilot and Sabre Wulf on the GBA after the MS buyout.
That was different because Microsoft expressed no interest in the handheld market, and so allowed Rare to develop for the GBA.
You catch my drift though? Though I doubt it would ever occur at the levels I’m thinking of.
I don’t think so.
I think they would just foster so much ill will if they removed them from other systems that it’s simply not worth the ensuring PR nightmare.
However anything beyond the planned Vita version is surely up in the air.
What annoys me the most is that Microsoft and Minecraft both have the same amount of letters, start with “Mi” and end with “ft” and have “cr” in them, so when I skim read I keep getting the two words mixed up…
Minecrosoft
Yeah, Microsoft should just rename themselves Minecraft and be done with it already! 😉
As much as some people hate his decision, could you really blame him? That’s a lot money to turn down.
I remember when I bought the alpha and my friends told me I wasted fourteen bucks. I’d love to go back now and tell them what Microsoft paid for it!
I’m actually pretty optimistic with MS’ purchase.
MS’ Xbox Division has always come across to me as the
That they intend to continue to support the PS version, just confirms that impression.
But the one thing I’d like to ask Notch is “Why Microsoft?” Why did HE choose to sell to Microsoft? Especially when he expressed opinions like “I’d rather have minecraft not run on win 8 at all than to play along. Maybe we can convince a few people not to switch to win 8 that way..”