Microsoft buy Minecraft -EXCLUSIVE Xbox content!

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Errkal
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Errkal » Tue Sep 16, 2014 6:02 am

Also Minecraft is a game you go though phases with, you spends months playing and building etc. then you loose interest and move on to other stuff for 6 months then sort of re-discover it. Look at the Minecraft thread here, it has been quiet for months then in the last few weeks it has become active again as people re-discover the game.

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TheTurnipKing
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by TheTurnipKing » Tue Sep 16, 2014 6:16 am

[iup=3565571]Errkal[/iup] wrote:Also Minecraft is a game you go though phases with, you spends months playing and building etc. then you loose interest and move on to other stuff for 6 months then sort of re-discover it. Look at the Minecraft thread here, it has been quiet for months then in the last few weeks it has become active again as people re-discover the game.

That's also an artifact of updates: There's new stuff to discover on a frequent basis. One would hope that, with a company like Microsoft behind it, this would accelerate the process of releasing updates.

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Victor Mildew
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Victor Mildew » Tue Sep 16, 2014 6:23 am

I wonder if this will become the GWG poster boy, as in minecraft 2 is permanently free along with any DLC and updates.

Hexx wrote:Ad7 is older and balder than I thought.
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Errkal
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Errkal » Tue Sep 16, 2014 8:11 am

[iup=3565574]TheTurnipKing[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565571]Errkal[/iup] wrote:Also Minecraft is a game you go though phases with, you spends months playing and building etc. then you loose interest and move on to other stuff for 6 months then sort of re-discover it. Look at the Minecraft thread here, it has been quiet for months then in the last few weeks it has become active again as people re-discover the game.

That's also an artifact of updates: There's new stuff to discover on a frequent basis. One would hope that, with a company like Microsoft behind it, this would accelerate the process of releasing updates.

I would think so, they have the people to do it, if done right this could be the best thing to happen to Minecraft.

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captain red dog
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by captain red dog » Tue Sep 16, 2014 8:15 am

In my opinion $2.5bn for one game is absolutely insane. Isn't that on par with the Star Wars sell to Disney?

MS will never make that money back, even with a sequel, unless they seriously farm the serious out to garbage like Minecraft Kart, Minecraft Sports etc. People will get tired of that very quickly.

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Rog
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Rog » Tue Sep 16, 2014 8:23 am

[iup=3565561]satriales[/iup] wrote:2. Mojang is Minecraft, and Minecraft is Notch.
Mojang are currently a one-game company, and that one game was solely created by Notch who will be leaving once this deal is done. They are basically just buying Minecraft and they don't get any of the talent that created it.


Notch created it yes but the majority of what is Minecraft now has been done by Jeb. Development was passed off to him a long time ago. Notch doesn't need Minecraft and Minecraft doesn't need Notch. I'd even say that it wouldnt have gotten to this level had development not been given to Jeb.

Jeb seems to be the only member of mojang that is confirmed to be staying on. At least he thinks so.

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Dual
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Dual » Tue Sep 16, 2014 8:30 am

[iup=3565592]captain red dog[/iup] wrote:In my opinion $2.5bn for one game is absolutely insane. Isn't that on par with the Star Wars sell to Disney?

MS will never make that money back, even with a sequel, unless they seriously farm the serious out to garbage like Minecraft Kart, Minecraft Sports etc. People will get tired of that very quickly.


I can see it being Angry Birds level of branding.

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Errkal
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Errkal » Tue Sep 16, 2014 8:33 am

BRING ON MINECRAFT LAND!

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1cmanny1
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by 1cmanny1 » Tue Sep 16, 2014 9:53 am

All those youtubers must be shitting their pants now. Microsoft will balls it up somehow.

The reason minecraft is so popular because it receives frequent and regular updates, so it always stays fresh especially if you couple it with a creative individual. As I said before, I am pretty sure Microsoft will put a stop to that. I also wouldn't be surprised if they got rid of dinnerbone and the people that actually develop the game (Notch has had nothing to do with it for a long time).

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Parksey
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Parksey » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:00 am

Dual wrote:
[iup=3565592]captain red dog[/iup] wrote:In my opinion $2.5bn for one game is absolutely insane. Isn't that on par with the Star Wars sell to Disney?

MS will never make that money back, even with a sequel, unless they seriously farm the serious out to garbage like Minecraft Kart, Minecraft Sports etc. People will get tired of that very quickly.


I can see it being Angry Birds level of branding.


To be fair, Minecraft was already going along those lines - they bring out Annuals and books about it already. I presume there are toys too?

And Star Wars was a $4bn dollar purchase. It doesn't sound much more than Minecraft, which did boggle my mind a bit, but I suppose twice as much when you get to those figures is quite a big difference. I suppose Star Wars is also something that incurs significant costs too (I.e. the cost of making a new SW movie), whereas the probably don't need to spend that much on Minecraft. Where it goes next though, is interesting, as it didn't seem to be a game that needed a sequel. Likewise, there is no guarantee that it will still be a phenomenon in a year or two. Gaming can be quite fickle.

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TheTurnipKing
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by TheTurnipKing » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:16 am

[iup=3565618]1cmanny1[/iup] wrote:All those youtubers must be shitting their pants now. Microsoft will balls it up somehow.

The reason minecraft is so popular because it receives frequent and regular updates, so it always stays fresh especially if you couple it with a creative individual. As I said before, I am pretty sure Microsoft will put a stop to that. I also wouldn't be surprised if they got rid of dinnerbone and the people that actually develop the game (Notch has had nothing to do with it for a long time).

If I was making Minecraft videos, I'd be wondering whether Microsoft is going to claim the strawberry float out of their videos. I'd be very surprised if they made that mistake, though.

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TheTurnipKing
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by TheTurnipKing » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:17 am

[iup=3565624]Parksey[/iup] wrote:To be fair, Minecraft was already going along those lines - they bring out Annuals and books about it already. I presume there are toys too?

Loads.

I've not seen any beverages, though, which I have for Angry Birds.


Last edited by TheTurnipKing on Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:19 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Dual
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Dual » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:17 am

Yet

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Errkal
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Errkal » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:35 am

[iup=3565618]1cmanny1[/iup] wrote:All those youtubers must be shitting their pants now. Microsoft will balls it up somehow.

The reason minecraft is so popular because it receives frequent and regular updates, so it always stays fresh especially if you couple it with a creative individual. As I said before, I am pretty sure Microsoft will put a stop to that. I also wouldn't be surprised if they got rid of dinnerbone and the people that actually develop the game (Notch has had nothing to do with it for a long time).


Regular updates?

http://minecraft.gamepedia.com/Version_history

I would say irratic updates. Microsoft would make them more regular by giving more resource which means more fixes for bugs and issues and more resource for new features.

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TheTurnipKing
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by TheTurnipKing » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:41 am

[iup=3565650]Errkal[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565618]1cmanny1[/iup] wrote:All those youtubers must be shitting their pants now. Microsoft will balls it up somehow.

The reason minecraft is so popular because it receives frequent and regular updates, so it always stays fresh especially if you couple it with a creative individual. As I said before, I am pretty sure Microsoft will put a stop to that. I also wouldn't be surprised if they got rid of dinnerbone and the people that actually develop the game (Notch has had nothing to do with it for a long time).


Regular updates?

http://minecraft.gamepedia.com/Version_history

I would say irratic updates. Microsoft would make them more regular by giving more resource which means more fixes for bugs and issues and more resource for new features.

And correspondingly greater expectations.

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Rax
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Rax » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:46 am

[iup=3565577]Ad7[/iup] wrote:I wonder if this will become the GWG poster boy, as in minecraft 2 is permanently free along with any DLC and updates.

That actually isnt a bad idea, it would be a great way to get millions of people to pay for Gold, regular content releases, much like they have on PC now would keep people subscribed for years. That would also allow them release it on Playstation and iOS but with paid for DLC and a staggered release schedule. Seems to be a good fit for it overall.

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TheTurnipKing
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by TheTurnipKing » Tue Sep 16, 2014 10:52 am

[iup=3565657]Rax[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565577]Ad7[/iup] wrote:I wonder if this will become the GWG poster boy, as in minecraft 2 is permanently free along with any DLC and updates.

That actually isnt a bad idea, it would be a great way to get millions of people to pay for Gold, regular content releases, much like they have on PC now would keep people subscribed for years. That would also allow them release it on Playstation and iOS but with paid for DLC and a staggered release schedule. Seems to be a good fit for it overall.

Well, they've got the Realms gooseberry fool as well, which would still allow them to turn a profit on top of the base-game. If you're not familiar with it, Realms is where basically you "hire" a Minecraft Server for multiplayer through Mojang themselves.

https://minecraft.net/realms

So they could give away the base game for "free" as part of GWG (so that everyone has access to it, giving them maximum audience) and then make their money back on a monthly sub-fee basis.

WOW turns over like a billion in a year in subscription fees, right?

Suddenly that 2bn+ purchase price doesn't seem like such a bad deal, does it?

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Rax
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by Rax » Tue Sep 16, 2014 11:22 am

[iup=3565663]TheTurnipKing[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565657]Rax[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565577]Ad7[/iup] wrote:I wonder if this will become the GWG poster boy, as in minecraft 2 is permanently free along with any DLC and updates.

That actually isnt a bad idea, it would be a great way to get millions of people to pay for Gold, regular content releases, much like they have on PC now would keep people subscribed for years. That would also allow them release it on Playstation and iOS but with paid for DLC and a staggered release schedule. Seems to be a good fit for it overall.

Well, they've got the Realms gooseberry fool as well, which would still allow them to turn a profit on top of the base-game. If you're not familiar with it, Realms is where basically you "hire" a Minecraft Server for multiplayer through Mojang themselves.

https://minecraft.net/realms

So they could give away the base game for "free" as part of GWG (so that everyone has access to it, giving them maximum audience) and then make their money back on a monthly sub-fee basis.

WOW turns over like a billion in a year in subscription fees, right?

Suddenly that 2bn+ purchase price doesn't seem like such a bad deal, does it?

Yeah Im familiar with Realms but is it not functionality that is, for the most part, already baked into the console versions? ie you are able to open your world to other players so they can come in and play in your world. As I understand it the only thing that full Realms support would bring is the ability for others to use your world when youre offline. Im open to correction here, Ive never played the console version or mucked around with realms, Im going on what Ive read and my own understanding of them.

Obviously I wouldnt rule anything out but charging an additional fee for Realms on Xbox when the cloud is such a big thing they want to push doesnt seem like a good move. They could use Realms to show off that, your world persists even when youre offline, your friends can build without you and you come back to find theyve blown everything up or something.

The more I think about it the more I realise this could be a great purchase by Microsoft, they just need to handle it the right way, something Im going to remain skeptical about.

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captain red dog
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by captain red dog » Tue Sep 16, 2014 11:24 am

Minecraft has made a small effort in bringing out toys and books admittedly, but I don't think anybody really minds that as it doesn't dimish the core product. However, crappy games like a Minecraft Karting, Minecraft Kinect Sports will directly harm the main game as people won't trust it.

I also can't see the updates being free of charge from a certain point. When they added horses, that is a key thing that Microsoft would normally charge for.

It's all conjecture of course, but Microsoft don't really have a good track record of buying a franchise/developer and making something of it. Just look at Rare and Banjo (not quite the same ballpark as Minecraft but an interesting comparison).

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TheTurnipKing
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PostRe: Microsoft buy Minecraft - CONFIRMED
by TheTurnipKing » Tue Sep 16, 2014 11:33 am

[iup=3565682]Rax[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565663]TheTurnipKing[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565657]Rax[/iup] wrote:
[iup=3565577]Ad7[/iup] wrote:I wonder if this will become the GWG poster boy, as in minecraft 2 is permanently free along with any DLC and updates.

That actually isnt a bad idea, it would be a great way to get millions of people to pay for Gold, regular content releases, much like they have on PC now would keep people subscribed for years. That would also allow them release it on Playstation and iOS but with paid for DLC and a staggered release schedule. Seems to be a good fit for it overall.

Well, they've got the Realms gooseberry fool as well, which would still allow them to turn a profit on top of the base-game. If you're not familiar with it, Realms is where basically you "hire" a Minecraft Server for multiplayer through Mojang themselves.

https://minecraft.net/realms

So they could give away the base game for "free" as part of GWG (so that everyone has access to it, giving them maximum audience) and then make their money back on a monthly sub-fee basis.

WOW turns over like a billion in a year in subscription fees, right?

Suddenly that 2bn+ purchase price doesn't seem like such a bad deal, does it?

Yeah Im familiar with Realms but is it not functionality that is, for the most part, already baked into the console versions? ie you are able to open your world to other players so they can come in and play in your world. As I understand it the only thing that full Realms support would bring is the ability for others to use your world when youre offline. Im open to correction here, Ive never played the console version or mucked around with realms, Im going on what Ive read and my own understanding of them.

Obviously I wouldnt rule anything out but charging an additional fee for Realms on Xbox when the cloud is such a big thing they want to push doesnt seem like a good move. They could use Realms to show off that, your world persists even when youre offline, your friends can build without you and you come back to find theyve blown everything up or something.

The more I think about it the more I realise this could be a great purchase by Microsoft, they just need to handle it the right way, something Im going to remain skeptical about.

The 360 version of Minecraft has traditionally been it's own little private fiefdom, rather out of necessity than design.

But it should be noted that Realms are seemingly going to be cross-platform, with support for Minecraft Pocket. So it would seem to make sense for them to support the console versions with that, too.

As for Minecraft spinoffs... Sure, they could do that. But it would seem to make more sense for them to add the functionality into Minecraft itself.

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