Report: Microsoft in talks to buy Minecraft studio for $2 billion
Could you be playing your favorite open-world game exclusively on Microsoft's platforms?
Minecraft just made the jump to current-gen consoles, but its original creator, Mojang, may be jumping onto the Microsoft bandwagon, according to a report published by The Wall Street Journal.
The report comes from a source with knowledge of the matter, who claims a deal could be reached between Mojang and Microsoft as early as this week and is valued at over $2 billion.
If this report turns out to be true, this would certainly be a feather in Microsoft’s cap as Mojang has been steadily gaining momentum with Minecraft. With each update and new console release, more and more players are become addicted to the title, and keeping it exclusively on Microsoft’s platforms could strike a huge blow to its competition.
It would also be quite a surprise considering Mojang’s Markus Persson has publicly shunned outside investments and has also railed against big corporations, Microsoft included.
Both Mojang’s CEO and a Microsoft spokesperson declined to comment on this report.
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Daniel Perez posted a new article, Report: Microsoft in talks to buy Minecraft studio for $2 billion.
Could you be playing your favorite open-world game exclusively on Microsoft's platforms?-
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"It would also be quite a surprise considering Mojang’s Markus Persson has publicly shunned outside investments and has also railed against big corporations, Microsoft included."
Perhaps this has something to do with it?
https://twitter.com/notch/status/478766808841732096
Apparently posted around the same time talks with MS began.
My guess:
Marcus consider Minecraft as "DONE". He does not work on it anymore. It will be free to play forever for those that bought it. Every little thing he tries to do to "protect" Minecraft is met with hostility/smearing/anger.
Now he wants "out". He gets a bunch of cash and can do whatever he wants and does not have to worry about Minecraft anymore.
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Sounds dumb to me for both sides. notch already has money hats, and they're a one hit wonder so WTF is the point for MS? Could they really ever recoup that much cash, even with Minecraft's popularity? Also it's a small team so it's not like they'd be buying much talent.
Jesus, and I thought their Yammer purchase was idiotic.-
Well, Microsoft is mainly buying the rights, so I'm sure they have some half-baked idea about putting out a Minecraft 2 and building some kind of forever-brand out of it. But I'm sure the end result is that they'll just overcomplicate the game mechanics and change the style to something nearly unrecognizable, and nobody will want to play it.
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I think Microsoft is way off on this one. Part of Minecraft's appeal is in the story of its development, its fairly unique (at the time) distribution model, and its core simplicity. Minecraft as a brand would lose a substantial amount of social cache just by being driven off the lot by a large company like Microsoft, and anything that Microsoft subsequently might do with the brand would only make it worse.
Still, it's kind of amusing that Microsoft, a company that in the games arena focuses on producing AAA titles exclusive to its own console (or online service for the PC titles), is interested in paying out such a huge amount for a brand that came to life as a pixelated, PC-only, originally free-to-download game that was made by one dude.
Minecraft should be a lesson in the commercial possibilities of creative freedom and the power of a single talented individual with a good idea. For a tiny fraction of the 2 billion, they could give some of their own developers the time and resources to realize their own creative goals. That would be worth the investment more than a (very late) acquisition of a product that pulled it off. -
https://twitter.com/notch/status/281139739304800256
Markus Persson
@notch
Anyway, my price is two billion dollars. Give me two billion dollars, and I'll endorse your crap.
12:51 PM - 18 Dec 2012