The developer of the indie-game Minecraft is doing an AMA on reddit

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/gjrf4/iama_indie_game_developer_who_made_a_commercially/

by ulvund • 15 years ago

117 30 15 years ago

reddit.com

ErrantX• 15 years ago

He's saying that revenue is in the region $20-30 Million.[1]

That's... crazy. Awesome, but crazy. I knew Minecraft was a success story but not to that extent!

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/gjrf4/iama_indie_game_...

Peroni• 15 years ago

I was blown away too. My favourite line from the entire conversation was: It all ends up in an account somewhere, and I try not to look at it.

You have to respect the guys dedication. To not let that massive sum distract him and still get down to dirty coding is remarkable. More power to him.

andywood• 15 years ago

It's currently taking in > $200,000 per day.

http://www.minecraft.net/stats.jsp

matthew-wegner• 15 years ago

It's worth mentioning that Notch began Minecraft as an individual, operating as an individual, so much of that early revenue hits Sweden's ~50% tax rate...

But yeah, as far as I'm aware Minecraft is far and away the most profitable indie game that owns their own distribution channel (ie no XBLA, Steam, etc involvement).

TheAmazingIdiot• 15 years ago

Ok, dumb question.

I looked on reddit for it, as well as google. No dice.

What is an AMA in reddit speak?

nbpoole• 15 years ago

IAmA (as in http://www.reddit.com/r/iama/) = I Am A

AMA = Ask Me Anything

heyitsnick4• 15 years ago

Switch search engines :) It's the first result for searching "reddit what does AMA mean" on duckduckgo.

mcrittenden2• 15 years ago

It's the first result on Google for that query too.

RodgerTheGreat• 15 years ago

UrbanDictionary is usually my first stop for decoding this kind of slang:

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=AMA

silverbax88• 15 years ago

Last month's Game Developer magazine had a great breakdown on his entire growth process.

heyitsnick4• 15 years ago

As a redditer commented; I have never played minecraft for fear of never being able to put it down. It's fantastic it's been such a success, I think games like this will always appeal to a certain niche but no one count have predicted it would have been so successful to such a large audience.

With that said, I just contend myself with watching the odd youtube video. I dare not get closer.

TillE• 15 years ago

The typical path that many people (myself included) have experienced is: total obsession for 1-2 weeks, followed by rapidly waning interest.

It's a fantastic game, but you can quickly experience everything it has to offer, and thereafter you can set your own boundaries quite easily. It's really just a great big sandbox with no explicit motivating factors. But if Markus decides to include RPG-like elements some day, we're in big trouble.

sevenproxies• 15 years ago

>The typical path that many people (myself included) have experienced is: total obsession for 1-2 weeks, followed by rapidly waning interest.

This what I experienced. Mutliplayer is fun though, but I can't play the game properly due to bugs (framerate issues, random disconnects / crashes to desktop). I'm not sure if my local JRE has a problem but I have been doing Java development work recently and I've not had any issues.

I think once the bugs have been ironed out and the development process has been refined (to prevent re-occuring bugs) the game can really grow. Recent updates has shown that new features are being added to the game (including reaching out to the mod community) and by the time of proper release the game will have much more to offer.

Semiapies• 15 years ago

It can be pretty long-term absorbing if you get into tinkering and construction, especially in groups. My friend who was running a server on his own box for him, myself, and a couple of other people eventually broke down and rented a Minecraft server after a few months.

RPG-like elements? Oh dear, that would be disasterous.

nvarsj• 15 years ago

This was also my experience. It's also been one of the few games my wife has played intensely. We both got quite bored of it after a couple of weeks of addicting play. It's a really great concept, just severely lacking in any overall goal. Makes me wonder what a dedicated, complete minecraft-like game could accomplish.

It's also an excellent example of getting a working prototype out as soon as possible. You never know, it may be even more successful than the completed version. :-)

falcolas• 15 years ago

> But if Markus decides to include RPG-like elements some day, we're in big trouble.

You're probably looking for Wurm Online, then. More advanced than Minecraft, with the same sandbox multiplayer environment and RPG like elements such as skills and mobs.

I listened to an interview with the lead Wurm Online developer a month or so ago on the Massively podcast, and he mentioned that he was originally with the Minecraft dev team, but split off some years back for wanting to do something more involved.

yesimahuman• 15 years ago

I find it more of a roller coaster. I get into it for a few weeks, then stop playing for a while. Then it repeats once I try the new updates or play with my friends on multiplayer.

Groxx• 15 years ago

I think the interest stays longer once you start playing with mine cart boosting and killing mobs with logic-gate contraptions. Then it turns the game into you against the game instead of the enemies in the game - an extremely open-ended, creativity-driven style of play.

bonch• 15 years ago

I was very interested in it for a couple of weeks, but then I stopped playing much. Once in a while, I get in a mood to add onto my subterranean underworld and fire it up again. Still need to finish my underground biodome and Nether castle.

I wish the engine wasn't so inefficient. Disassembly shows some cringe-worthy code. This kind of game should run on netbooks, yet areas are choppy even on high-end machines. The pixel art also starts hurting my eyes after a while. Interpolation would help a lot. While higher-resolution texture packs help, they also risk breaking after updates.

cdr2• 15 years ago

Yes, there's definitely some inefficient code - but voxel-type games like this are also legitimately computationally difficult. Just because it looks like pixels doesn't mean it's simple to run.

There are occasional engine improvements, but Notch thinks (as he says in that reddit thread and elsewhere) that players don't appreciate changes that aren't new features.

Also, my machine is mid-range at best, and I never have any problems. In Windows of course - Mac and Linux are quite a different story. Then again, you could say the fact that it runs in other OSes at all is impressive.

nikcub• 15 years ago

An interesting question, and one that is more relevant to this community, would be to ask about being approached by investors.

How soon it happen, how often, what they said or offered, etc.

There must have been a stampede of VC's and angel investors after the stories of his success in beta were published.

bryanh• 15 years ago

A great quote in response to a question about Minecraft's continuous release schedule: "Developing in the dark is scary and probably wrong."

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/gjrf4/iama_indie_game_...

Apocryphon• 15 years ago

Someone should ask if he went to a Montessori school.

Sukotto• 15 years ago

You can watch a 20 minute mini-documentary about Notch and the Mojang company here: http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/minecraft/101/

(Part of a kickstart project to do a much more involved documentary http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2pp/minecraft-the-story-... )

drno• 15 years ago

As an early player of minecraft I have always had a nagging question to ask: why did minecraft succeed while second life "failed"? In a sense they offer similar creative expression but with different gameplay philosophies.

The developer of the indie-game Minecraft is doing an AMA on reddit

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