Rumour confirmed: Microsoft Purchase Minecraft for $2.5B (Post#122)

[Rangers]

WSJ says MS is in serious discussions to purchase Mojang, Notch's company/developer of Minecraft. For $2 billion.


http://online.wsj.com/articles/microsoft-near-deal-to-buy-minecraft-1410300213


I dont get this for MS. Unless they can make Minecraft a retroactive MS exclusive, which I doubt. And even then I dont think it's have great effect. Minecraft being effectively a 360 console exclusive late last gen didn't for example cause a sea change.

Other than that I guess you'd be banking on Mojang coming up with another big thing in the future, which again I'd doubt, or certainly you cant count on.

And once again I'll add my familiar refrain, 2 billion is 20 bucks per console times 100 million consoles (and X1 is probably tracking to more like 50m). That should have been enough to significantly augment the GPU which would have garnered much better sales results imo. And thats in a vacuum. The actual results would have been even more bottom line friendly, since they wouldn't have had to run all these special free game deals and such to boost X1 sales.

Or hell for that matter, 2 billion could have paid for a cut to $349 for the forseeable future. (50 dollars off the next 40 million consoles, for reference they're at 5 million sold so far). Or $100 off for the next 20 million ($299).

It seems like a bad deal and wasting money to me. I cant see Mojang ever doing much of note in the future rather just withering away like Rare.

 

[MfA]

Penny wise, pound utterly retarded.

Unfortunately loss leading on the hardware has a negative perception now ... while overpaying for acquisitions for some unfathomable reason doesn't raise an eyebrow on the stock markets.

 

[Globalisateur]

For reference, 8 GB of GDDR5 ram instead of 4 GB will cost Sony ~1 billion dollars for the whole PS4 gen.

Imagine what Microsoft could have done better with its hardware with those rumored 2 billions.

 

[temesgen]

WSJ says MS is in serious discussions to purchase Mojang, Notch's company/developer of Minecraft. For $2 billion.


http://online.wsj.com/articles/microsoft-near-deal-to-buy-minecraft-1410300213


I dont get this for MS. Unless they can make Minecraft a retroactive MS exclusive, which I doubt. And even then I dont think it's have great effect. Minecraft being effectively a 360 console exclusive late last gen didn't for example cause a sea change.

Other than that I guess you'd be banking on Mojang coming up with another big thing in the future, which again I'd doubt, or certainly you cant count on.

And once again I'll add my familiar refrain, 2 billion is 20 bucks per console times 100 million consoles (and X1 is probably tracking to more like 50m). That should have been enough to significantly augment the GPU which would have garnered much better sales results imo. And thats in a vacuum. The actual results would have been even more bottom line friendly, since they wouldn't have had to run all these special free game deals and such to boost X1 sales.

Or hell for that matter, 2 billion could have paid for a cut to $349 for the forseeable future. (50 dollars off the next 40 million consoles, for reference they're at 5 million sold so far). Or $100 off for the next 20 million ($299).

It seems like a bad deal and wasting money to me. I cant see Mojang ever doing much of note in the future rather just withering away like Rare.

I agree; purchasing a publisher for essentially one title makes little sense. Would they have bought Angry Birds if the timeline had been different? And how well would that have worked out? I also agree that some additional budget for GPU would have gone a long long way, of course hindsight is 20/20 but if they had put some of us in a room and done a focus test we would said what we're saying now - don't skimp on power, gamers are ok with paying a premium for power. Granted nobody would have known what Sony was brining to the table but we all knew 1080P was an expectation even if it doesn't make sense in all instances...

 

[Silent_Buddha]

For reference, 8 GB of GDDR5 ram instead of 4 GB will cost Sony ~1 billion dollars for the whole PS4 gen.

Imagine what Microsoft could have done better with its hardware with those rumored 2 billions.

That, of course, assumes that Minecraft and it's DLCs don't continue to generate revenue (there are a lot of DLCs for Minecraft that continue to generate significant revenue). Enough to cover the 2 billion, not likely, but enough to defray the cost significantly.

That's also assuming that Mojang doesn't create another hit. Which may or may not happen. I never expected Minecraft to become as large of a hit as it has, but it has. So, while I'm skeptical, I'm not ruling it out.

And even if they don't. A Minecraft 2? Minecraft 3?

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/135752-Minecraft-For-Consoles-Outsells-Minecraft-For-PC

54 million copies have been sold. Of that at least 1.5 million were on PS3. Over 12 million on X360. The PS4 and XBO versions weren't even out yet at the time of that article (end of June).

The Playstation version likely accounts for less than 15% of total unit sales thus far. So it wouldn't be the end of the world if they lost the PS sales if it became exclusive to PC/Mac/Mobile/Xbox. The vast majority of players are on PC followed by Xbox and mobile.

I still question the move. It's a bit of a risky move. But not as risky as it looks at first glance.

Regards,
SB

 

[Nisaaru]

Maybe the prime target for the purchase is Mobile.

 

[Rockster]

Mojang would need to have something very exciting in the pipeline for that. Its Facebook Mark Z kind of crazy (ie.19B for whatsapp, 3B for snapchat, 2B for oculus). I mean if you need/want exclusives, then why not throw 13B at the problem and buy EA or hell, whatever it takes to get Nintendo. Problem solved.

 

[-tkf-]

Minecraft 2
Minecraft 3
Minecraft 4
Minecraft 5
Dlc, season passes, monthly fees.
Exclusive to Microsoft consoles and windows 8+

Of course minecraft as we know it will die instantly the moment Microsoft buys it, everything that made it what it was will be gone like tears in the rain.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Of course minecraft as we know it will die instantly the moment Microsoft buys it, everything that made it what it was will be gone like tears in the rain.

Minecraft would be one hell of a challenge to lock down because of how it's been developed and the licence under which most people own it.

But yeah, a large part of the community could be alienated. But pissing off gamers seems to be their thing lately

Sent from my iPhone using Forum Runner.

 

[Rangers]

Minecraft 2
Minecraft 3
Minecraft 4
Minecraft 5
Dlc, season passes, monthly fees.
Exclusive to Microsoft consoles and windows 8+

Of course minecraft as we know it will die instantly the moment Microsoft buys it, everything that made it what it was will be gone like tears in the rain.

Mainly because people will be like "Minecraft sucks now because Microsoft owns it"

A Minecraft 2, 3 etc...I guess that's pretty cool, but the concept seems pretty one off and not really vastly improvable, except maybe better graphics, which would probably remove some of it's whimsical charm and run-on-anything popularity anyway.

 

[eastmen]

A Minecraft 2 could work. They can redo the back end and add a lot of nice stuff to it.

I don't know why MS buying something has to be bad

 

[Gubbi]

.... or hell, whatever it takes to get Nintendo. Problem solved.

Hear, hear !!!

It would take $15B, - about the same amount of bucks it cost in 2000, when MS considered buying Nintendo before venturing into console gaming from scratch

Cheers

 

[Shifty Geezer]

MS would become MineShaft to the masses. It's a ludicrous notion, because the game won't make that much money as a platform exclusive. There'll just be clones on other machines that'll take off. No way its worth 2 billion, which makes the rumour unlikely.

 

[Rurouni]

I don't think Minecraft is a system seller so 2 billion isn't worth it. Of course Mojang might make something different, but I still can see Mojang creating a system seller. Don't confuse it sells a lot vs system seller.

 

[MrFox]

Heck, for 2 billion they could probably buy Insomniac.

(I hope not, but if I mention it I'll jinx it)

 

[Bagel seed]

Seeing as how Minecraft is like the gateway drug to video games for many kids these days, they probably want to get in on that mind share for the younger demographic and hope they follow them into the next generation.

 

[dobwal]

It'll reduce the amount of steps I have to go through in order to remove the snapped app, but I still don't like the help to appear as a snapped app. Not a big issue, though.

The biggest problem that I have with snapped game manuals is that its slow. I don't see a point in the need to navigate to a menu just to turn around and launch an app. The tried and true standard practice isn't being improved upon but rather encumbered so why do it this way.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

A Minecraft 2 could work. They can redo the back end and add a lot of nice stuff to it.

You mean like Forge and the thousands of mods that already do this? There is nothing about Minecraft you can't change. Add things, remove things, change the core game, completely re-write the rendering to use the latest shaders. There are extensive mods like CustomNPCs where you can add NPCs with any combination of looks, abilities and behaviours. You can write quests, there are plenty of private servers running various MMOs running on Minecraft with mods.

By changing, or becoming "the man" of Minecraft, something Notch and Mojang successfully avoided, it they will massively reduce a huge amount of the appeal for a lot of people who use mods.

 

[Jay]

I don't know anything about Minecraft, never played it have no interest in it.
But that doesn't mean I don't appreciate just how big it is. Are they worth $2b, know idea, I also have no idea what other game ideas they may have up their sleeves that they showed MS, including where they see Minecraft 2,3,4 going.

But your comments about mods etc, is that even available on consoles?
If not, then they may make it available to XB1.
They may not stop it at all on PC, in fact they may expand the PC market, by making it available to Microsoft RT etc.

It doesn't need to be a system seller either, it just needs to be part of a portfolio on XB1.
So even if they don't make it exclusive and allows it on PS3 & 4, there are ways to make sure the XB1 is the definitive edition, allow mods, all DLC (some just timed, other exclusive), etc

I do understand the general surprise if this is true though.

 

[dobwal]

You mean like Forge and the thousands of mods that already do this? There is nothing about Minecraft you can't change. Add things, remove things, change the core game, completely re-write the rendering to use the latest shaders. There are extensive mods like CustomNPCs where you can add NPCs with any combination of looks, abilities and behaviours. You can write quests, there are plenty of private servers running various MMOs running on Minecraft with mods.

By changing, or becoming "the man" of Minecraft, something Notch and Mojang successfully avoided, it they will massively reduce a huge amount of the appeal for a lot of people who use mods.

Except there are plenty of minecraft users that haven't indulge in the type of value that mods add.

My 6 year old son loves Minecraft and part of that love involves watching about the mods on Youtube (I am forced to watch it with him because I have to cull through the ones with bad language). But he can't participate.

Updating the graphics, new gameplay features, incorporating some of features of the most loved mods and/or tools that makes it easier for the masses to participate in what minecraft is all about is worth a Minecraft 2 label.

I do think it would be a bad ideal for MS to lock MC behind Windows and the Xbox. Its not like they have to do so. It might be a better play to lock it behind their cloud platform versus their hardware. Universal and portable saves that migrate to any platform would seem to better serve their best interest as well as MC fans.

One Minecraft for multiple platforms would be a good way to endear fans. I haven't checked lately but my son says MC on the 360, iOS and PC aren't the same game as features are platform dependent.