WSJ: Mojang Could Be Worth $1 Billion • Hacker News Board

Re: WSJ: Mojang Could Be Worth $1 Billion

#41

Post by pimeys » Mon, Feb 04, 2013, 4:18 PM UTC

tterrace wrote: post #15

I just finished talking with a colleague whose six year old loves minecraft and I remember talking with a twelve year old who was similarly obsessed - to the point of knowing the patch numbers and all the details. The community which grew organically around this game is incredible, and that kind of peer-to-peer promotion is priceless.

I remember my friend telling me about this game and showed me a youtube video of the gameplay. I tested Minecraft and didn't like it. After a while I tested it again and I was completely hooked.

Today we're playing it almost every evening after work with my wife in our own server. Doing missions together, building our own city, farming and raising animals.

I just found out the FTB mod pack for it. It's unbelievable how much stuff people have added to the game. Now I can make a portal gun, build a railroad system or design my own futuristic neon city.

I paid like what, 10 euros for this?

Re: WSJ: Mojang Could Be Worth $1 Billion

#42

Post by zeroexzeroone » Mon, Feb 04, 2013, 4:22 PM UTC

wcoenen wrote: post #23

ben0x539 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lightning never strikes the same place twice, etc

I never got that analogy. Lightning will strike the same place over and over again[1], because that place has the least resistance for charge to flow between the clouds and the ground. [1] http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/wea00/wea00354.htm

After lightning strikes it probably doesnt :)

Re: WSJ: Mojang Could Be Worth $1 Billion

#43

Post by martinced » Mon, Feb 04, 2013, 4:24 PM UTC

I think one real lesson here is that super-shiny high end graphics are not what counts. The gameplay is by far the most important ingredient in any game's success.

More than ten years ago back when I playing Counter-Strike (CS still being immensively succesful btw) I was using a "low poly" mod: this would replace the models of the players with models made of fewer polygons (the head became a cube, etc.) because it would give me a faster framerate.

And the shitty graphics didn't matter: the important thing was the gameplay.

If you can have both great gameplay, great graphics and great perfs, go for it.

But if you have to choose and want to get succesful: cut down the graphics budget. That's not what's going to make your game succesful.

Re: WSJ: Mojang Could Be Worth $1 Billion

#44

Post by rdl » Mon, Feb 04, 2013, 6:02 PM UTC

Laremere wrote: post #22

nightpool wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cool thing is none of this was made for the profit or sales numbers. Notch makes games because he loves making games. In fact, it kinda seems like he's intentionally trying for a more obscure game, something to be niche with a strong community rather then wildly popular.

Ox10^c sounds like a game where Notch went "Ok, I have money and a fanbase which will pay attention if I make an obscure game, what game do I really want to play but wouldn't get approved in a million years by a publisher."

I've wanted a multiplayer game where I could script most of the day to day activity for about as long as I've played games. I think 0x10^c will be super popular.

Re: WSJ: Mojang Could Be Worth $1 Billion

#45

Post by corkeh » Mon, Feb 04, 2013, 6:07 PM UTC

For those having trouble getting past the paywall: http://wsjwap.mo2do.net/s/4150/388?articleId=SB1000142412788...

Re: WSJ: Mojang Could Be Worth $1 Billion

#46

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Feb 04, 2013, 10:00 PM UTC

justinhj wrote: post #39

nicpottier wrote: post #33

I love Minecraft, it is genius, original and tons of fun, but you need at least two points to draw a line, one hit does not a trend make. The game world is littered with 'one hit wonders' but it is very hard to repeat that success, doubly so on the scale of Minecraft. For those that say Mojang is somehow unique, that Notch is the messiah of indy gaming, all I can say is survivor bias. The game industry is chock full…

I've been working on video games for 20 years and from my perspective Minecraft is not a one hit wonder, it's the coming of age of a genre. It reminds me of when I first saw Doom running. It was graphically beautiful for the day and a real technical accomplishment. Although it was by no means the first FPS, it was a huge hit and drove a lot of other companies to go into the genre. That industry has peaked today with…

[deleted]