MS to Buy Mojang for 2bn?

[Tom]

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/09/report-microsoft-to-buy-minecraft-developer-mojang-for-2-billion

I don't even. How can mojang be worth more than twitch? And even then, why would ms want mojang? It's just a rumour, and one I think is pretty silly.

What do you guys think? realistic?

[Mr. Analog]

Sounds dodgy to me

[Lazybones]

As great as minecraft is it would probably be purchasing it at its peak. Looking at the quality of clones that have been made and how technology advances it will be due to be superseded by something in only 1 or 2 years..

They are a one game company, none of the other stuff has been remotely popular enough to warrant interest.

[Darren Dirt]

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/09/report-microsoft-to-buy-minecraft-developer-mojang-for-2-billion

I don't even. How can mojang be worth more than twitch?

in case the rumor mill at one point was saying it was M$ gonna buy twitch...
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/08/amazon-not-google-reportedly-buying-twitch-for-1-billion/

But a revenue-generating product with a long life like Minecraft has an extra valuable asset: a fan base, a built-in market... for ... other stuff (Microsoft maybe thinks diggers will eventually work in cubicle farms and needs to make 'em think of them instead of free products, Linux, etc.? -- see also what Notch said.)

[Darren Dirt]

Notch can be a prick:

That's it, I'm never using my eyes again. I'm done. http://i.imgur.com/tsEcDkS.jpg

SO TRUE: "@notch why would you do that to me?!"

[Mr. Analog]

There was a recent Dilbert strip that summarized what would happen if MS took over

http://dilbert.com/2014-07-31/

...except imagine the guy there represented actual project contributors instead of Notch

I'm not sure if this is true or not but there was a person who posted about the announcement working at Mojang who said pretty much everybody broke down at the news. It could explain why so many people bailed out of Bukkit at the same time

The sad thing is that Minecraft came out at exactly the right time with the right features but was mostly built into something truly awesome by the community. Modders, texture packs, creative players, social media. It was more than just a building sandbox game (Infiniminer anyone?), it really grew from the support of the devs and players that formed the community around it.

Microsoft will be left with the Brand and a built in Microsoft-hostile community. The most likely first step they'll take is move "Minecraft Realms" into the Microsoft cloud somewhere and manage the @%&# right out of it. Imagine paid DLC, subscriptions and other stupid things (GFWL! /kidding)

Minecraft will never truly die, but, Notch selling out and having the community freak out is going to hurt it badly, which is a shame because it's really been an amazing adventure and with updates being so frequent lately and so much added content it's managed to stay fresh and interesting since pretty much the day I bought it, not many other games I own can say that

[Darren Dirt]

Hey now maybe Notch will have time to build a slightly-improved version* of Dwarf Fortress!

http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/

...Because for games to survive longterm you gotta make sure Losing Is Fun (thanks http://vsrecommendedgames.wikia.com/wiki/Dwarf_Fortress )

]
Though its medieval milieu of besieged castles and mutant enemies may be familiar, Dwarf Fortress appeals mainly to a substratum of hard-core gamers. The game's unofficial slogan, recited on message boards, is "Losing is fun!" Dwarf Fortress's unique difficulty begins with its most striking feature: The way it looks. In an industry obsessed with pushing the frontiers of visual awe, Dwarf Fortress is a defiant throwback, its interface a dense tapestry of letters, numbers and crude glyphs you might have seen in a computer game around 1980. A normal person looks at ♠?dg  and sees gibberish, but the Dwarf Fortress initiate sees a tense tableau: a dog leashed to a tree, about to be mauled by a goblin.

This bare-bones aesthetic allows Tarn to focus resources not on graphics but on mechanics, which he values much more. Many simulation games offer players a bag of building blocks, but few dangle a bag as deep, or blocks as small and intricately interlocking, as Dwarf Fortress...

...It's like a jalopy with a V-12 under the hood. "The processing power that Dwarf Fortress uses is on the same scale as modern engineering software for designing aerospace hardware," says Ames, the engineer. "You have more complicated simulations in Dwarf Fortress than when you model the aerodynamics of a wing."

*I'm kidding of course -- DF is definitely low on the mainstream-accessibility scale! (But that's what makes me curious about it, now that I just heard of it!)

[Mr. Analog]

If you're looking for a hard as balls Roguelike check out FTL

That game will kick your ass

...and then you'll play it again

[Lazybones]

2 Billion price explained in old Tweet 12:51 PM - 18 Dec 2012

https://twitter.com/notch/status/281139739304800256

Markus PerssonVerified account ‏@notch

Anyway, my price is two billion dollars. Give me two billion dollars, and I'll endorse your crap.

[Mr. Analog]

Should read verified sellout

But all of us here know that

Notch is such a dick

[Lazybones]

Should read verified sellout

But all of us here know that

Notch is such a dick

If I hacked together a game that sold millions I would cash out as well.

[Tom]

Especially if you want to get out of the business. I think notch has wanted out for a while.

[Mr. Analog]

That's the sad thing I probably would too

$2 billion would buy a lot of gumballs...

[Darren Dirt]

If you're looking for a hard as balls Roguelike check out FTL

That game will kick your ass

...and then you'll play it again

Hell no. But just on principle; the game designers have never openly acknowledged their obvious love for and inspiration from SUNDOG: FROZEN LEGACY (distributed by "FTL*", ironically enough).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FTL:_Faster_Than_Light
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunDog:_Frozen_Legacy

:cough:


(also, I watched one or two "let's play" of FTL a few months ago -- it looked boring, not frustrating. SD:FL was never boring. Even when you died after a lot of progress and had to repeat some of your travels and activities since the last save point -- similar to how the original Deus Ex was a perfect level of difficulty/frustration without becoming boring).



*man I miss those days, when a single coder (sometimes with a couple of buddies) could come up with a simple idea and build a SUPER-FUN game that lots of people would gladly pay for and enjoy playing, and not need a hundred MILLION dollar budget.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FTL_Games SD:FL caused me many a gaming-till-dawn session; and "OIDS" was another one, had its own level designer too, physics and shoot-em-up perfectly balanced and FUN, anyone but me remember that one? And where would the "dungeon crawl" genre be without "Dungeon Master"?

[Mr. Analog]

It looks boring because after playing a few rounds you start to realize that each decision has an impact on the game, not just for the current situation but the next 3 or 4, to the point where people pause the game so much it's almost like a turn based space sim.

I mean you'll see guys pause, turn off their oxygen generators and boost their shields just long enough to absorb 1 or 2 hits because they know they'll be taking damage later to get to the next waypoint, there is a certain amount of rush during the experience

Something like Rogue Legacy might be more to your liking, it's a Roguelike but platform-y (and a lot of fun)