Markus-Persson
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Minecraft to get portals between servers, eventually
Minecraft maestro Markus Persson recently updated his blog with a progress report on his new studio, Mojang Specifications, and news about the upcoming Halloween update for the game. He notes that Mojang has found a building and now includes six employees: three programmers, a pixel artist, a CEO and a business developer. As for the Halloween update, Persson says it will include six new block types, five of which have "unique abilities." There will also be a new monster, "a new dimension" and portals. Persson explained later in a tweet that these portals will eventually be able to link between different Minecraft servers, though this functionality won't be implemented anytime soon. So, can monsters use portals? If so, we totally would not build a transdimensional monster funnel leading directly inside of another player's meticulously crafted fortress. So, feel free to invite us to a game and leave us alone in the back room for a few minutes ... okay?
Blockman Dash mod mixes Mega Man Legends and Minecraft
In Minecraft, you can pretty much build anything, so some fans set out to ease the tension of waiting for Mega Man Legends 3 Project by creating a Mega Man Legends-based mod called Blockman Dash. Check out a tour of Apple Market past the break!
Minecraft Halloween update adds new monsters, fishing, wristwatches
A blog post on the official website for the biggest indie hit in all of recorded human history, Minecraft, has revealed that a whole slew of new features will be added to the title as part of a "Halloween Update." These new features are fairly wide-reaching, including new monsters (which are "actually difficult this time around"), torches which eventually extinguish over time, fishing, the ability to fast travel by moving through an (assumedly dangerous) "hell world," and a craftable wristwatch, which lets players keep track of how much time is left in the day before the baddies rear their ugly heads. There are also a few mechanical changes to the game planned for the October 31 update as well, such as new music and sounds, a few bug fixes and additional multiplayer functionality. We sure hope you can finish your to-scale recreation of the Taj Mahal before Halloween, because, man, it sounds your build site is going to get hazardous.
Minecraft dev's profits spawn new, six-person studio
When he's not flying to Valve to speak about his world-building game, Minecraft, one-man development team Marcus Persson has been spending his days lately scouting for a new office and a couple more employees. Profits from his yet-to-be-finished crafting game have already netted enough to start a development studio and hire a handful of employees. On the latest Indie Games Podcast, Persson said he's looking for "about six" employees in total, and he's got four so far. He's also already got plans for a second game -- a title to be developed alongside Minecraft that he repeatedly points out is "going to be fairly different" from his first solo outing. Unlike Minecraft, however, Persson won't be heading up development of the second game, but one of the other folks he's working with. As for when Minecraft will be completed? He "doesn't dare" guess. Hopefully five other people will help speed up the process!
Minecraft earned $350,000 in a single day
As it turns out, the server troubles experienced by Minecraft last week -- which led to an impromptu free-to-play weekend -- might have served as a perfect marketing technique for the indie world-building title. When combined with exposure from Penny Arcade, this free weekend apparently served to make its players hungry for a legit version of the game. According to a Minecraft sales-tracking site, the game was purchased 25,936 times within the 24-hour period after it came back online last Wednesday, netting its creator, Markus Persson, somewhere in the neighborhood of $350,000. The game's sales dropped off a bit since the servers' revival, but have remained significantly higher than before the free-to-play weekend. That's a whole, whole lot of money -- but nothing compared to the paychecks the game's players have lost due to sinking entire lifetimes into their DIY projects. We just want to redo our palace's marble floors, finish the diamond tower and dam up this lake, and then we're done. We mean it this time!
Your mine is the scene of the crime in fan's Minecraft trailer
With its primitive graphics and tough-to-explain premise, Minecraft doesn't do the best job of selling itself. Luckily, fan and YouTuber Vareide is there to step in after the break with his Inception-inspired trailer. And if that doesn't pan out? There's always R&B. [Thanks, Pat]
Minecraft server issues cause impromptu free-to-play weekend
If the latest Penny Arcade strip filled you with an interest/mortal fear of Markus Persson's indie sandbox title Minecraft, you'll be pleased to learn that the game is free to check out today (and possibly even a bit longer). On the game's official site, Persson reported, "Minecraft got way too popular for this humble server," leading him to temporarily shut down a few of the game's online services. Luckily for us spendthrifts, Persson decided to institute "a 'free-to-play weekend', or however long this will take to fix." You'll have to purchase the game and register a new account once things get back up and running, but this seems like a pretty great chance to see what the game's all about without paying for it up front. That is, if you couldn't suss out from the title that it mostly focuses on mining, and then crafting.
