Tag: minecraft

Why did Minecraft get the works?

Posted on March 11, 2015 by - News

turkTurkey has been fast becoming a place where anything can get banned from the internet for the lamest excuses.

You can be banned for insulting the dead hero Atatürk, you can be blocked for revealing tapes proving government corruption and not it seems you can be censored for playing Minecraft.

A Turkish ministry claims that the game is “too violent” after a report from Turkey’s Family and Social Policies Ministry.

The decision whether or not to band Minecraft is currently in the hands of the Turkish courts as the ministry has submitted their report of the game being too violent to the legal affairs department, as well as instructions for the legal process to begin the ban.

A portion of the report was said to say:  “Although the game can be seen as encouraging creativity in children by letting them build houses, farmlands and bridges, mobs [hostile creatures] must be killed in order to protect these structures. In short, the game is based on violence.”

It seems that the Ministry is little concerned that kids might grow up confusing the game world and reality, possibly even “going as far as torturing animals without knowing what kind of pain they’re causing the creature”.

We guess that like other countries concerned about game violence, Turkey is a peaceful place which does not have any violence at all. Any that happens of course is not born out of a frustration with a corrupt, increasingly autocratic government, but Angry Birds or Tetris which were never banned.

Microsoft coughs $2.5 billion for Mojang

Posted on September 15, 2014 by - News

Microsoft campusSoftware giant Microsoft said it has bought Mojang, which makes the video game Minecraft for $2.5 billion.

The Swedish company has sold over 50 million copies but the three founders will leave the company.

Mojang said on its website change is scary, but “it is going to be good though. Everything is going to be OK.”

Mojang said Minecraft had grown and grown like Topsy.  “Though we’re massively proud of what Minecraft has become. It was never Notch’s intention for it to get this big.”

“Notch” is the brains behind Minecraft and the majority shareholder.  He doesn’t want to run such a big company and the pressure was getting too much. “The only option was to sell Mojang. He [Notch] will continue to do cool stuff though. Don’t worry about that.”

Microsoft about to buy Minecraft outfit

Posted on September 10, 2014 by - News

showposter_1354981054Software giant Microsoft is close to inking a deal to buy Mojang the Swedish company behind the  “Minecraft” video game.

It is believed that Microsoft will have to write a $2 billion cheque for the company and everything could be announced as early as this week.

“Minecraft” is a game where players build structures with blocks to protect against nocturnal monsters which is a little like what Microsoft has been doing, without much success, in the mobile market.

The deal will add to Microsoft’s Xbox video game business, at a time when the competition in the video game console market is heating up.

Acquiring Minecraft gives Vole control of an online world that has become a blockbuster despite breaking a lot of the rules. Minecraft’s blocky graphics are crude it also is sold the old-fashioned way — by charging people to buy a copy.

The price varies depending on what kind of device people use to play the game, ranging from $7 on mobile phones to $27 for computer versions. A version of Minecraft for Microsoft’s Xbox, which has been a top seller for the console, costs $20.

The business is already lucrative. Mojang’s revenue was about $360 million last year, up 38 percent from the year before.

Mojang was co-founded by Markus Persson, who has said in the past that he did not want to sell the company or take money from outside investors.

Redmond has shipped five million Xbox One units to retailers worldwide since the launch. In the same month Sony   sold more than 7 million PlayStation 4 units and was struggling to keep up with consumer demand, so it must be hoping that Minecraft will drive more traffic to its console.