RUMOUR: Microsoft Want's Minecraft

In what could be the mostly poor timed move in the history of video game buyouts. A fresh multi sourced rumour has emerged.

UPDATE: Majong is now an member of the Microsoft family. Notch and his fellow co-founders will leave as soon as everything is sorted, they'll each be leaving with a cut of the £2.5 billion, notch owning more walks away with something like 1.7 billion.

Do Minecraft fans have to worry? Not at all though Notch created Minecraft he handed ddevelopmentover to "Jens" in 2011 and has made Minecraft what it is today. PC users will still be able to mod, record and generally carry on doing what has made the game legend. Minecon will also continue for the foreseeable future.

Do PlayStation, Android and iOS fans have to worry? nope Microsoft and Mojang, will continue to support these devices "and more". whilst this might cause joy in Nintendo fans it's likely they are referring to windows phone and Surface tablets.

The only concerning thing is that their other non Minecraft projects are now uncertain. When asked why and about his future Notch had this to say "it's not about the money, It's about my sanity" He never set out to create this phenomenon or run a multinational company "I'm just a computer geek, who likes to post his opinions on twitter" the designer said "if any of my future projects start gaining traction, I'll probably just end it".

Notch has been increasingly uncomfortable about the pressure of being the "Minecraft guy" and today's news confirms he has been looking for an out and felt Microsoft was the best choice to keep Minecraft going as is. It's expected Microsoft will make it's money back by June 2015 thanks to sales of the game, merchandise, contracts with Sony and the Minecraft empire in general.

Orginal Story:Until confirmed this is firmly a rumour. right we got that straight? good.

According to multiple sources Microsoft is preparing to buy Minecraft developer Mojang for a rather cool $2 BILLION, this would include Minecraft and all other games in development. The rumour says Markus "Notch" Petterson would stay on to handle the transfer to MS and then leave for new pastures. Notch leaving has been on the cards for sometime, whilst he hasn't said it himself but ever since he passed Minecraft over to his 2nd he has been taking steps away from Mojang. Cancelling his games working only on tech demo's suddenly cancelling deals with other companies. Notch has always maintained that they haven't been "in it for the money and only do what make's sense for our games" and whilst a sale to Microsoft might seem against that he has been rather open with his friendship with now Xbox head Phil Spenser and how he has enjoyed working with Microsoft (outside his issue with the Tablet version of Windows 8) so it wouldn't be completely unfounded,

But what about the recent launch of Minecraft on PS4? what would happen to that? it's unknown if they'd loose support and for the first time in Minecraft history a version of the game would be "finished" or MS would have to honour current contracts. However an insider is claiming Microsoft sees Minecraft as an "product" and not a game, Likening it to MS Office that runs on competing systems, So exclusivity might not even happen.

Abe's Take
Fans shouldn't worry as I doubt if this happens the PC version would change in anyway. Notch leaving the company isn;t an issue as stated above hasn't had much to do with it for the last few years. Microsoft isn't really known now for ruining devs they've bought. They tend to lock them into a theme but not much more. PS Minecraft fans on the other hand have something to worry about. As we saw when Amazon bought Double Helix developer of Stryder and Killer Instinct (reboot) the game's publishers (Capcom and Microsoft) had to replace the teams.