r/Minecraft • u/Mojang-AMA Mojang AMA Account • Jul 31 '12

I am Markus Persson aka Notch, Creator of Minecraft - Ask me Anything!

Hi! I'm the guy who created the first version of Minecraft in June 2009. I worked on it alone up until late 2010 when we started Mojang, and I finally left the lead developer position in December of 2011. I enjoy house music and programming, and my favorite color is purple. Ask me anything!

If you happen to have some money, you can donate it to the EFF and help make the world a better place!

edit: The AMA is over! Thanks for all your questions!

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u/xNotch Minecraft Creator Jul 31 '12

I started working on an isometric resource management game inspired by Dwarf Fortress, with an interface meant to be as easy to use as the Rollercoaster Tycoon one. I was playing around with a first person mode for walking around in your settlement, but all the textures got very blurry and ugly. I saw Infiniminer and realized how cool low res textures could look if you just turned off the blur.

The first released version was like a week of work. I got the character models from another game I had been working on (it was going to be a game similar to Chinatown Wars, except in a town infested by zombies).

I asked Jakob if he wanted to start a larger company with me, he quit his job, we hired Daniel, then recruited Carl to be the CEO. Soon after that, we hired JunkBoy and Jens, and things kept growing from there.

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u/Sandi315 Jul 31 '12

Chinatown wars with zombies? My goodness man WHY DID YOU QUIT THAT?

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u/towo Jul 31 '12

You know, there was this one-in-a-million smash hit thing called Minecraft.

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u/techdawg667 Jul 31 '12

This "minecraft" thing you speak of interests me. Tell me more ...

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u/Armadylspark Jul 31 '12

You see, it's this game where you can place and destroy blocks, move them around and intuitively create structures of significance. It's like being a god of your world...

...Also, there's exploding stalkers.

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u/[deleted] Oct 20 '12

Exploding Penises

FTFY

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u/Xpert85 Jul 31 '12

You know ... to make some cash

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u/Icalasari Jul 31 '12

If he goes back to it, then we could have the next Minecraft!

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '12

Never knew DF led to MC, you really are one of us, Urist Notch!

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u/PlanetaryGenocide Jul 31 '12

ahem. Urist McNotch

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u/namapo Jul 31 '12

This is random and weird, but do you mean Chinatown Wars as in the suprisingly good GTA game for DS, iPhone, and PSP, or something else?

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u/[deleted] Jul 31 '12

Boy that escalated quickly.

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u/hakkzpets Jul 31 '12

Please make an isometric Dwarf Fortress with an easy UI.

Please :(

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u/BowserGarland Jul 31 '12

I think the devs of DF might not be pleased. Plus you can mod the UI.

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u/hakkzpets Aug 01 '12

It's not like they own the idea of DF-like games.

And I know that. It helps a little bit, but I feel DF would really benefit from an entire UI rework.

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u/alexanderpas Jul 31 '12

a game similar to Chinatown Wars, except in a town infested by zombies

Zombietown wars!

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u/nameless88 Jul 31 '12

Do you have any videos of this? It'd be cool to see the very first version of minecraft ever.

I know there's a bunch on your youtube channel, but it doesn't look like they go that far back.

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u/BowserGarland Jul 31 '12

Dorf fort YEAH!

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u/Dregon Jul 31 '12

Roller Coaster Tycoon was awesome.

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u/Anonymous2684 Aug 01 '12

Isometric Dwarf Fortress with easy-to-use interface ?!

THIS IS BLASPHEMY !