Hello fellow minecrafters,
I don't know about you, but I've been following minecraft and it's community from PC to XBOX to Pocket Edition, since nearly day 1. It has progressed at in incredible rate into a huge community based game. When the xbox version was announced I was very excited as I am more of a controller gamer, than a keyboard and mouse gamer. As it hit xbox, it became clear that we would probably never actually catch up the the PC version and all it's features. I quote this from minecraft Wiki not knowing it's complete accuracy, but the numbers sound roughly correct: April 2011, Persson estimated that Minecraft had made €23 million (US$33 million) in revenue, with 800,000 sales of the alpha version of the game, and over 1 million sales of the beta version. The Xbox 360 version of Minecraft became profitable within the first 24 hours of the game's release when the game broke the Xbox Live sales records with 400,000 players online. I wanted to bring this to everyone's attention, that the growth rate on xbox has been substantial and is a huge part of the community. even without all the features. This is where myself and I'm sure a lot of you feel wronged. Knowing that in 11 months 6 million copies of the xbox version have sold, compared to the 10 million in about twice the time that PC has. The xbox statistically is growing at a faster rate than the PC. I personally know how long I remember waiting on each update, and how excited I was. Usually each time to get the update and find out how little was actually added, and how many bugs presented themselves without a care. Now just alone on sales of PC, XBOX, and Pocket Edition(which Im not exactly sure of) They have sold over 15,000,000 copies at about $20 on average. Taking into consideration xbox has taken their share and updates cost money let's rough that figure down a bit. Let's say 12 million went directly back to xbox, and to give a fair estimate let's say $15,000,000 has went back into game development and the people working on the game. That leaves a wide margin of more than $250 MILLION DOLLARS. Here's my problem, we are the community, and we put them in that position. I'm not saying they don't deserve any credit because the game itself is amazing. My issue is that if there is that kind of a large profit from this game, please explain to me why there are only 43 people involved with developing this game. A community of over 15,000,000 people are relying on 43 people to continue to bring them a new edge while they sit on massive piles of cash. Money that could employ many developers and continue the extremely fast pace process of developing one of our favorite games and pass times. If this isn't enough to get your attention towards the subject. Minecraft just received TU9. The most highly anticipated update yet. Come to find out it is also the most bug-ridden and disappointing as well. Lighting Issues, Multiple System Crash Errors, Mobs not acting correctly, on top of many issues that have existed this entire time. We are expected to wait patiently as they fix these updates, knowing that more than likely another update will bring more unfixed issues. Past that lies the fact that xbox suffers a considerable amount of server lag, and has been discussed but not pursued. This is a community game, to play with your friends. There has been talk of 'Minecraft Realms' but it went straight for testing on Pocket Edition, and PC. Pocket Edition being the least profitable, and PC already having a stable server basis. Why was Xbox not thought of?
We've started a twitter to collaborate new information we get as it shows itself, but xbox needs help. Whether that be to hire new people, or to take a new approach, something should be done. I feel it is unjust for any company to profit that much without reinvesting in itself, and us, the community are the ones who suffer from it.
We hope you will see the scale of how much were paying and how much were getting as a community, and how the 1% and 99% continues to grow farther apart in every aspect of the world. This is beyond a game, this is a company neglecting their customers and profiting. Thanks for reading, and please we'd love to hear what you have to say!
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I'm not sure why XBOX is being underdeveloped and the emphasis is being put either on the PC or pocket Edition. The least Mojang could do is give 4J a greater ability to actually fix the bugs by giving them slightly more freedom I guess? It's ridiculous that with each new bug something significant seems to break. The XBOX might eventually surpass PC in sales and have a wider a base but that also leaves into consideration about XBOX's new upcoming counsel, and whether or not we can transfer games and saves over to the new counsel and experience far less bugs?
I do not mean to argue the fact that, clearly it is more popular on Xbox 360 and the fact itself deserves more recognition. Still you have to look at the reasoning too. The cost of a decent PC which can run Minecraft sufficiently versus an Xbox 360. Also the game is cheaper on Xbox than the PC. The Xbox platform does not have the same gaming capacity and there are many more hoops to jump through that every update must be approved by Microsoft which they do not have to worry with on updating their PC baby.
With that being said, I completely agree that they should afford a larger development team to either get more updates at a faster pace or more content in each update.
About Unokitsune's concern about moving to the new Xbox console coming up, the Minecraft game is an arcade game for the Xbox. Surely we'll be able to download the Arcade games we've purchased on the new console as well. If not , well, that would be a costly decision on their part. Lots of unhappy customers, they would have.
I agree - the end was cool I suppose and the xp is great - but what do you get from it? Lots of work to get there, and there is nothing there except end blocks and the dragon....only a few new items, all pretty much decorative. Fire charges are cool, but the are buggy. On one map I have a whole sky full of fires that won't despawn, even after exiting and re-entering. Built a rapid fire rack of dispensers to shoot them, and many shots do not disapear. After a min of operation - xbox freezes. Also the range on the shots is way way too far - they shoot from one side of the map to the other side.
Honestly - I never believe that companies beta test updates or patches anymore. Having been a freelance beta tester mnyself, I find it mindboggling that I and others can find seriously annoying bugs, graphical glitches, broken gameplay mechanics, lag events (where wasn't any lag before), and crashes. Making many parts of the game unplayable. I found 3 major bugs in the first 15 minutes of getting TU9. The lighting issue, tnt sometimes causing massive lag, freezes, or crashes, and the fire charge errors. Wtf? Heck it has been days and their supposedly heavily moderated official list post hasn't even been updated. And only has a few bugs listed.
I don't usually complaim, and it is hard to tell what the money numbers are really, 4J could just as easily be barely making a profit, while microsoft and Mojang are raking in the cash with fees. No one knows but them. But I do it its utter crap we really barely got any new items. No hoppers, dispensers can't face up or down, etc etc
Microsoft is the reason the Xbox 360 Edition is the way it is.
So have fun trying to make one of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world change how they've worked their gaming company for more than a decade.
Microsoft is the reason the Xbox 360 Edition is the way it is.
So have fun trying to make one of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world change how they've worked their gaming company for more than a decade.
But lets just be thankful MCX360 isn't run by EA.
"Sorry! In order for you to have access to the diamond tool pack you need to pay 0.99 Cents, or you can buy it with 50 Minecraft Premium points!" -If EA made Minecraft on the 360.
You're title is misleading. It should be something like "We want more, now!"
No.
You're whole premise is that Mojang/4J made tons of money so they should hire more people and crank out updates faster.
* They made tons of money because they earned it and took the risk of publishing it (yes, there was a risk- it could've flopped). Don't forget: we gave them the money. Don't make it sound like the "greedy bastards" took it from us.
* They could, like 95% of the other game publishers, sell us "DLC" or "Expansion Packs". Instead they're taking that profit and using it to give us free updates…. at their expense. In other words, they are "re-investing the money", for our benefit. How are we "suffering"?
* You suggest that they hire more people so they can crank out updates faster. So when it's caught up, you fire them after a few months? Heck, it would take these "contract" workers a month just to learn the program, much less how to do their little addition without messing any of the rest of it up.
Sorry, I guess I'm one of the few that thinks 4J is doing a good job, especially compared to some companies. I paid for the original game and I got that. I don't feel "entitled" or "deserve" anything beyond that. That I've gotten several updates with additional features for free is a very welcome bonus and benefit.
Don't bite the hand that feeds you.
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I agree with Geneo as far as how 4J could be like many other companies and sell DLC rather than give free updates. It is annoying that with the updates we get more bugs or lag so that would be my only complaint.
You're title is misleading. It should be something like "We want more, now!"
No.
You're whole premise is that Mojang/4J made tons of money so they should hire more people and crank out updates faster.
* They made tons of money because they earned it and took the risk of publishing it (yes, there was a risk- it could've flopped). Don't forget: we gave them the money. Don't make it sound like the "greedy bastards" took it from us.
* They could, like 95% of the other game publishers, sell us "DLC" or "Expansion Packs". Instead they're taking that profit and using it to give us free updates…. at their expense. In other words, they are "re-investing the money", for our benefit. How are we "suffering"?
* You suggest that they hire more people so they can crank out updates faster. So when it's caught up, you fire them after a few months? Heck, it would take these "contract" workers a month just to learn the program, much less how to do their little addition without messing any of the rest of it up.
Sorry, I guess I'm one of the few that thinks 4J is doing a good job, especially compared to some companies. I paid for the original game and I got that. I don't feel "entitled" or "deserve" anything beyond that. That I've gotten several updates with additional features for free is a very welcome bonus and benefit.
Don't bite the hand that feeds you.
Well excuse me for having an opinion. If you read carefully and had a realistic point of view, countries starve over less amounts of money. Xbox has been neglected on bug issues since the day it came out, and if that's because 4j isn't receiving the funding they need(which I highly doubt as they are a previously successful company) then something should be done. I understand your concept with free updates, and how we've already paid. This would make sense if the 'free updates' didn't ruin the game play one after another without concern of fixing bugs that have been around since day one. Let me use the double iron doors for example. This has been an issue since day one and has never even been addressed by 4j. On top of that, in the TU9 update it states 'Improved Lighting'. That's a deceitful lie as far as I'm concerned and shouldn't been confirmed before stated. You can be satisfied with a faulty product, but I guarantee you if you bought an electrical device that requires updates, and an update from the manufacturer rendered it useless, you'd have a bone to pick. If you disagree with this, well then that's fine. We will continue to fight for a functional product that we already paid for.
Thanks for your response!
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Once again were not complaining about how the new things are being added. Our problem is that bug issues have outnumbered new features and rendered a lot of the game literally unplayable. We are frustrated, and we want what we paid for. A functional Xbox version of Minecraft.
On a second note, I personally would be fine with buying an occasional DLC. Keeping in mind that a DLC would have more time and effort to be put into place, and would (I would hope) force them to review bugs. This problem revolves around Microsoft, 4J Studios, and Mojang. Something needs to be done.
More and more time goes into the pocket edition, and pc to put us farther away from catching up, as we wait months at a time for a bug fix, to bring more bugs before they can even worry about new features. It is unfair, no matter what way you look at it.
Hiring help is not a 1 day process, and I understand that it will take time for a new developer to learn the games code. So why not hire them now, rather than wait until the game hasn't rendered itself bug ridden, and it is too late to save it.
I never said the solution was simple, and I never said it would be easy. What I am saying is that there are a minimum of 6,000,000 people trying to enjoy something that takes a turn for the worse every time we're supposed to see progress. I truly enjoy minecraft, it's community, and the idea of a never-ending game.
This would make sense if the 'free updates' didn't ruin the game play one after another without concern of fixing bugs that have been around since day one. Let me use the double iron doors for example. This has been an issue since day one and has never even been addressed by 4j.
However, many of these bugs have been around even longer in the PC version of the game and have yet to be addressed by Mojang. I'm no longer convinced that 4J has been given the liberty under their contract to "correct" something before it was corrected in the PC version.
However, many of these bugs have been around even longer in the PC version of the game and have yet to be addressed by Mojang. I'm no longer convinced that 4J has been given the liberty under their contract to "correct" something before it was corrected in the PC version.
This may very well be true. With that being said, it's an issue. An issue millions of people are waiting on a solution for. This needs to be addressed and taken care of. I am also slowly losing hope as I see our community neglected due to legal terms. I just read earlier that I was very close to correct with my figures. Here's a section of one article I read:
Even if you don’t play Minecraft, you’re probably aware that just about everyone else does. It is, after all, an immensely popular game. But how popular is it, exactly?
Well, in 2012 alone, Mojang, the maker of Minecraft, has reported a revenue of $237.7 million, which is kind of a lot money.
“It’s almost hard to grasp,” said Mojang CEO Carl Manneh. “It’s easy to become a bit blind working at Mojang. Everything’s happening so fast and it’s going so well. One almost needs to pinch oneself to know it’s for real.”
“When we started Mojang in 2010 we made a budget for the first year. Three months later we just trashed it – it became totally irrelevant. We still have the same feeling now. There simply are no good ways to forecast how much money we are going to make.”
“Minecraft is a power of its own now – it’s just rolling,” he said. “We have so many markets where we are not very strong yet, where many play Minecraft but few have bought it simply because you can’t use our online payment solution there. That’s something we’ll get our hands to during 2013.”
It seems as if Minecraft isn’t settling for just all of the money – the beast, it hungers for more.
I understand this game is still developing itself in a way, and that a lot of the boom was unexpected. If there literally is no budget at this point, what is stopping them from expanding? It seems to be legal terms at this point but I can't be sure. I'm not trying to point the finger at anyone, I am trying to get a message directly to Mojang themselves, that the community is becoming unhappy with the process, and pace of updates for xbox, while PC recieved complete and full attention.
II've read a lot of direct interviews with notch, and this doesn't seem to be his fault. He's doing everything he knows how to do. I think the main issue being presented, is that no information is getting to them directly about the progress, and what they could do to better. I believe with his intellect, which he has proven well, changes can be made and this could go a lot better than it is now. Until we group our voices and make it known this is an issue, nothing will be done. We will continue to pile bugs, on bugs, and inevitably ruin the xbox version to a point where starting from scratch again would make sense.
Thanks once again for reading everyone!
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I feel it is unjust for any company to profit that much...
Then you quoted:
Well, in 2012 alone, Mojang, the maker of Minecraft, has reported a revenue of $237.7 million....
Economics 101:
Profit = Income minus Expenses.
So what if Mojang's income was $237 million? What you keep forgetting to mention is the Expenses: office rent, utilities, software, computers, servers, taxes, wages, salaries, travel, advertising, lawyer/legal fees…. and that's just off the top of my head- I'm sure there's more. So what little is left after all that- that's Profit, and it sure isn't anything near the $237 million you're making it sound like.
Reminds me of the old Wizard Of Id cartoon.
The Duke presents the King with the plumber's bill.
King: Holy cow! That's a lot just for remembering that water runs downhill!
Duke: Yea, but it ain't all water…..
...that the community is becoming unhappy with the process, and pace of updates for xbox, while PC recieved complete and full attention.
Huh?
Some of us, after an update, actually play the game for more than an hour before we start wondering why we haven't heard about the next update. Is the "community" as a whole unhappy with "the process", or just you? You say the PC version is receiving "complete and full attention" from Mojang…. and you think 4J isn't giving the xbox version theirs?
In 8 months (of 2012) the xbox version got 7 updates. Remember that the xbox version can't come out every week with just a few bug fixes and a new thing or two like the PC can- they have to wait and do them all at once in on big update. So discounting the "snapshots" and "pre-releases", how many actual updates did the PC get in the same time period?
We will continue to pile bugs, on bugs, and inevitably ruin the xbox version to a point where starting from scratch again would make sense.
?
Doesn't each PC "snapshot" and "pre-release" contain tons of bug fixes? Check the wiki. (In the 1.4.4 pre-release there were 22 bug fixes, with 9 more bugs known but still not fixed). The xbox version isn't any more buggy than the PC version.
We all wish updates were quicker.
We all wish all bugs were squashed and we had a perfect game with perfect updates.
But that's not gonna happen with a game as complicated as MC. And throwing more people at it isn't gonna fix anything- it'll just make things more complicated.
"Sorry! In order for you to have access to the diamond tool pack you need to pay 0.99 Cents, or you can buy it with 50 Minecraft Premium points!" -If EA made Minecraft on the 360.
“We have so many markets where we are not very strong yet, where many play Minecraft but few have bought it simply because you can’t use our online payment solution there. That’s something we’ll get our hands to during 2013.”
Thats why MC isn't getting updated as much as you'd like. Mojang, and possibly 4J, are working on creating profit in other countries so that they can expand their pockets.
Economics 101:
Profit = Income minus Expenses.
So what if Mojang's income was $237 million? What you keep forgetting to mention is the Expenses: office rent, utilities, software, computers, servers, taxes, wages, salaries, travel, advertising, lawyer/legal fees…. and that's just off the top of my head- I'm sure there's more. So what little is left after all that- that's Profit, and it sure isn't anything near the $237 million you're making it sound like.
Reminds me of the old Wizard Of Id cartoon.
The Duke presents the King with the plumber's bill.
King: Holy cow! That's a lot just for remembering that water runs downhill!
Duke: Yea, but it ain't all water…..
You're making it as if the expenses are a lot. No, they are not. If you breakdown the expenses, you will be surprised.
What, a few millions wouldn't suffice for office rent, utilities, software, computers, servers, taxes, wages, salaries, travel, advertising, lawyer/legal fees? You're kidding me right? They are not a huge company with thousands of staff.
Then, we take a look at the revenue of XBLA version alone, let's just say that Microsoft took home half of the sales (marketing, revenue share etc.).
Six million copies and they are making $60M off the Xbox.
That's a lot of money. You can pay 100 top-notch programmers with $100k a year income and still left home with $50M.
I understand this game is still developing itself in a way, and that a lot of the boom was unexpected. If there literally is no budget at this point, what is stopping them from expanding? It seems to be legal terms at this point but I can't be sure. I'm not trying to point the finger at anyone, I am trying to get a message directly to Mojang themselves, that the community is becoming unhappy with the process, and pace of updates for xbox, while PC recieved complete and full attention.
I think that the "PC received complete and full attention" while the Xbox languishes on the back burners of Mojang and 4J is an erroneous assumption. That Notch has some "issues" with Microsoft has been evident in the media; but Notch no longer runs the Minecraft project... JEB does. I honestly don't know if JEB has issues with Microsoft or not; but Mojang are as bound by the original porting agreement as 4J and Microsoft are. The Xbox version began this process a year later than the PC and, for all intents and purposes, it remains about a year behind the PC now. In addition, the companies entering into the project fully realized the limited capabilities of the current console, so the "plan" for porting it probably has considered the possibility that no more could possiby 'fit" on the Xbox than what the game had at 1.2.3... and it may have been that they thought possibly that even that amount of "stuff" wouldn't fit. It may have been a gamble from the start; and the sad reality MAY be that this console is max'd right out at this point. For example, the lagging is evident despite the fact that the developer has done loads of things to try to reduce it. For example, they've reduced the drawn distance to a point where people are now complaining about overrunning the drawing of the terrain frequently. They've also set limits on entities that people are now complaining about incessantly. They kept the world at its original size rather than increasing the height. We may not want to admit it (and I certainly don't like it); but it might possibly just well be that we will have to wait until the next console to get "caught up" to the PC.
Perhaps THAT is where all those redevelopment monies and staffing energies are going right now... towards developing this game to break ground on a new console that is currently shrouded in secrecy. We can't see what may be going on behind currently closed doors. 4J's long-term future as a company does not rest on the Xbox 360. If that's where they are throwing all their eggs, they won't last out another year or two regardless of the amount of money you think they've pocketed and not re-invested this year. I would bet dollars to donuts that they are re-investing a ton on staff and development kits for the new console... postering perhaps to put a really advanced version of Minecraft at the "front' of the lineup for that console.
In the meantime, most of us are saying that we got our $20 worth out of this game long ago. Today is just beginning Day 4, waiting for a bug fix for an update that was released on April 4th (a day earlier than it was scheduled)... and it's Sunday, Day 2 of a weekend. Don't 4J staff deserve to take the weekends off?
Still it is quite clear the process for the xbox 360 is majorly broken and we are being treated as second class owners of the game whom can be left with it virtually unenjoyable for a month at time instead of investing and doing some proper testing before release. They cannot have the cake of little testing and the console at the same time. The different platforms have different expectations about the ability to use the product. Further the very nature of the certification process and limit on the number of Title Updates allowed should be forcing them to increase the size of the team and do more testing for the 360. The very arguments about why it is acceptable for the Xbox to be so far behind the PC are the items that argue for more staff and testing for the 360 version.\
If the 360 were being treated like a 360 where testing is required and should be done due to the fact they cannot release patches willy-nilly like the PC, then none of the MAJOR TU9 issues should have made it to us.
A (6 million customers @ $20 a pop) $120,000,000 customer base who are likely to influence the expected doubling of that customer base within the next 12 months not being able to access the product due to a decision to ship with a major bug
it very badly reflects on the reputation of the company by showing the company as willing to CHOOSE to ship products with known major game breaking bugs.
The above financial examples are only Xbox Edition and no DLC sales. DLC sells like mad for this game based on everyone whom I've seen wearing skins, so one can reasonably figure it is a good chunk of change as well.
I've not even gone on about the other very visible clearly chosen to ship with bugs. Instead my focus has been to provide requested examples or new related information for only the game breaking issues that affect every world. I can find you a multitude of other items that demonstrate this CHOICE to ship a broken Title Update that affect every world. Example, dispensers shooting and picking up liquid was part of this update. It takes 2 dispense attempts to find that was broken.
Testing was not done and/or decision were made to ship with many multitudes of known bugs including very visible major game breaking bugs for this Title Update. Either way that is unacceptable given the financial interests of this company related to this product.
This one is so common the developer touching the code should have caught the issue in unit test as he was developing it. (Miss one, minor)
The QA Team should have caught it as part of the lighting tests that would have been part of any competent manager's cycles since lighting is specifically changing. (miss 2, major since bug fixing and testing was at least 12 days plus all the time prior)
The QA Team should have caught in the lighting regressions tests to make sure the parts of lighting code not touched didn't break. (miss 3, major since bug fixing and testing was at least 12 days plus all the time prior)
Finally the QA team should have caught it in the final full regression test done prior to marking things done and packaging & shipping to Microsoft for certification. (miss 4, Unacceptable that after 12 days of bug fixing this was allowed to go to Microsoft like this)
So with that said. There was a management decision to ship with this bug or one of the worst QA teams in the world.
4J really needs to do something about their QA process if it was truly missed since it shows a 100% lack of testing. If it was not missed which is VERY LIKELY, then they need to do something about managers willing to ship such visible and game breaking bad code.
That is totally unacceptable PC thinking in regards to the Xbox. One cannot just choose to ship it on the Xbox as console users just expect it to work. All of the arguments as to why they can't just act like the PC are the very arguments for why more devs and more testing needs to be done on the 360.
Still it is quite clear the process for the xbox 360 is majorly broken and we are being treated as second class owners of the game whom can be left with it virtually unenjoyable for a month at time
It's only DAY 4 since the update was released... and over a weekend at that. The bugs in any previous update were not nearly as devastating as this most recent one (Silver account but) and did not warrant deviating from a bug fix schedule that was already a concession made by Microsoft due to the "nature" of the game. I do believe this one does warrant an emergency bug fix; but your ranting on it being a month when it hasn't just destroys all the credibility of your argument. At least have the courtesy to stop these blatant exaggerations and get your timeline straight.
It's only DAY 4 since the update was released... and over a weekend at that. The bugs in any previous update were not nearly as devastating as this most recent one (Silver account but) and did not warrant deviating from a bug fix schedule that was already a concession made by Microsoft due to the "nature" of the game. I do believe this one does warrant an emergency bug fix; but your ranting on it being a month when it hasn't just destroys all the credibility of your argument. At least have the courtesy to stop these blatant exaggerations and get your timeline straight.
I am basing that estimate on the HISTORY that 4J have established. If you think history and facts destroy credibility of an estimate then you don't know how to do estimations, trending, analysis, and capacity modeling. One uses history and trends to predict future events to a limited degree.
Given every one of these issues can be found on the Tutorial world in under 1 minute. Any and all proper testing should have prevented the Non-Live & Silver user issue. Any and all testing should have caught the lighting bugs. This was a clear management decision to ship with either 0 testing and/or major bugs.
Please tell me where my timeline is wrong. March 11 to March 23 was bug fixing. That is 12 days. There is another 12 days between March 23rd and April 4th when this patch came out that at any point 4J could have stopped the release. They instead made a conscious, knowing, purposeful, and willing decision and choice to ship with these major bugs and/or no testing.
Update > Bugfix = Time
May 9th 2012 > June 15th 2012 = 1 month 5 days
July 13th 2012 > August 7th 2012 = 3 weeks 5 days
October 16th 2012 > November 15, 2012 = 1 month
December 19, 2012 > January 30, 2013 = 1 month, 2 weeks, 5 days
With that I again say there is ZERO reason for the game breaking bugs to have reached the end users.
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Retired StaffI don't know about you, but I've been following minecraft and it's community from PC to XBOX to Pocket Edition, since nearly day 1. It has progressed at in incredible rate into a huge community based game. When the xbox version was announced I was very excited as I am more of a controller gamer, than a keyboard and mouse gamer. As it hit xbox, it became clear that we would probably never actually catch up the the PC version and all it's features. I quote this from minecraft Wiki not knowing it's complete accuracy, but the numbers sound roughly correct: April 2011, Persson estimated that Minecraft had made €23 million (US$33 million) in revenue, with 800,000 sales of the alpha version of the game, and over 1 million sales of the beta version.
The Xbox 360 version of Minecraft became profitable within the first 24 hours of the game's release when the game broke the Xbox Live sales records with 400,000 players online.
I wanted to bring this to everyone's attention, that the growth rate on xbox has been substantial and is a huge part of the community. even without all the features. This is where myself and I'm sure a lot of you feel wronged. Knowing that in 11 months 6 million copies of the xbox version have sold, compared to the 10 million in about twice the time that PC has. The xbox statistically is growing at a faster rate than the PC.
I personally know how long I remember waiting on each update, and how excited I was. Usually each time to get the update and find out how little was actually added, and how many bugs presented themselves without a care. Now just alone on sales of PC, XBOX, and Pocket Edition(which Im not exactly sure of) They have sold over 15,000,000 copies at about $20 on average. Taking into consideration xbox has taken their share and updates cost money let's rough that figure down a bit. Let's say 12 million went directly back to xbox, and to give a fair estimate let's say $15,000,000 has went back into game development and the people working on the game. That leaves a wide margin of more than $250 MILLION DOLLARS. Here's my problem, we are the community, and we put them in that position. I'm not saying they don't deserve any credit because the game itself is amazing. My issue is that if there is that kind of a large profit from this game, please explain to me why there are only 43 people involved with developing this game. A community of over 15,000,000 people are relying on 43 people to continue to bring them a new edge while they sit on massive piles of cash. Money that could employ many developers and continue the extremely fast pace process of developing one of our favorite games and pass times.
If this isn't enough to get your attention towards the subject. Minecraft just received TU9. The most highly anticipated update yet. Come to find out it is also the most bug-ridden and disappointing as well. Lighting Issues, Multiple System Crash Errors, Mobs not acting correctly, on top of many issues that have existed this entire time. We are expected to wait patiently as they fix these updates, knowing that more than likely another update will bring more unfixed issues.
Past that lies the fact that xbox suffers a considerable amount of server lag, and has been discussed but not pursued. This is a community game, to play with your friends. There has been talk of 'Minecraft Realms' but it went straight for testing on Pocket Edition, and PC. Pocket Edition being the least profitable, and PC already having a stable server basis. Why was Xbox not thought of?
We've started a twitter to collaborate new information we get as it shows itself, but xbox needs help. Whether that be to hire new people, or to take a new approach, something should be done. I feel it is unjust for any company to profit that much without reinvesting in itself, and us, the community are the ones who suffer from it.
You can follow us here:
https://twitter.com/Minecraft_Comm
We hope you will see the scale of how much were paying and how much were getting as a community, and how the 1% and 99% continues to grow farther apart in every aspect of the world. This is beyond a game, this is a company neglecting their customers and profiting.
Thanks for reading, and please we'd love to hear what you have to say!
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With that being said, I completely agree that they should afford a larger development team to either get more updates at a faster pace or more content in each update.
About Unokitsune's concern about moving to the new Xbox console coming up, the Minecraft game is an arcade game for the Xbox. Surely we'll be able to download the Arcade games we've purchased on the new console as well. If not , well, that would be a costly decision on their part. Lots of unhappy customers, they would have.
Good Mining to you all.
Honestly - I never believe that companies beta test updates or patches anymore. Having been a freelance beta tester mnyself, I find it mindboggling that I and others can find seriously annoying bugs, graphical glitches, broken gameplay mechanics, lag events (where wasn't any lag before), and crashes. Making many parts of the game unplayable. I found 3 major bugs in the first 15 minutes of getting TU9. The lighting issue, tnt sometimes causing massive lag, freezes, or crashes, and the fire charge errors. Wtf? Heck it has been days and their supposedly heavily moderated official list post hasn't even been updated. And only has a few bugs listed.
I don't usually complaim, and it is hard to tell what the money numbers are really, 4J could just as easily be barely making a profit, while microsoft and Mojang are raking in the cash with fees. No one knows but them. But I do it its utter crap we really barely got any new items. No hoppers, dispensers can't face up or down, etc etc
So have fun trying to make one of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world change how they've worked their gaming company for more than a decade.
But lets just be thankful MCX360 isn't run by EA.
"Sorry! In order for you to have access to the diamond tool pack you need to pay 0.99 Cents, or you can buy it with 50 Minecraft Premium points!" -If EA made Minecraft on the 360.
No.
You're whole premise is that Mojang/4J made tons of money so they should hire more people and crank out updates faster.
* They made tons of money because they earned it and took the risk of publishing it (yes, there was a risk- it could've flopped). Don't forget: we gave them the money. Don't make it sound like the "greedy bastards" took it from us.
* They could, like 95% of the other game publishers, sell us "DLC" or "Expansion Packs". Instead they're taking that profit and using it to give us free updates…. at their expense. In other words, they are "re-investing the money", for our benefit. How are we "suffering"?
* You suggest that they hire more people so they can crank out updates faster. So when it's caught up, you fire them after a few months? Heck, it would take these "contract" workers a month just to learn the program, much less how to do their little addition without messing any of the rest of it up.
Sorry, I guess I'm one of the few that thinks 4J is doing a good job, especially compared to some companies. I paid for the original game and I got that. I don't feel "entitled" or "deserve" anything beyond that. That I've gotten several updates with additional features for free is a very welcome bonus and benefit.
Don't bite the hand that feeds you.
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Retired StaffWell excuse me for having an opinion. If you read carefully and had a realistic point of view, countries starve over less amounts of money. Xbox has been neglected on bug issues since the day it came out, and if that's because 4j isn't receiving the funding they need(which I highly doubt as they are a previously successful company) then something should be done. I understand your concept with free updates, and how we've already paid. This would make sense if the 'free updates' didn't ruin the game play one after another without concern of fixing bugs that have been around since day one. Let me use the double iron doors for example. This has been an issue since day one and has never even been addressed by 4j. On top of that, in the TU9 update it states 'Improved Lighting'. That's a deceitful lie as far as I'm concerned and shouldn't been confirmed before stated. You can be satisfied with a faulty product, but I guarantee you if you bought an electrical device that requires updates, and an update from the manufacturer rendered it useless, you'd have a bone to pick. If you disagree with this, well then that's fine. We will continue to fight for a functional product that we already paid for.
Thanks for your response!
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Retired StaffOn a second note, I personally would be fine with buying an occasional DLC. Keeping in mind that a DLC would have more time and effort to be put into place, and would (I would hope) force them to review bugs. This problem revolves around Microsoft, 4J Studios, and Mojang. Something needs to be done.
More and more time goes into the pocket edition, and pc to put us farther away from catching up, as we wait months at a time for a bug fix, to bring more bugs before they can even worry about new features. It is unfair, no matter what way you look at it.
Hiring help is not a 1 day process, and I understand that it will take time for a new developer to learn the games code. So why not hire them now, rather than wait until the game hasn't rendered itself bug ridden, and it is too late to save it.
I never said the solution was simple, and I never said it would be easy. What I am saying is that there are a minimum of 6,000,000 people trying to enjoy something that takes a turn for the worse every time we're supposed to see progress. I truly enjoy minecraft, it's community, and the idea of a never-ending game.
Thanks again for reading!
However, many of these bugs have been around even longer in the PC version of the game and have yet to be addressed by Mojang. I'm no longer convinced that 4J has been given the liberty under their contract to "correct" something before it was corrected in the PC version.
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Retired StaffThis may very well be true. With that being said, it's an issue. An issue millions of people are waiting on a solution for. This needs to be addressed and taken care of. I am also slowly losing hope as I see our community neglected due to legal terms. I just read earlier that I was very close to correct with my figures. Here's a section of one article I read:
Even if you don’t play Minecraft, you’re probably aware that just about everyone else does. It is, after all, an immensely popular game. But how popular is it, exactly?
Well, in 2012 alone, Mojang, the maker of Minecraft, has reported a revenue of $237.7 million, which is kind of a lot money.
“It’s almost hard to grasp,” said Mojang CEO Carl Manneh. “It’s easy to become a bit blind working at Mojang. Everything’s happening so fast and it’s going so well. One almost needs to pinch oneself to know it’s for real.”
“When we started Mojang in 2010 we made a budget for the first year. Three months later we just trashed it – it became totally irrelevant. We still have the same feeling now. There simply are no good ways to forecast how much money we are going to make.”
“Minecraft is a power of its own now – it’s just rolling,” he said. “We have so many markets where we are not very strong yet, where many play Minecraft but few have bought it simply because you can’t use our online payment solution there. That’s something we’ll get our hands to during 2013.”
It seems as if Minecraft isn’t settling for just all of the money – the beast, it hungers for more.
Read more: http://segmentnext.com/2013/02/04/minecraft-made-all-of-the-money-all-of-it/#ixzz2PkWtzcqr
I understand this game is still developing itself in a way, and that a lot of the boom was unexpected. If there literally is no budget at this point, what is stopping them from expanding? It seems to be legal terms at this point but I can't be sure.
I'm not trying to point the finger at anyone, I am trying to get a message directly to Mojang themselves, that the community is becoming unhappy with the process, and pace of updates for xbox, while PC recieved complete and full attention.
II've read a lot of direct interviews with notch, and this doesn't seem to be his fault. He's doing everything he knows how to do. I think the main issue being presented, is that no information is getting to them directly about the progress, and what they could do to better.
I believe with his intellect, which he has proven well, changes can be made and this could go a lot better than it is now. Until we group our voices and make it known this is an issue, nothing will be done. We will continue to pile bugs, on bugs, and inevitably ruin the xbox version to a point where starting from scratch again would make sense.
Thanks once again for reading everyone!
Then you quoted:
Economics 101:
Profit = Income minus Expenses.
So what if Mojang's income was $237 million? What you keep forgetting to mention is the Expenses: office rent, utilities, software, computers, servers, taxes, wages, salaries, travel, advertising, lawyer/legal fees…. and that's just off the top of my head- I'm sure there's more. So what little is left after all that- that's Profit, and it sure isn't anything near the $237 million you're making it sound like.
Reminds me of the old Wizard Of Id cartoon.
The Duke presents the King with the plumber's bill.
King: Holy cow! That's a lot just for remembering that water runs downhill!
Duke: Yea, but it ain't all water…..
Huh?
Some of us, after an update, actually play the game for more than an hour before we start wondering why we haven't heard about the next update. Is the "community" as a whole unhappy with "the process", or just you? You say the PC version is receiving "complete and full attention" from Mojang…. and you think 4J isn't giving the xbox version theirs?
In 8 months (of 2012) the xbox version got 7 updates. Remember that the xbox version can't come out every week with just a few bug fixes and a new thing or two like the PC can- they have to wait and do them all at once in on big update. So discounting the "snapshots" and "pre-releases", how many actual updates did the PC get in the same time period?
?
Doesn't each PC "snapshot" and "pre-release" contain tons of bug fixes? Check the wiki. (In the 1.4.4 pre-release there were 22 bug fixes, with 9 more bugs known but still not fixed). The xbox version isn't any more buggy than the PC version.
We all wish updates were quicker.
We all wish all bugs were squashed and we had a perfect game with perfect updates.
But that's not gonna happen with a game as complicated as MC. And throwing more people at it isn't gonna fix anything- it'll just make things more complicated.
I doubt Mojang would've allowed that.
Thats why MC isn't getting updated as much as you'd like. Mojang, and possibly 4J, are working on creating profit in other countries so that they can expand their pockets.
You're making it as if the expenses are a lot. No, they are not. If you breakdown the expenses, you will be surprised.
What, a few millions wouldn't suffice for office rent, utilities, software, computers, servers, taxes, wages, salaries, travel, advertising, lawyer/legal fees? You're kidding me right? They are not a huge company with thousands of staff.
Then, we take a look at the revenue of XBLA version alone, let's just say that Microsoft took home half of the sales (marketing, revenue share etc.).
Six million copies and they are making $60M off the Xbox.
That's a lot of money. You can pay 100 top-notch programmers with $100k a year income and still left home with $50M.
Now, where are the other expenses?
I think that the "PC received complete and full attention" while the Xbox languishes on the back burners of Mojang and 4J is an erroneous assumption. That Notch has some "issues" with Microsoft has been evident in the media; but Notch no longer runs the Minecraft project... JEB does. I honestly don't know if JEB has issues with Microsoft or not; but Mojang are as bound by the original porting agreement as 4J and Microsoft are. The Xbox version began this process a year later than the PC and, for all intents and purposes, it remains about a year behind the PC now. In addition, the companies entering into the project fully realized the limited capabilities of the current console, so the "plan" for porting it probably has considered the possibility that no more could possiby 'fit" on the Xbox than what the game had at 1.2.3... and it may have been that they thought possibly that even that amount of "stuff" wouldn't fit. It may have been a gamble from the start; and the sad reality MAY be that this console is max'd right out at this point. For example, the lagging is evident despite the fact that the developer has done loads of things to try to reduce it. For example, they've reduced the drawn distance to a point where people are now complaining about overrunning the drawing of the terrain frequently. They've also set limits on entities that people are now complaining about incessantly. They kept the world at its original size rather than increasing the height. We may not want to admit it (and I certainly don't like it); but it might possibly just well be that we will have to wait until the next console to get "caught up" to the PC.
Perhaps THAT is where all those redevelopment monies and staffing energies are going right now... towards developing this game to break ground on a new console that is currently shrouded in secrecy. We can't see what may be going on behind currently closed doors. 4J's long-term future as a company does not rest on the Xbox 360. If that's where they are throwing all their eggs, they won't last out another year or two regardless of the amount of money you think they've pocketed and not re-invested this year. I would bet dollars to donuts that they are re-investing a ton on staff and development kits for the new console... postering perhaps to put a really advanced version of Minecraft at the "front' of the lineup for that console.
In the meantime, most of us are saying that we got our $20 worth out of this game long ago. Today is just beginning Day 4, waiting for a bug fix for an update that was released on April 4th (a day earlier than it was scheduled)... and it's Sunday, Day 2 of a weekend. Don't 4J staff deserve to take the weekends off?
If the 360 were being treated like a 360 where testing is required and should be done due to the fact they cannot release patches willy-nilly like the PC, then none of the MAJOR TU9 issues should have made it to us.
That is totally unacceptable PC thinking in regards to the Xbox. One cannot just choose to ship it on the Xbox as console users just expect it to work. All of the arguments as to why they can't just act like the PC are the very arguments for why more devs and more testing needs to be done on the 360.
It's only DAY 4 since the update was released... and over a weekend at that. The bugs in any previous update were not nearly as devastating as this most recent one (Silver account but) and did not warrant deviating from a bug fix schedule that was already a concession made by Microsoft due to the "nature" of the game. I do believe this one does warrant an emergency bug fix; but your ranting on it being a month when it hasn't just destroys all the credibility of your argument. At least have the courtesy to stop these blatant exaggerations and get your timeline straight.
Given every one of these issues can be found on the Tutorial world in under 1 minute. Any and all proper testing should have prevented the Non-Live & Silver user issue. Any and all testing should have caught the lighting bugs. This was a clear management decision to ship with either 0 testing and/or major bugs.
Please tell me where my timeline is wrong. March 11 to March 23 was bug fixing. That is 12 days. There is another 12 days between March 23rd and April 4th when this patch came out that at any point 4J could have stopped the release. They instead made a conscious, knowing, purposeful, and willing decision and choice to ship with these major bugs and/or no testing.
- 23 Mar 13 - Update is in Cert testing and change log has been posted
- 11 Mar 13 - TU9: Still working on bug fixes
Update > Bugfix = TimeMay 9th 2012 > June 15th 2012 = 1 month 5 days
July 13th 2012 > August 7th 2012 = 3 weeks 5 days
October 16th 2012 > November 15, 2012 = 1 month
December 19, 2012 > January 30, 2013 = 1 month, 2 weeks, 5 days
With that I again say there is ZERO reason for the game breaking bugs to have reached the end users.