GameStar Scrolls will be very different from Minecraft. Why don’t you play it safe and stick to the blockbuilding-concept, perhaps with just a few adjustments?
Markus Persson Well, Minecraft already exists. And the second game is one Jakob and I always wanted to play. But there is no such game so we have to create it ourselves. And now we have the chance to do this. We are truly convinced that the concept works and we don’t just want to develop a Minecraft 2.
GameStar So you ride on the huge wave of Minecraft success and popularity to push the new product you always wanted to develop.
Markus Persson I think you can say that, yes. Jakob does most of the work at the moment and we hired a Backend Developer to help us out. In terms of programming the game doesn’t have much in common with Minecraft, but in the Game Design there are similarities. Prominently what makes fun in a game and what doesn’t.
GameStar You must have gotten many offers from publishers who claim to bring Minecraft to the mass market. Did you never consider selling the brand?
Markus Persson In the beginning I got several offers, that’s true. Then they realized that I wasn’t going down that path, the brand was just too profitable to sell it. There were also two or three bigger job offerings that I turned down.
GameStar Perhaps you were a little too expensive for them.
Markus Persson Maybe. (laughs)
GameStar Did you ever consider leaving Sweden and moving to perhaps Silicon Valley, start your company here?
Markus Persson No, never. I will definitely stay in Sweden. The big companies are all located in Silicon Valley, that’s true. But the developers themselves are scattered around the world, there is no need for me to leave Sweden.
GameStar We heard a lot about children who love to play Minecraft. Has it been a conscious decision to open the game for a younger audience?
Markus Persson This was more or less accidental. Sure, Minecraft is less brutal and definitely quieter than other games, maybe that is why a broad audience has easy access to it. But it is also about exploration and creativity which always works well with kids.
GameStar Do you also get a lot of mails from parents, be it with positive or negative feedback?
Markus Persson Absolutely, many parents contact me. But I also get a lot of handwritten letters from children. Sometimes they add cool ideas what they want to see in the game, of course they draw them for me.
GameStar The whole Minecraft concept might work well as a social game, with an integrated shop for items and resources and so on. Have you ever thought about that?
Markus Persson Many of these social games are solely designed around the idea of draining money from the players. For me as a game designer this concept doesn’t resemble a »game«, it is more like gambling. I want to create something that is worth paying for. For example it’s becoming interesting if you have to pay every time you die in a game. This has been done in a similar fashion with pinball for decades now. I know that I have to pay if a ball falls through, it creates tension and defines the game experience.
If I start selling diamonds in Minecraft that would destroy balance. Richer players would also be more successful, you really have to be careful with that.
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GDC 2011 - Impressionen der Messe ansehen
GameStar Minecraft’s huge success is based on an original idea that you implemented with very limited resources. Would you say that the future belongs to small and independent developers like yourself or will Minecraft remain a rare pearl in the vast AAA-ocean?
Markus Persson I hope there will be both. I love playing the latest shooters. It’s like watching a Hollywood action movie, that must not become extinct. But I also hope that there will be more space for smaller teams that create original games. It has been a trend for a long time to scale up development and produce blockbuster titles with several hundred employees. In the long run this won’t be healthy for the industry. You don’t need 200 people to write a good book, and you don’t need 200 people to create a fun game.
GameStar Markus, thank you very much!
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