We are often asked “how did you learn to code?”, and for tips about how to get started with game programming. I learned most of my programming from books and from hacking around in the few examples I could find (there was no Internet back then). Our Mojam “Catacomb Snatch” source code could possibly be a good starting point for new programmers, so here’s a quick getting-started guide!

First of all, there are some prerequisites. You will need the following:

• A Java development kit installation. Get it from Oracle
• The Eclipse IDE (you can use other IDEs, of course, but in this guide I’ll be using Eclipse)
• The Catacomb Snatch source code from your Humble Bundle

After installing the JDK and placing Eclipse somewhere, start Eclipse and create a workspace (such as “C:\workspace”). Then create a folder in that workspace called “mojam” (such as “C:\workspace\mojam”) and place the contents of the source zip in that folder. It should look something like this:

Then switch to Java perspective in Eclipse and right-click in the “Package Explorer” and choose “New->Java Project,” like this:

In the popup dialog, enter the same name for the project as you called the folder in your workspace. In my case it was “mojam”:

Eclipse should be able to locate source and library folders automatically, so the next step is to try to start the game, like this:

Now you will notice that the game instantly crashes! Oh my… but don’t worry, it can be fixed! Go to “Run->Debug Configurations…” and find the “MojamComponent” configuration. Select “Classpath” and “User Entries”. Click on “Advanced” and select “”Add Folders.” Locate the folder called “res” and add it. Now the game should run when you press “Debug”!

Now you can play around with the source code!

Tasks:

• Fix the Harvester crash bug. The reason it crashes is that it’s trying to use the synchronized random during the render step (will cause de-synchronization in multiplayer!). Try to fix this (and synchedRandom should still be null during rendering) :)
• Fix the players receiving the other player’s score.
• Make multiplayer more smooth in high-latency situations. Hint: Increase “currentTurnLength” in TurnSynchronizer.java. (I incorrectly wrote “currentTurnTickCount” before, because of brain fart.)

Challenges:

• Multiplayer for more than 2 people (will require a lot of changes, especially to the way the server socket is treated)
• Change the game in to a tower defence ;)
• Try the game with WASD+Mouse controls
• … or something else

Cheers!

UPDATE: Some people have problems with missing “PaulsCode” libraries. It seems like Eclipse sometimes doesn’t add the JAR files in the “lib” folder to the class path, so you must do that manually. To do that, right-click on the project and select “Configure Build Path,” and then add the JARs to your class path.

UPDATE 2: If you want to continue exploring game development in Java, you can find more resources and beginner’s help at http://www.java-gaming.org/

Today is the final day of the Humble Bundle Mojam. We’ve raised over $352,000 so far and still have around 5 hours yet!

There are now THREE games in the bundle… Catacomb Snatch made by us and currently untitled games by Oxeye Studio and Wolfire Games.

Here’s a peek at Catacomb Snatch… A steampunk Egyptian themed RTS shoot em’ up game.

So many people have given so generously and we wanted to do some extra special things for the Top 10 donators! Our friends at J!NX and Razer have hooked us up.

1 – Naga Hex Mouse, Black Widow Ultimate Keyboard, Creeper Mouse Mat and $200 J!NX gift code
2 – Naga Mouse, Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $100 J!NX gift code
3 – Naga Mouse, Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $75 J!NX gift code
4 – Naga Mouse, Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $50 J!NX gift code
5 – Naga Mouse, Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $50 J!NX gift code
6 – Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $50 J!NX gift code
7 – Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $50 J!NX gift code
8 – Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $50 J!NX gift code
9 – Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $50 J!NX gift code
10 – Large Golithus Mouse Mat and $50 J!NX gift code

But on top of that… ALL of the top 10 will get to join the Mojang Team on a private Minecraft server for 30 minutes of multiplayer fun! Not to mention we will send you a signed art print from the Catacomb Snatch SIGNED by the whole team!

Remember ALL of the money will be put in to charity.

Let’s get to $500k… then Notch with shave his beard! We can do it! Head over now to watch the live-stream and help charity – humblebundle.com

Today Carl, Notch, Jeb, Jon and I are at the Bella Center in Copenhagen for LEGOworld to unveil LEGO Minecraft. We are extremely happy with how it turned out and are excited to show you!

LEGO Minecraft is NOW available for pre-order on http://jinx.com/LEGOminecraft

Make sure you keep updated with all the latest news about it on the LEGO Minecraft page — http://www.facebook.com/legominecraft

Coming summer 2012.

Starting this Friday, February 17th at 10 CET Mojang will be creating a new game LIVE with all of the money going to charity. With the help of our friends at HumbleBundle.com, we are having a fun game jam weekend! By donating, you will be given the game created in the 60 hours (and maybe some other fun things too).

We’ll also have some fun and silly incentives for reaching certain amounts of money (like Aron FINALLY creating a Twitter account). We’ll also be doing some giveaways and Q&A’s with the Mojangstas.

Make sure to follow @mojangteam and @notch for updates. Also use #Mojam to submit questions!

We want your help to choose the theme and the genre. The highest and lowest voted from each category will be combined for the game. Of course, you’ve always wanted to play a Shoot Em’Up Dating Simulator with a Candy Land World War II theme. Choose wisely!

Here’s the development snapshot of week 7, 2012! List of changes:

• Added new world file format called “Anvil” (256 max height and 4096 block IDs*)
• Multi-player light calculations do no longer cause affected blocks to be transmitted to the clients, instead the clients will recalculate the light on their own
• Villagers will repopulate villages based on how many houses there are available
• Some nights in villages will be worse than others…
• Added a redstone-controlled light source
• Decreased chance for the rare mob drops
• All animals use the new AI system now

* The game can’t use the full range of IDs yet because there are still some assumptions that IDs above 256 are items.

Update! New version number is 12w07b, fixing the following problems:

• Crash bug corrupting levels when spawning mobs above the 255th block
• Sheep animation is correct in SMP

Get the snapshot here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w07b/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w07b/minecraft_server.jar

If you havent downloaded Minecraft you can grab it here: www.minecraft.net/download

NOTE: This snapshot will convert the maps you load to the new file format. If you want to revert to the old format, you need to replace the “level.dat” file with the file called “level.dat_mcr”. The new format will write world regions to files called “*.mca”, so your original regions will remain as “*.mcr”.

// jeb and jon (Twitter: @jeb_ and @jonkagstrom)

Hello!

Jon and I have been working on a new map format for Minecraft that we’ve dubbed “Anvil” (it’s just a name). The purpose of the new format is to prepare for modding, especially to allow for more block types, but also to improve other areas of the game (such as map height). The changes are:

• Maximum build height has been increased to 256 (was 128)
• Empty sections of the world are not loaded into memory
• Block ids have been increased to 4096 (was 256) by adding a 4 bit data layer (similar to how meta data is stored)
• Block ordering have been changed from x/z/y to y/z/x in order to improve compression
• Packets for sending chunks have been updated (a full 128-high chunk is smaller than the old format, and a chunk with lots of empty space is much smaller)
• Biomes are saved per x/z column, which means they can be altered by tools

The next snapshot, and Minecraft 1.2, will automatically convert worlds to the new format. The files of the current format (“McRegion”) will remain in your save folder, if you need to restore them for some reason.

I’ve prepared a converter (with source code) for tool makers that wants to be prepared. You do not need to use this to convert your maps! It’s only for reference!

Download the converter+source here

Some info:

• The 16x128x16 “Blocks”, “Data”, “SkyLight” and “BlockLight” tags are removed
• A “Sections” tag has been added with up to 16 compound tags
• Each section has 16x16x16 “Blocks”, “Data”, “SkyLight” and “BlockLight” tags
• Each section has a “Y” integer tag saying which section it is (note that some Y positions can be skipped). 0 is at the bottom of the world and 15 is the topmost section
• Each section also has a “AddBlocks” tag, which is a DataLayer byte array just like “Data”. The “AddBlocks” tag is not included in the converter since the old format never had block ids above 255. This extra tag is created whenever a block requires it, so the getTile() method needs to check if the array exists and then combine it with the default block data. In other words, blockId = (addBlock << 8) + baseId.
• Each chunk has a 16×16 byte array with biome ids called “Biomes”. If this array is missing it will be filled when the game starts. The converter doesn’t include any biome sources, though (it had too many dependencies to be included).
• Note that the old format is XZY and the new format is YZX (see the difference between DataLayer and OldDataLayer).
• The new format uses the extension “.mca” instead of “.mcr” (the old format is kept for safety, with the level.dat backed up as “level.dat_mcr”)

Finally, a shoutout to Robinton’s hard work on his mods: http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/310298-100robintons-mods/

Cheers,

// jeb_

Here’s the development snapshot of week 6, 2012! List of changes:

• Many minor bug fixes and tweaks
• Doors have been changed to properly detect if they are open or closed. Double doors in existing maps will need to be updated
• Villagers will move indoors during night and rain, and socialize with each other
• Zombies will break down wooden doors on hard difficulty
• Added cat sounds
• Better movement for mobs in water
• Added rare mob item drops

Get the snapshot here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w06a/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w06a/minecraft_server.jar

If you havent downloaded Minecraft you can grab it here: www.minecraft.net/download

Please note that if you are using this snapshot, your worlds may not load properly if you “downgrade” to an older version again.

// jeb and jon (Twitter: @jeb_ and @jonkagstrom)

We decided to do an extra update of the snapshot this week. The reason was because of the shift-click bug when crafting items, which would consume all the items in the crafting table and only produce a single result item. This bug is troublesome because it’s such a fundamental feature, and we don’t want to penalize people if they forget that it’s broken.

We also fixed so that cats can be told to sit with an empty hand.

Get the snapshot here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w05b/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w05b/minecraft_server.jar

// jeb and jon

Here’s the development snapshot of week 5, 2012! List of changes:

• Many mob-related bug fixes (and some new behaviors)
• Ocelots are easier to tame, and cats can be told to sit
• Many small bug fixes and tweaks
• Villagers will try to detect village houses and live in them
• Updated language files (now with 50% less profanities!)

Get the snapshot here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w05a/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w05a/minecraft_server.jar

If you havent downloaded Minecraft you can grab it here: www.minecraft.net/download

// jeb and jon

EDIT: The snapshot was updated again. We fixed a cat crash bug and updated the languages.

Time for the snapshot of week 4, 2012! List of changes:

• New jungle-specific mob that can be tamed
• Skeletons have new AI and a few new behaviors
• Various minor bug fixes and changes
• Added an experience item to creative mode
• Added a flame item…
• Updated language files

Get the snapshot here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w04a/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w04a/minecraft_server.jar

If you havent downloaded Minecraft you can grab it here: www.minecraft.net/download

As you know, Minecraft is run using the Light-weight Java Game Library (LWJGL). We’ve been using a really old version of LWJGL because last time we tried to update it the game broke down and became unplayable for a lot of people. We are going to try to update it again once we release Minecraft 1.2.

However, the recent LWJGL version (2.8.3) includes a bunch of fixes for those of you who play with non-latin languages. If you want to try it out (to be able to chat in Japanese or Korean, for example), you should go to LWJGL’s download page and get lwjgl-2.8.3.zip (link for the lazy). In it you will find a folder called “jar” and a folder called “native.” Pick the files in those folders and replace the files located in your “.minecraft/bin” and “.minecraft/bin/natives” folders. Chatting in Korean should be a lot easier now.

// jeb and jon

The guys over at Oxeye have worked liked machines and they have released a new update for the alpha! It contains gazzillion of fixes and tweaks. You can read the full change log after the jump.

If you have the installer just start it and it will update automatically.

You can grab Cobalt here: www.playcobalt.com

v102 ALPHA

Alterations:

• Jet shoes are now additive instead of reaching speed. Jet shoes can be used while rolling in the air. While using jet shoes while rolling, you will slow down your roll a lot making you vulnerable, but it also gives you very interesting control mechanics.
• Throwing has been reworked. Charge time is now variable depending on how long you press which makes it snappier, throwing will try to push the throw towards your actor trajectory, giving more power over throw direction, as well as throwing in itself is more physical making up/down/backwards and strange middle of roll throws possible.
• reworked scope to be a bit more useful, as well as giving a little better bullet time bonus.
• auto aim now doesn’t snap back and forth frantically. If you have auto aimed against a target, and it goes behind a wall, you will keep aiming towards the last visible position.
• Rolling now slows down reloading by a significant amount..
• Simply moving against a conveyor belt will now move you, even if you are not grabbing it like a wall grab.
• Added more upgrades to slugger revolver, slugger cobra, slugger pipe and slugger breacher.
• Slugger revolver now starts as it should with no extended barrel, so there are now 2 levels. Tweaked it so that starting point is lower than normal, and ending point with max is higher than before.
• Tweaked all upgrade prices so that more expensive guns have more expensive upgrades. This is because I want it to be less obvious to get them, so that alternative spending possibilities are considered, and also follow better with the economy that you have when being able to afford expensive guns.
• increased price of matter army issue from 250 to 275.
• switched price of spike bow and price for spike bow repeater
• Sliding backwards up walls is now possible.
• Made air rolling backwards as easy as rolling backwards.
• Changed weapons on smooth jazz.
• The Plus can now be moved with explosions and applied force.
• Bomb is now called Thermal Bomb and has had its effect reworked. It is now not instant kill, instead it has damage over time. This makes is less good against tough foes like hamsters and predators. It will also not instantly kill you with shield but will wear your shield down faster than normally. Cost is 50 Volts.
• Stick Grenade and Grenade now cost 15 instead of 16.
• Improved the handling of the boomerang, also made it harder to hit with bullets.
• Tweaked waves in survival house, as well as added 3 new tiers.
• Added color blind modes to compensate for Protanopia, Deuteranopia and Tritanopia.
• Reworked bird movement to be more fluent.
• Added bird wing and breathing sounds and animations for when out of energy
• Activated tile physics can now hurt actors!
• Elevators can now crush enemies if squished by them.
• Increased reload times for bird and shroom as well as lesser recoil recovery speed.
• Altered layout and weapons and ai paths on cannon arena.
• Missles have slightly more bullet time associated with it.
• new map by frall called voodoo!
• Safest Gate has been extended
• Klonk now deals a small amount of heat damage

Bug-fixes:

• Blowing up by a bomb no longer screws up the next life.
• Fixed crash with trying to join a controller with a removed preset
• Plasma assault upgrade names
• Fixed stage selection loading everything too early.
• Shop windows could be outside of level
• laser pointer getting smoke as laser pointer.
• fixed enemies being included in the aim over mechanic cause you to raise the gun above enemies instead of pointed against them.
• Bounced and deflected projectiles now correctly generate bullet time
• Fixed left gas bouncer in position on windy valley.
• Added repair broken weapon ai.
• Fixed hanging cords gathering speed invisibly, making them jump like crazy when activated. This would often make them render incorrectly too.
• Max upgrade level upgrades could be left in the upgrade bench.
• Did some optimizations for larger scale actor and ai code which in practice should mean smoother fps at later survival tiers.
• Fixed not being able to arrange bots into teams a second time without restarting the game.
• Sound at volume 0 now actually doesn’t play the samples. Also, made the sound volume curve exponential so that it has greater precision at low values.
• Strange rolling down wall and then not being able to slide up it again bug fixed.
• fixed buying weapon, buying upgrade, and then buying the same type of gun again.
• improved transition to main menu with transparent menu disabled.
• fixed upgrades not being buyable with many of the same gun. Still a bit iffy, but at least it works.
• added suicide distance ai to grenades.
• Bots should not drop plug for the purpose of throwing it against projectiles now.
• Hud elements are now adapted to screen resolution which fixes things like shops being outside of the screen.
• reload animations to shroom and bird.
• shroom not sticking to ground after punch anymore as well as wall climbing more reliable.
• the switches for the doors on the survival maps are now only usable by players.
• fixed mouse being visible when it shouldn’t

Time for the snapshot of week 3, 2012! List of changes, since 1.1 last week:

• Ladders regained their collision box, and vines are climbable when they have a solid block behind them
• Added jungle biome (requires a new world) with new tree and leaf types
• Updated language files
• Dispensers will place mobs instead of releasing the spawner egg
• Zombies have new path-finding AI
• Wolves have new AI and can be bred (when tame)

Get the snapshot here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w03a/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w03a/minecraft_server.jar

// jeb and jon

No sane person can be for SOPA. I don’t know if we’re sane, but we are strongly, uncompromisingly against SOPA, and any similar laws. Sacrificing freedom of speech for the benefit of corporate profit is abominable and disgusting. — Notch

Tomorrow, January 18, we will close down www.minecraft.net, www.mojang.com and www.playcobalt.com in a protest against the Stop Online Piracy Act. Read more about the protest on reddit’s blog, Wikimedia Foundation, WordPress’ blog and Destructoid.

(Minecraft and Cobalt login servers will still be available.)

We are excited to announce that Minecraft 1.1 is out!

Jeb and Jon have been hard at work squashing bugs and creating amazing new features.

Below is a list of some of the added features:

- Bow Enchantments
- Golden Apple recipe
- New language translations.
- Slightly smoothed color transitions between biomes
- Reduced brewing time to 20 seconds
- Added spawn eggs to creative (the colors of the eggs even look like the mobs)
- Added world type options (currently only super-flat and default)
- Removed collision box from ladders
- Sheep eat grass and regain their wool

Plus many bug fixes!

Want to see Minecraft 1.1 in action. Check out this video by the talented H.A.T. Films guys!

HI EVERYBODY!

I hope you have had a great Christmas and a fun New Year’s Eve! Minecraft – Pocket Edition was released for iOS and Android in the middle of November. We went to Minecon, had vacation and then the Christmas came by and a lot of gamers got a smartphone/tablet and bought Minecraft – Pocket Edition. As I stated in a previous post we had an initial plan of making Minecraft – Pocket Edition more like Minecraft Creative. But alas we were wrong. We have read tons of comments and feedback and it seems like we made a huge mistake. You wanted monsters, resources, animals and more different blocks. This means that the initial code we had written didn’t exactly fit with the new plan where we wanted to add all the stuff you have been asking for. So we have been reorganizing, rewritten and changed the whole plan for Minecraft – Pocket Edition.

So where is my update?

We have planned to submit and update by February the 8th. Then Android Market and the iOS AppStore must approve it and it will be in your hands.

What will the update include?

In the background a lot of stuff has changed to support the survival aspects of the game. You will see some neat looking animals and new blocks. Crafting won’t be in this update since we need to redesign the GUI for it and it will need some iteration and thinking. But the great part is that the foundation for survival will be mostly done and we can throw out much more fun updates! Yay! :D And hopefully the progress of the updates will be much more faster. Oh, and of course some bug-fixing have been done too. Doors and fences will be in there it too!

I’ll keep you updated when we have more stuff to share. In the meantime, if you want to get in touch with me you can follow me on twitter: @Kappische

Hey hey

Finally time for the next snapshot! This snapshot has the following changes:

• New language translations. We changed from using Google Docs to a new system, so these may still contain a lot of errors or missing texts. Please check the Minecraft forums (language section) for more info.
• Slightly smoothed color transitions between biomes
• Reduced brewing time to 20 seconds
• Decreased randomness of Enchantment Tables
• Changed colors of spawning eggs to more represent the mobs they spawn
• Made biomes slightly more varied (hills in forests and deserts, beaches)
• Added world type options (currently only super-flat and default)
• Removed collision box from ladders
• Updated fence gate collision box to align with fences

Get the snapshot here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w01a/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/12w01a/minecraft_server.jar

We are currently still preparing work for the mod API. The API is going to take some time to implement properly, so we ask for patience :) Also, Jon is currently working on improving the AI for mobs to make it easier for us to add new behaviors. The first goal is to add breeding support to wolves, and then move on to more useful / interesting villagers.

// jeb and Jon

Since MineCon, the Oxeye team and the Mojang web team have been working day and night to make Cobalt available before Christmas. That’s what we promised . Today we’re thrilled to announce that Cobalt (Alpha) is out!

The game is still under heavy development and will be so for a long time. Just like Minecraft, Cobalt will be discounted during development and increase in price as it reaches Beta and finally the 1.o release. The Oxeye team posted an overview of the different milestones leading up to release along with some additional info, that you can read here. The full game will sell for €20 (≈ $26) and it will be discounted 50% to €10 (≈ $13) during Alpha. The Beta will have a 25% discount tag.

This release marks a big step for Mojang, entering a new phase for the company. Cobalt is the second game to be publicly available for us and also our first 3rd party developed game. Today we’re also taking the first step in introducing a unified Mojang account, that we recently announced. Users who already have signed up for Minecraft are able to use those accounts when ordering Cobalt.

Working with the Oxeye team has been an awesome experience. Both companies have very similar views on game development and how we want to involve the community. We have travelled together to GDC (back then we weren’t actually weren’t working together yet), demoed Cobalt together at both PAX and on MineCon in Las Vegas. Tons of epic multi-player death matches have been battled out at these events. The reception has been overwhelming. thewreck, kinten, anosou, and jeb: you guys rock!  We can’t wait to get more feedback from people who are joining the gaming festivities today.

Wanna play Cobalt? Here’s your link!

Hello again!

This week’s snapshot barely has any changes since last week. All I’ve done is to add a few multiplayer spam protections (to prevent packet spam and chat spam). I’ve also added a few new lines to the splash texts. You can get the JAR files here:

• Client: http://assets.minecraft.net/11w50a/minecraft.jar
• Server: http://assets.minecraft.net/11w50a/minecraft_server.jar
• (These JARs may still say 11w49a when you start them… It’s just a joke. Funny, eh? Haha…)

The reason why not so much has changed is because I’ve been busy with some Cobalt stuff, and reading tons and tons of emails (my inbox stream is finally starting to slow down a little). I’ve also been busy testing out different translation tools for the ingame languages. If you are interested in helping out with the translations, I suggest you try to locate the necessary information on the Minecraft forums. The reason why I’m not giving you a link here is because I don’t want to cause too much traffic to their servers ;)

I would also like to mention that I’ve received tremendous help from the Minecraft Coder Pack (MCP) team (http://mcp.ocean-labs.de/index.php/The_MCP_Team). They’ve organized an email correspondence with translators, handled Googledoc language lists and also helped filling out the new tool with latest translations.

Also, obviously, a big thanks to all of you who has helped me out with the actual translation work. The clip below warmed my heart! <3

For the record: Currently Sheep eat both grass from grass blocks and from tallgrass. They will eat grass regardless if they have been sheared or not, but baby sheep will eat more often than old sheep.

// jeb_

Hello friends!

The guys at Oxeye Game Studio and the Mojang web team are currently hard at work with bringing the Cobalt pre-order to you ASAP. In preparations for this the Oxeye guys would like to share the visions of what Cobalt is and how the development of the game will play out over the coming months.

What is Cobalt?

Cobalt is an awesome platform game featuring several game modes in both hot-seat multiplayer and in singleplayer. Cobalt comes with a game editor where players can create their own maps and adventures. Cobalt is ALSO a platform game engine that can be used to create new modes or completely new games.

What are the plans for Cobalt?

Our vision for Cobalt is to expand on the in-game editor  to the point where the player can create everything from single maps to whole campaigns from scratch, including adding their own units and characters and finally being able to share their creations with the community from within the game.

Meanwhile, the development team will continue adding their own maps and game modes to the game as well as continue work on the main campaign.

What will the player get when pre-ordering Cobalt?

When pre-ordering the game the player will get access to the current build of the game as well as all future updates up until and including the full release of the game. This is limited to the PC-version of the game (Mac, Windows, Linux). Pre-orders will of course be offered at a discount price.

By pre-ordering you support the continued development of the game. Think of it as part pre-order, part funding support.

Current status of the game – Alpha

The first alpha release includes two hot-seat versus game modes (capture the plug and death match) and a co-op game mode (survival). The number of players in hot seat mode is theoretically limited by the number of USB-controllers you manage to forcefully plug in to your poor computer. That and the hardware limitations of your computer. Theoretically.

Our development philosophy is to keep it simple and manageable by being a relatively small team. That is why the alpha will be limited to the features we know are reasonably stable. This will help to keep development focused which in turn will help us update the game more often.

Please note that the current alpha is only available for Windows.

What are the major milestones for the games development?

• Alpha
• Hot seat multiplayer
• Continued work on singleplayer/co-op main campaign
• Introducing the level editor
• Windows only
• Beta
• Fully functional level editor
• Continued work on singleplayer/co-op main campaign
• Introducing in-game level sharing
• Introducing more editors
• Windows, Mac OS X and Linux
• Gold – Feature complete game includes:
• All editors fully functional
• In-game level sharing
• Completed main campaign
• Hot seat multiplayer

What About Networking?

Since we know people will ask about this, yes, we would like networking too! And yes, we are actually looking at networking, but as it stands now, we are not including networking in our vision for the game because as it is now, networking remains uncertain.

Who develops Cobalt?

Cobalt is being developed by Oxeye Game Studio, which in reality means it’s being developed by three friends who all love making games: Daniel “thewreck” Brynolf, Jens “jeb” Bergensten and Pontus “kinten” Hammarberg. Thewreck is the main developer of Cobalt. He has pretty much single-handedly created the game with occasional help from the rest of the Oxeye crew.

Oxeye has also aquired help from talented musician Mattias “Anosou” Häggström-Gerdt, artist and game designer Gabriel Verdon and programmer Jacob William Jervey.

Since the summer of 2011 Oxeye Game Studio has teamed up with Mojang to help bring Cobalt to release.

Finally, a couple of recent Cobalt videos:

Stay tuned for updates about the upcoming release.

Hi!

As many of you probably already know, we are publishing “snapshots” of the development of Minecraft. These are builds of the game that may contain incomplete features or other things that we are testing. These are uploaded separately from the launcher, and are an optional release for those of you who want a sneak peek of what’s new in the game.

This week’s snapshot contains the following changes (since last week):

• Sheep eat grass and regain their wool
• Farmland is no longer destroyed by items and particles (haha, lol…)
• Added multiple languages
• Added a “spawn mob” egg item to creative mode
• Corrected a setTileEntity multiplayer bug
• Corrected a powered rail bug
• Corrected a redstone update bug

I would like to give a huge THANKS to all of you who helped out translating the game, and to the Minecraft Coder Pack team for helping out with the administration of the language files. Also a big thanks to Ryan ‘Scaevolus’ Hitchman for help with the Unicode rendering.

The language files are still work in progress, so translation errors and mistakes may still exist. As stated earlier, the snapshots are in development versions of the game :)

You download the snapshot files from here:

• Client http://assets.minecraft.net/11w49a/minecraft.jar
• Server http://assets.minecraft.net/11w49a/minecraft_server.jar

To use these, you need to replace the JAR file in the application folder and then start the game from the launcher. If you are not sure what I’m talking about, either search for help or wait until we’ve made an official release ;)

Cheers!

/ jeb

Edit: Forgot to mention the “spawn mob” egg item

In the beginning there was Minecraft, but it wasn’t long after we started talking about Scrolls (and later Cobalt) that we realized we wanted players to be able to use the same credentials for all games, and this is where we currently are headed.

The idea is that you use this Mojang account (where the username would be your e-mail address) to sign in to Minecraft, to Scrolls and to Cobalt. After that you would proceed to choosing which profile you’d like to play as—for Minecraft this would correspond to today’s accounts (premium status, display name, skin etc).

The reason for this change is first and foremost to keep things simple for players who wish to play our other games, or to have several Minecraft accounts under the same roof. And oh, we won’t just shove over the almost 18 million (!) current Minecraft accounts to the new system but you’ll have to opt in, at least for this point in time.

We are planning on rolling out the service with Cobalt some time this month and then fully integrate it with Minecraft early next year.

If you have any questions, comments or feedback I’d love to hear from you in this reddit thread.

Stay cool!

Hey!

I have recently gotten a lot of tweets about Minecraft – Pocket Edition (you know, Minecraft for iOS/Android) and I will try to explain to you guys what we are doing and how we are going to move forward.

A lot of people have been asking what we were doing after the first initial Android release and why they haven’t gotten more updates. Well, after the first initial launch of the Android version Aron started to port the game to iOS. We just wanted to make sure that the iOS version was on par with the Android version before continuing the, work since it is quite complicated to deal with different versions with different features. We have one small bug fix update that is waiting for iOS that is already out on the Android. So let’s move on.

The plan now is to start digging into making Minecraft – Pocket Edition with Survival features!! Please note that we will NOT replicate Minecraft and try to bring all the features that are already out. This is not possible and does not match the touch platform. I’m trying to be as detailed as possible to show you why some stuff may take some time.

This is what the plan looks like right now and being worked on:

• A new file system – to make sure we can support items and mobs in the world
• Item system – to be able to pick up items
• Crafting – we know you want this :) This will probably need some iterations since the interface will be customized for the touch devices
• Inventory system
• Mobs – animals and enemies!
• Optimizing rendering code – we are experimenting with caves but need to make it work better before we are able to release it
• Clean up of code and overall optimization

Please note that we don’t have any dates set yet. Also, please make sure you update your phone/pods to the latest version of your operating system for best compatability.

Aron updated the Android version of Minecraft – Pocket Edition for Android last night to 0.1.3. This update includes better support for Android tablets, performance improvements (5-30% depending on device and settings) and a few bug fixes. Here’s the list:

1. Minor version 0.1.3 (compatible with iOS 0.1.2+)
2. + Better tablet support, less oversized ingame UI elements
3. + Performance improvements, especially in Non-Fancy graphics mode
4. + Added cactuses to deserts
5. + Added Turn Sensitivity setting
6. + Improvements in network chunk loading
7. + More sounds in J-version
8. Fixed a crash bug when connecting to some iOS server maps
9. Blocks placed on snow were added incorrectly in multiplayer

Check it out here!

The latest collection from the Official Minecraft store is perhaps our most diverse yet, with a host of brand new product types. While you’re already expecting a few new tees, we are now offering pendant necklaces, a keychain, a lanyard, and even a belt!

As we’re in the middle of gift-giving season, your presents are not complete without being wrapped in the all-new Cobblestone or Diamond wrapping paper.

Does your wrist feel naked? How about a Creeper bracelet to wrap around it.

With a plethora of new items added to the Steve and Creeper heads, stickers, posters and Creeper Flexfit Hats, we’re pretty sure all your Christmas shopping is covered ;)

Head over to the store at JINX!

We were trying to do a big thing about this during MineCon that Minecraft – Pocket Edition would be released for iOS worldwide during Friday. BUT! To be able to do this we had to release on iOS a day before to make sure it was out all over the world. Seems like some of you guys found out already about this and seem to enjoy the game a lot! :D

Minecraft – Pocket Edition is the top grossing app all around the world which is super exciting! I hope you enjoy it and looking forward to new updates that will eventually come. This is just the beginning :)

Also the multiplayer is cross platform with the Android version :)

And we also made a homepage for this: http://www.minecraft.net/pocket

THIS is a party you don’t want to miss. ‘Nuff said.

]]> http://www.mojang.com/2011/11/17/into-the-nether-party-with-deadmau5/feed/ 0 http://www.mojang.com/2011/11/04/minecon-live-streaming/ http://www.mojang.com/2011/11/04/minecon-live-streaming/#comments Fri, 04 Nov 2011 20:54:00 +0000 Lydia Winters http://mojang.com/?p=908

We know that many of you aren’t able to be in Vegas for the event, so we decided to bring it to you. We are VERY excited to announce that IGN will be our official live streaming partner for MineCon.

Catch the general session, coverage from the exhibit floor and get ready for some great contests all brought to you by our friends at IGN. Make sure you check out their announcement about it here.

We’re going to have a big contest with some awesome prizes for the hosts of the best MineCon live streaming parties. So invite all your friends, create your best costumes and get ready to party from wherever you are in the world!

More details coming soon.

For those who missed the call-out about  the Minecraft build contest sponsored by our friends at Sony Ericsson, here’s a reminder. Enter your greatest creation and win a trip to New York City to meet the lovely and talented Kristen Schaal. Contest ends November 7th!

Learn all about the contest here.

We just received news from our event coordinators for MineCon that we are completely sold out.

Yay for that and see you all in Vegas!

This time ‘block’ is actually referring to the neighborhood where people live IRL. Let me explain.

During the 50′s and 60′s Sweden was suffering housing shortage due to a fast growing population. In 1965 the Swedish government decided to build 1 million appartements in areas outside of the major cities, which nowadays is referred to as the ‘The million programme‘. Today these housing projects are in urgent need of restoration and modernization.

‘Mina Kvarter’ (english: My Blocks)  is a project initiated by Svensk Byggtjänst with the aim to build a sustainable future for the million programme housing and townscape. Basically, to make these places attractive to live in.

What does this have to do with Minecraft you may ask? Well, one corner stone of the ‘My Blocks’ project is to give the people who live in these areas the opportunity to be part of shaping their future neighborhood. That’s where Minecraft comes into play; giving people a tool to visualize their ideas of how they want to change their part of town.

Citizens of Fisksätra shaping the future of their block

Volunteers from the Minecraft community have already built replicas of these areas on servers where citizens are invited to remove, build and reshape constructions, parks and roads etc. Several property owners and construction companies have already committed to use these ideas as basis for the decision making around the reshaping of these projects.

Do you live in one of these areas and wanna join in? Join the Facebook page [Swedish] or read more on Byggtjänst web site [also Swedish].

We are thrilled to announce that MineCon attendees will have the opportunity to play Minecraft on Xbox 360 months before the public release!

Minecraft for Xbox 360 is currently in heavy development and we are very happy with the progress. Daniel is working tightly with the 4J team to coordinate Notch’s design decisions. We want to keep the core experience of the original PC version intact, while ensuring the game fits its new platform.

We are also excited that Microsoft joins us at MineCon as the main sponsor for the convention. Microsoft will participate in the preview of the Xbox 360 version of Minecraft and will also be showing off some cool stuff in the exhibition area of the event. It’s going to be a great celebration of everything Minecraft.

J!NX Stronghold Sale

Attention, miners and builders! J!NX has crafted the most awesome tees inspired by Minecraft, and wants to make sure you get some. You can get $7 off all Minecraft tees when you use code MCSTRONGHOLD during checkout. This sale is only good through Friday, October 14, though, and only available while supplies last. *not valid in combination with any other offer or sale price.

Make sure you sport your new gear at MineCon! Book your ticket here and book your hotel before all the rooms are gone!

Curse’s MineCon 2011 Premium Sweepstakes 

Our friends over at Curse are giving you a chance win a trip to MineCon. They will be flying the two winners to Minecon and will be paying for their hotel and all expenses :) They’ve also teamed up with Logitech and Intel to give away lots of cool prizes! Head on over to the minecraft forums to check out the official rules!

Sony Ericsson’s Build for Kristen Contest

Kristen Schaal is getting started with Minecraft: Pocket Edition on the Xperia™ PLAY and needs a little help!  She’s asking you to build her a palace and in exchange you could win yourself a trip to come to New York and teach her the world of Minecraft. Neat, right? The official building has already started, so watch this video from Kristen and get ready to build!

Today we are very happy to announce that Minecraft – Pocket Edition will be available world wide for Android 2.2+ phones. This release includes customized touch controls and all the core creative aspects of Minecraft. You will also be able to invite friends to build in your world when connected to the same wi-fi. With Minecraft – Pocket Edition for Android we are taking the next big step in the mobile experience of Minecraft.

Releasing Minecraft – Pocket Edition on the Xperia Play first proved to be a good starting point for us. Lots of lessons learned about mobile gaming and the market place. We have been getting a lot of great feedback from users that now goes in to our development plans. This initial release is focusing on the creative aspects of Minecraft and making sure that the core experience works great on the phones.

Just like the PC/Mac/Linux version of Minecraft we’re planning to continue developing the Pocket Edition for a long time with frequent updates. We’re looking forward to engaging in further discussions with our community as we take the next step for the Pocket Edition.

Get Minecraft – Pocket Edition here!

Calling all speakers! Calling all speakers!

For MineCon 2011 we are going to have two types of sessions… panels and lighting talks.

Panels will generally be an hour long and will consist of multiple panelists speaking about the same topic. This means that you don’t have to be on stage alone, which will give us more entertaining and free-flowing sessions. A panel usually consists of three to six people who will speak and answer questions about a specific topic, and a moderator who will introduce the panelists, take questions from the audience and generally keep the session moving and on-time.

Lightning talks will be 5-minutes long and are great for presenting ideas, concepts or to show off some great work you’ve done. You will have to submit a 5-minute long video OR 20 presentation slides that will play for 15 seconds each (if you are chosen these will need to be submitted by 11-01-11). Lightning talks keep you on track and allow you to get your point across quickly and in a short, entertaining format.

In order to submit a panel or lightning talk you must follow these directions:

1. Choose whether you want to be a panelist or give a lightning talk.
2. Send an email to minecon@mojang.com with the following attached:

• type of session you want to give (panel/lightning talk)
• your suggested session’s title description of your session (between 150 and 300 words)
• who you think your potential audience is
• suggestions of other people you think should be involved in your panel (ignore this for lightning talks)
• a link to a 30-60 second video of yourself, telling us why you and your session should be chosen

3. Wait at your computer for an email from Mojang! Ok, don’t really wait, but you will hear back from us within a couple weeks. Do NOT submit your email multiple times, and do NOT email, Twitter, Facebook, call, stalk or otherwise ask us if we have gotten to your proposal yet. We are going to have lots of submissions and your messages will only distract us and take time away from us getting through them all. Everyone who takes the time to put together a proposal WILL hear back from us!

If your session is chosen, we will email you and give you instructions on how to proceed. You will need to have a MineCon ticket, get yourself to Vegas and take care of your food and lodging. This is a special opportunity and we want all panelists and lightning speakers to be a committed part of the Minecraft community. Although we will say… you’ll walk away with an extra special Speaker Swag Bag!

Tips:

What makes for a good proposal? Be as specific as possible. It will take planning and pre-thought to make a specific proposal, and those are the same things you’ll need to make a successful session.
What makes for a good video? We want you to take those 30-60 seconds to make us really want to see your session. So don’t worry about special effects or cool camera work, make it about the content and sell sell sell your idea to us!
Can I submit a panel with other people? YES! If you want to create a panel and you already know the other people who will be involved, submit your idea together! You’ll have to get creative in your video, but make sure to include (or in some way introduce) everyone.
What if I submit the same idea as someone else? Great! If it’s an idea we choose we will probably put you together in the same panel so you can both present as panelists. The deadline for submissions is Friday, October 14th at 11:59 PST. If you haven’t already purchased your MineCon ticket, do that here. Also our room block is almost full, make sure to book now to reserve your room at the Mandalay Bay.

Today is the LAST day to purchase MineCon tickets at $99. The Early Bird Special ends at 11:59pm PST tonight. Get your tickets here, before the price increases to $139.

Our great group rate at Mandalay Bay won’t be around for much longer, so make sure to book your room now too.

See you in Vegas!

We are very excited to announce that the Yogscast will be joining us at MineCon! They will have an autograph time and also a main session. Simon and Lewis have been a big part of the Minecraft community through their successful YouTube channel and we are thrilled to have them attending MineCon.

If you haven’t already purchased your MineCon tickets, head over and grab yours on the official site. The special group rate for Mandalay Bay is only available for a few more weeks, make sure to book your room now.

Also, after almost 30,000 votes, the official cloak for MineCon attendees is…. (drum roll please)

More big announcements coming soon!

We are excited to announce the MineCon website has received a major overhaul with tons of new information. Check out the updated schedule, a little FAQ  and more updates. Our AMAZING room rate at Mandalay Bay is only good for another few weeks. Book now before you lose out on the great pricing. Click here to book.

Now on to more MineCon swag… For the first time ever, Mojang will be giving Minecraft Cloaks to all MineCon attendees! You’ll receive your cloak before MineCon and be able to keep it even after the event is over.

We have made a few suggestions for cloak designs and we need your help deciding on the official cloak. Voting ends Monday, September 26th. Cast your vote here.

We are excited to announce that all MineCon attendees will receive Scrolls and Cobalt alpha codes as soon as they are released! (Woo, that’s a value of many many dollars!)

If you haven’t already purchased your ticket and hotel room at Mandalay Bay, what are you waiting for? Head on over to MineCon.mojang.com and get everything reserved for an amazing weekend! Early bird pricing for MineCon and Mandalay Bay won’t be around for much longer, book today.

In all the craziness surrounding PAX, we have forgotten to announce the winner of the Ultimate Fan Experience. I asked Notch to randomly choose a number between 1 and 500 and he picked 267. Congratulations to Joseph Larsen who has won! He will be given a room for MineCon, VIP seats at the events and also hang out with the Mojang Team for a meal. Congratulations Joseph, we look forward to meeting you in Vegas!

With MineCon just around the corner, this is the time to book your room at the Mandalay Bay. Right now, they are giving us an incredible deal with room rates at $69 for Wednesday, Thursday & Sunday and $99 for Friday and Saturday. They have also allowed for 18-20 year olds to book rooms. Typically in Vegas you must be 21 or over. We won’t have these room rates for too much longer. Head over to the Mandalay Bay website to book your room with our group rate! All of Mojang will be staying at Mandalay Bay and we highly recommend that you do too!

We’ve been getting a lot of questions regarding the MineCon schedule, so we wanted to give you a quick overview of what will be happening.

On Friday, the exhibit hall and game room will open at 10am and the first keynote address will begin at 1pm. Both days will be jammed packed with exciting events such as contest, exhibits, classes covering all different Minecraft topics (with special quests speaking on panels), the Indie Developer theatre, special announcements and much more. Not to mention that each night, there will be incredibly fun parties. Friday night there will be a special 21 and under party (Miners Party) and on both Friday and Saturday there will be 21 and over parties. MineCon will mark the OFFICIAL release of Minecraft and we are extremely excited to celebrate it with you! A more specific schedule will be available soon.

So what are you waiting for? Head on over to minecon.mojang.com to register for MineCon 2011. It is an event you DO NOT want to miss!

We’re really excited to reveal our collaboration with Swedish sock powerhouse Happy Socks and the launch of three custom pairs of Minecraft socks!

This day marks the entry of Minecraft into haute couture and we hope you’ll love it as much as we do. The socks are sold in packages of three pairs (and one swell package at that!) over at the Happy Socks’ store.

We have a lot of exciting things happening at the Mojang booth during PAX Prime (booth 6201 on the 6th floor)! Here is a schedule of the big events, but there will be things going on and prize giveaways throughout the day… so stay close!

We will also be having some Twitter contests going on so you can win some amazing prizes, follow @minecraft on Twitter and enable text notifications to your cell phone from the @minecraft account (visit HERE for instructions on how to do this). You’ll need to respond very quickly sometimes in order to win! (note: standard text messaging rates will apply)

Trade Show Schedule:

Friday:

1:00-1:50pm Cobalt Challenges – challenge the developers of Cobalt to a duel!
2:00-2:20pm Xperia Play demo – see the Xperia Play in action
3:00-3:30pm Adventure Update Q&A with Notch – learn all about the awesome new update
3:30-4:00pm Adventure Update demo

Saturday:

11:00-11:30am Scrolls Q&A with Jakob
12:00-12:20pm Xperia Play demo – see the Xperia Play in action
1:00-1:30pm Have your photo taken with Notch on our awesome graphic backdrops!
2:00-2:30pm Cobalt developer’s Q&A
2:30-3:00pm Cobalt game demo
3:00-3:50pm Cobalt Challenges – challenge the developers of Cobalt to a duel!
4:00-5:00pm Minecraft Costume Contest – show off your best Minecraft costumes and win some great prizes!

Sunday:

11:00-11:50am Cobalt Challenges – challenge the developers of Cobalt to a duel!
1:00-1:20pm Xperia Play demo – see the Xperia Play in action
2:00-3:00pm MinecraftChick’s show video recap – come be a part of MCC’s recap of the entire show!
5:30pm Griefer Party – come by and take away pieces of Mojang’s first booth as souvenirs (we will be tearing away our booth graphics and giving them away!)

Unable to head out to PAX? Stay tuned to the blog and twitter to find out about exciting giveaways for the Minecraft Community!

Something is going on over at pigtales.minecraft.net. We are trying to figure out what these pigs are talking about, can you help us?

(Real story will be revealed Friday 26th)

Ahoy there indie game developer!
We would like you to talk about and show your game at MineCon, in the main exhibitor hall for all our visitors. We want our visitors to be able to learn about other indie games during their visit at MineCon and what better way would it be than to let the developers themselves show it off? Do you want to show and tell your game to hardcore gamers?

Submission form
We would love to hear all about it! :)

I remember when my friends and I started up our own game company back in 2008. We thought that as soon as we would release our cool game, everybody would go to our webpage and buy it since it was so cool. Why wouldn’t they? We managed to get a trailer out that got some attention on gametrailers.com and also managed to sell the game on Steam. The much wanted and waited super great sales never came. We struggled after the release and managed to do some consultant work to pay the bills.

Luckily I’m (and especially Mojang) in a much better spot right now and we want you to benefit from it.

]]> http://www.mojang.com/2011/08/19/show-off-your-game-at-minecon/feed/ 0 http://www.mojang.com/2011/08/18/introducing-cobalt/ http://www.mojang.com/2011/08/18/introducing-cobalt/#comments Thu, 18 Aug 2011 14:01:28 +0000 Carl Manneh http://mojang.com/?p=628

Early on, even as we were founding Mojang, we talked about the idea of collaborating with other indie game studios to release more great games. We wanted to find studios who have our philosophy of developing games, which is staying close to the community and treating it as a service. Today we’re announcing our first game developed by a 3rd party: Cobalt by Oxeye Game Studios.

Oxeye was founded by Daniel ’thewreck’ Brynolf, Pontus ’Kinten’ Hammarberg and Mojang’s very own Jens ’jeb’ Bergensten. Additionally the music in Cobalt is made by Mattias ’Anosou’ Häggström, who is also making the music for Scrolls. Since Jeb is already working with Mojang, it was very natural for us to talk to Oxeye first about a collaboration. Actually during the past few months, most part of the Oxeye team have been residents in the Mojang HQ.

The Oxeye team will be joining us at PAX to demo Cobalt at the Mojang booth. Fans will be able to try the game and take on the developers in death match challenges.

Introduction to Cobalt
It’s hard to be a metal face. Agent Cobalt has learned as much after finding the Space Exploration Foundation’s lost colonization ship The Seed at planet X9CSEC5.5B-blue, Trunkopia. It was once built by a one million strong development team back on Earth, but disappeared merely 30 minutes after its subspace jump. Whatever happened on board during its misadventure, sanity was not invited.

Cobalt is an action game of running, jumping, rolling, shooting, throwing, dancing, hacking, rolling, flying, sliding, climbing, looting, deflecting, racing, piñata-ing, passing, scoring… and even more rolling! Play cooperatively with friends or defeat your enemies in a death match, loot match, race match, or Capture the Plug matches. (Or one of the other game modes, of course!)

The game is initially developed for PC platforms Windows, Mac and Linux. The Windows version will be released first.

The game’s map editor will be included with the release, and will be easy to share and find other player’s maps. Additionally the game is written mainly in Lua (a script language), which allows for easy modding.

Make sure to keep up with the latest development at playcobalt.com. We’re aiming to release Cobalt ‘this fall’.

We are looking for volunteers to help out at our PAX Prime booth in Seattle on August 26-28th. Volunteers must already have at least a one day pass to PAX. We have some really exciting gifts for people who are chosen to help at the booth!

If you are interested, please email volunteers@mojang.com, with the following information:
1) A copy of your PAX registration
2) A short note about why you’d like to help at the booth
3) Which days you’d be available
4) Contact information

More information about all the fun happening at PAX coming this Friday!

Today we are releasing the first version of Minecraft – Pocket Edition. The game will be exclusive to Xperia Play for a limited time and released to other Android devices after that.

The first version (Alpha 0.1) will focus on the creative aspects of Minecraft. We have tried to put in the features that make sense for playing on a mobile device while still keeping the core of the Minecraft experience. You will be able to select blocks on the touchscreen or just scroll through them with the circle and square buttons on the Xperia Play device. The first version also supports multi-player on a local wireless network allowing you to create a world and invite friends to build together. Some of the features in this release include:

• Randomized worlds
• Build anything you can imagine
• Build with 36 different kinds of blocks
• Invite and play with friends to your world (local wireless network)
• Save multi-player worlds on your own phone

Just like the PC/Mac/Linux version of Minecraft we’re planning to continue developing the Pocket Edition for a long time with frequent updates. We are eager to hear what the Minecraft community thinks about our new game and what you all want to see in future updates.

Minecraft – Pocket Edition is now available in Android Market (only visible to Xperia Play devices) for $6.99. Get it here!

To celebrate the fact that Notch is getting married to Ez tomorrow we’re having a Wedding Weekend over at Minecraft.net. When you buy Minecraft this weekend you’ll get a free gift code to give to someone you care about. The offer will expire midnight on Sunday (cet).

Join us in the celebration of love !

(More details on Notch’s blog)

Our friends at Jinx! have released a new batch of Minecraft merchandise including stickers, new t-shirt designs, a hoodie and Steve heads! Here are a few examples, go check out all the new merch in the official Minecraft store.

The moment you’ve all been waiting for… MineCon 2011 Registration

Tomorrow is the day we have all been eagerly awaiting, registration officially opens for MineCon 2011. It will be held November 18th and 19th in beautiful Las Vegas, Nevada

The site will go live at 9am PST (which is also 12pm EST and 6pm CET). Make sure you watch all of the Mojang Teams’ tweets, our FB page and blog for the announcement. Make sure you tweet using our event hashtag #minecon. Since this is our first event, we have no idea how quickly the tickets will sell out, so get yours fast! We will be having a very special drawing that will give the first 500 registrants a chance to win the Ultimate Fan Experience! Details about that will be on the website tomorrow.

The early bird registration price will be $99 and on the site you’ll be able to check out our special room rates for the Mandalay Bay Hotel & Casino.

We are all extremely excited about MineCon, as it will be the official release of Minecraft. Get ready for a weekend you will never forget!

Hello gamer!

Hope you are doing great out there in the Summer weather. Some of us here at Mojang are off on vacation and some are still working hard in the office. You may have seen Notch tweeting about our deals we have with Humble Indie Bundle, where you can test out Minecraft for free when you purchase the awesome indie bundle where you decide the price? Or you may have also seen that you can get free in-game t-shirts in Battlefield Heroes? I was one of the alpha/beta players and the game is cool (love the aesthetics btw ;))

Why are we doing these kind of stuff? Because we love games and want to support other developers. And I mean, when you have cool developers such as DICE/Easy just a few blocks away, you know you are in a good horde!

There is some new candy in the Minecraft merch store! Our friends over at Jinx! are continuing to produce awesome stuff for Minecraft fans. Have a look in the store what’s new!

Here are just a couple of examples of the new collection:

Finally we can reveal what the Creeper (latin: Creepus Explodus) is really made of.

You probably already new this: Creepers gonna creep

Take me to the Minecraft store!

UPDATE!

Here’s a neat discount code for you all: MINECART. Use this when buying 2 or more t-shirts to get free shipping! The code is valid until 7/11/11

This is a short video demonstration of the new piston blocks in Minecraft beta 1.7. The block is still in development, and sound effects are missing.

The piston block was originally developed as a mod by the Minecraft community member Hippoplatimus. Additional implementation details were supplied by DiEvAl.

Today, the day before the E3 madness begins, we announced that Minecraft is coming to Xbox. The development is just getting started and we’ll make sure to keep you all posted on updates. We’re aiming to release the initial version for Xbox this winter.

Our friends at Hat Films made these really neat “unveil videos” for us:

Once again the Steve heads will follow us to the US! This time we are bringing hundreds of heads to the show, and there will be several opportunities to get your very own Steve head. The handing out sessions, now called “Where is Steve?” will take place in the Sony Ericsson booth (#713) at the following times:

Tuesday the 7th: 1:30 pm and 4:30 pm
Wednesday the 8th: 10:30 am and 4 pm
Thursday the 9th: 11:30 am

Pro tip! Be there early and make sure to wear a blue t-shirt. The heads will only be handed out to people with blue t-shirts, just like the original Steve.

Hey Minecrafters!

We got some more news for you about our presence at E3. Next week we will have some happenings at our booth (#713) with Sony Ericsson. You will be able to meet up with Notch, MinecraftChick and The Shaft! (I will be there too of course!)

The lovely MinecraftChick will be there to demonstrate Minecraft – Pocket Edition! Mark your calendars boys and gals:

• Tuesday the 7th 12.30 pm
• Wednesday the 8th 11.00 am (The Shaft will join on this one!)
• Thursday the 9th at noon.

The guys from the Minecraft podcast “The Shaft” will also join us in the festivities. They will attend MinecraftChick and other Minecraft fans on the June 8th 11am play session (see schedule above).

“Build with Notch” is an other cool event where you will have the chance to play the pocket edition on Xperia Play with the creator of Minecraft!

Notch will be in the booth at 5 pm Tuesday the 7th.

Stay tuned for more news!

Mojang is looking for a talented 2D artist to join us at our office in Stockholm, Sweden. Having experience in animation is a plus.
You don’t have to speak Swedish, but you do have to live in/move to Stockholm.
If you think you are the one we are looking for, send your application to jobs@mojang.com along with work samples/portfolio.

Jakob Porser

It is official. Minecraft – Pocket Edition will be demoed on Xperia Play at E3. It has been really hard to keep my mouth shut and not talk about it because I have wanted to show it to you guys for a long time. I can promise you, it has been worth the wait.

Here is a pic of me playing Minecraft – Pocket Edition :D I’m really proud of my tripod

And here is the video of me playing! First ever live footage!

See you at E3!

Sometimes we mess up things here at Mojang. Remember when I wrote about our new ticket support on zendesk? Well, we failed miserably to give you proper support. So this is a new attempt. Since 98% of all the tickets we get are about people forgetting their username (aka not premium any more, user doesn’t exist or “hacked”) we have made this automated for you now.

From Minecraft.net you can reach the new support by click the Help-tab and then on account support and see that we have put up a new automated support. This will help those 98% of all you having issues with your account. You will be able to request all the usernames registered on your email and you will get a list with information about your accounts. So from now on, please go through the support system since the emails you have sent to us before will all be reset and can be resolved by the  new system. Sending emails to the regular payment/support mail will give an automated reply and link to the support system. I do really hope this will work, if not, we will figure out something new to help you out.

New Payment Options

We have now added over 100 payment options through MoneyBookers and PayPal! Depending on what country you are in, you can now do bank transfers and some other neat stuff. I know you with Amex and you in Germany and Poland will not encounter so much trouble with paying now. Also, just like I have stated before, don’t purchase gift codes from other sites since we don’t give you any support and can’t guarantee that they work. We will test these payment options out and see how it works. If we think we need to put in more options we will :) We want to make sure you guys feel comfortable with what we have.

At PAX East 2011 the event organizers put together a Minecraft sculpture contest in the PC Area. Minecraft was installed on more than 200 computers with access to the PAX East Minecraft servers where attendees built some extraordinary creations.

We couldn’t attend the show ourselves, but instead we sent over 50 Steve heads for the Minecraft fans at the show. Unfortunately the shipping company screwed up royally and the heads never made it. After tons of explicit language and more productive type of correspondence between us and the shipping company, they are finally found!

Our kind community rep Nathaniel have a list of 50 addresses to people who were promised these heads. He will pick up the boxes next week and send them out to you!

At GDC the heads actually found their way to the show. When GDC opened there was a huge line-up at our booth. 100 fans coming in blue shirts got a Steve head to wear.

In the beginning of June Mojang is attending E3 in LA and we’re planning to bring more Steve heads. Stay tuned for updates.

Dear Minecrafters,

It has come to our attention that there are people out there selling Minecraft accounts/giftcodes with stolen credit cards and hacked PayPal accounts. As you may understand we cannot support people who purchase Minecraft from other sites than www.minecraft.net. The stolen codes will be inactivated in a given time.

To make it easier for people to purchase Minecraft we are integrating lots of new payment options.

With the help of our great community all around the world, we won the March Mayhem 2011. It is a competition hosted by the guys over at the escapist, where the fans compete by voting on different game studios.

You can read the whole story by clicking the image below :)

And again, thank you very much fans! I’m really humbled by all the support we have gotten during the competition and also during my time here at Mojang.

Hello Interwebsz!

We are proud to announce our Minecraft Merch Store in collaboration with J!NX. At our store at J!NX you will be able to find some really neat tees and we are just getting started. A lot more stuff is on its way besSssssides t-shirts ;)

C’mon, go on and click the picture below to see the goods (and yes, a Minecraft update is scheduled for next aAAAaaaaooouweek)

Remember when I wrote about the documentary that the 2 Player Productions guys are looking funding for?

It seems like the guys have reached their goal! Yeahh! Or can we celebrate already? The minimum amount they needed was $150 000 but the more money they raise the more time they can spend on the documentary and make it even better and prettier :)

You can still fund the project and still be able to take part of this awesome project and its sweet deals. Click the image below to read more about the project.

Help spread the word with this little link: http://tinyurl.com/minecraftdoc

Back in November we started mentioning that we were going to start the development of our next title, and finally the day has come to let you guys in on the secret.
Mojang is proud and exited to present its next game, Scrolls (yay!)
To read about the game and to sign up for the closed alpha that will start later this year, visit scrolls.com.
What are you waiting for? Go go go go!!

Jakob Porser

Aloha everybody!

In the beginning of this year we had a camera crew around for a couple of days at the office. And that crew was 2 Player Productions. Their latest project is about to document (how awesome isn’t that?) our company Mojang and how it develops. Well, it seems like they have already received 1/3 of their funding needs! That is crazy since they published the project on Kickstarter this Monday. We salute you Minecraft fans! Great job!

You can read about the Kickstarter project here: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2pp/minecraft-the-story-of-mojang

And down here you can see the preview:

A lot of people ask us what the ‘map seed’ is, so I decided to post a really short explanation.

Computers are really bad at generating random values, so clever engineers have invented algorithms that create sequences that look random. The problem is that these algorithms will always give the same sequence of values if they begin from the same starting point. This starting point is called the “seed.”

For example, this code will always output the value ‘-1155869325′, so it’s actually not random at all:

   Random seededRandom = new Random(1);
   System.out.println(seededRandom.nextInt());

In Minecraft Beta 1.3, we added the option to select the seed for the map generator’s sequence of “random” values. In other words, if you create a world with a certain seed, it will look identical to other worlds created with the same seed. If you leave the seed blank, the game will use the current computer clock to select a new seed.

You can both enter a number or a text string. When you enter a text string the game will pick the string’s hash code to get the seed. For programmers, that is:

    String seedString = "Hello World";
    int seed = seedString.hashCode();

The map seed is only used by the world generator, and not for other stuff (such as spawn location, how many items mobs drop etc).

Read all about the update in The Word of Notch.

If you follow us on twitter you may have seen that there is a new Daniel in town. Daniel Frisk, our latest addition to the Mojang team, started to work with us yesterday. Frisk (I’ll call him Frisk for now, so you don’t get confused…) used to work with both Carl and Notch at jAlbum. Frisk will work with back-end development for the THE GAME WHICH HAS NOT BEEN ANNOUNCED YET (TM) and he will also help out with other server design stuff. We are all really excited to have Frisk on board to help us out here at Mojang!

Follow Frisk on twitter: twitter.com/danfrisk

New support system
From now on we will be using Zendesk which has a ticket support system. Hopefully this will make the support much more efficient.

If you have issues with your account/payment such as:

• You got charged more than expected.
• Your account is not premium anymore. Please check your username. 95% of the issues we get is people who log in with wrong usernames and not the ones they paid for.
• Your account has an email that isn’t yours or you have forgotten the password

Make sure you email payment at mojang dot com

If you have issues with the game such as:

• The game doesn’t start
• The game doesn’t behave as intedend

Please make sure you visit http://getsatisfaction.com/mojang or http://www.minecraftforum.net/ for further help.

I know that I have told people to email me directly if they have had issues before, but this is not needed anymore since we have some new support personnel helping us with the account/payment issues :)

This post is intended to give tool-makers a heads-up about the modified file format in the next version of Minecraft. If you are not a tool-maker you can relax and see this post as a blog filler :)

The purpose of changing format is to improve performance and to decrease the number of files a world needs. The old format stores each world “chunk” in its own file. A chunk is 16x16x128 blocks, and big worlds can use hundred of thousands of files in the old format. This is okay for Linux-based systems, but is quite slow on Windows. We tried several different implementations of file formats, but settled on the McRegion format created by Ryan Hitchman (aka Scaevolus), with minor modifications. McRegion stores 32×32 chunks in the same file, so it requires about 500 to 1000 times fewer files.

To save you the effort to reverse engineer the file format, here are the two most important source files you need to update your Minecraft tool: RegionFile.java and RegionFileCache.java.

Minecraft Beta 1.3 will automatically convert worlds to the new format, but if you want to make your own tool these are the steps you will need to make:

First, convert all chunks and write them to region files. For each chunk,

byte[] buffer = new byte[4096];
RegionFile region = RegionFileCache.getRegionFile(baseFolder, x, z);
try {
    DataInputStream istream = new DataInputStream(new GZIPInputStream(new FileInputStream(chunkFile)));
 
    DataOutputStream out = region.getChunkDataOutputStream(x & 31, z & 31);
 
    int length = 0;
    while ((length = istream.read(buffer)) != -1) {
        out.write(buffer, 0, length);
    }
 
    out.close();
    istream.close();
} catch (IOException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
}

If you have really large worlds I suggest you try to sort the chunk files so that you don’t have to switch regions too often. Also, you can check if a chunk already has been converted, to allow people to interrupt the conversion process and continue later.

Second, when all regions have been converted, update the level data (level.dat) with a new tag called “version” (all lower-case) with the integer value “19132″, and a tag called “LevelName” with any string value you want. If you are making map tools I assume you already know how to put new tags in the data.

EDIT: Scaevolus told me this is relevant to tool-makers (how to read a chunk in C): http://mod.ifies.com/f/110216/region.c

These boxes with Steve’s head just arrived! If you want one you should wear a blue shirt and come say hi at our booth at GDC. Our little booth is situated in the IGF part of the exhibition hall. We only got 100 Steve heads so you better hurry! I mean, you can actually look this bad ass!

Fulfill Steve’s dream of playing Minecraft with Notch and SeaNanners: vote for his appeal video!

Most of you probably heard this by now: Notch is joining SeaNanners in LA tomorrow for some Minecraft madness!

Machinima is selecting a group of players from the Machinima community to play along with Realm, SeaNanners and Notch. By submitting a video to SeaNanners’ YouTube Channel you’ll have a chance of joining the players on the stream. Make sure to subscribe to Machinima Realm’s YouTube channel for all the latest info on the event: www.youtube.com/machinimarealm

This will be sweet.

The next Mojang dev diary on PC Gamer is out! Check it out here. Missed out on the previous posts? They are all here.