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Mojang Studios is a Swedish video game developer based in Stockholm. It was founded by independent video game designer Markus Persson on May 1, 2009 as Mojang Specifications for the development and release of Persson's sandbox and survival video game Minecraft. The studio inherited its name from a previous video game venture Persson had left two years prior. Following the game's release, Persson, in conjunction with Jakob Porsér, incorporated the business as Mojang AB in late 2010 and hired Carl Manneh as the company's chief executive offer. Other early hires included Daniel Kaplan and Jens Bergensten.
Minecraft became highly successful, eventually the best-selling game of all time, giving Mojang sustained growth. With a desire to move on from the game, Persson offered to sell his share in Mojang, and the company was acquired by Microsoft through Xbox Game Studios (then known as Microsoft Studios) in November 2014.[1] Persson, Porsér, and Manneh subsequently left Mojang, with Jonas Mårtensson replacing Manneh. On May 17, 2020; Mojang was rebranded as Mojang Studios.
As of 2021, the company employs approximately 600 people.[2] Apart from Minecraft, Mojang Studios has developed Caller's Bane, Crown and Council, and further games in the Minecraft franchise: Minecraft Dungeons, Minecraft Legends, and the discontinued Minecraft Earth.
History[]
Mojang was founded by Markus Persson, a Swedish video game engineer and programmer on May 1, 2009. Following his graduation and a few years of working as a web developer, Persson created Wurm Online, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game, with colleague Rolf Jansson in 2003. They used the name "Mojang Specifications" during the development and, as the game started turning a profit, incorporated the company in 2007. Persson left the project later that year and wished to reuse the name, wherefore Jansson renamed the company.
In May 2009, Persson began working on a clone of Infiniminer, a game developed by Zachtronics and released earlier that year. Persson reused assets and parts of the engine code from an earlier personal project and released the first alpha version, now titled "Minecraft" on May 17, 2009, followed by the first commercial version on June 13, 2009. In less than a month, Minecraft generated enough revenue for Persson to take time off of his day job and eventually quit in May 2010.
In January 2011, Minecraft reached one million registered accounts, as well as ten million six months thereafter. The continued success of the game led Mojang to start the development of a port for mobile devices. Due to the incompatibility of the game's Java-based framework with mobile devices, this version was programmed in C++. Another version, initially developed for the Xbox 360, was released by Scotland-based developer 4J Studios and was also programmed in C++.
For the full release of Minecraft, Mojang held MINECON, a dedicated convention event, in Las Vegas on November 18-19, 2011 with Minecraft being formally released during a presentation on the first day. Thereafter, MINECON was turned into an annual event. Following the full release of Minecraft, Persson transferred his role as lead designer for the game to Jens Bergensten in December 2011.
On September 15, 2014, Mojang announced that the company was being purchased by Microsoft for US$2.5 billion. It became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Xbox Game Studios, with the acquisition being finalized on November 6, 2014.
In May 2019, ten years after Minecraft's release, the original browser-based version of Minecraft (called "Minecraft Classic") was re-released for free.[3] On May 17, 2020, Mojang announced its rebranding to Mojang Studios, aiming to reflect its multi-studio structure, and introduced a new logo. Minecraft Dungeons was later released for Microsoft Windows, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
References[]
- ↑ Sarkar, Samit (6 November 2014). "Microsoft officially owns Minecraft and developer Mojang now". Polygon. Archived from the original on 13 July 2018.
- ↑ Watson, Marc [@Marc_IRL] (4 March 2021). "I think this tweet is another reason I don't do it: everyone assumes that all ~600 people at Mojang directly create Minecraft Java and Bedrock 😂 And half the questions would be about that" – via Twitter
- ↑ Jones, Ali (8 May 2019). "Minecraft Classic is now available to play for free in your browser". PCGamesN. Archived from the original on 8 May 2019.
External links[]
- Mojang official website (archived 2017-03-31)
- Mojang at Twitter
- Mojang AB at MobyGames
- Mojang Studios at Wikipedia