Xbox Boss Phil Spencer Explains Minecraft Acquisition

Last year Microsoft announced that they would be acquiring Mojang and together with that, the developer’s IP which includes the incredibly popular title Minecraft. The deal was valued at a whopping $2.5 billion, but why would Microsoft spend that amount of money? After all it is safe to say that Minecraft is probably Mojang’s most popular game at the moment.

Speaking in an interview with Eurogamer, Microsoft Xbox boss Phil Spencer revealed the real reason why the Redmond company was interested in acquiring the studio and the game – unification. As it stands Microsoft plans to unify the desktop and mobile through Windows 10 and Spencer cites Minecraft as an example of how the unification process might work.

For example gamers playing a game of Minecraft could potentially swap to a console or a mobile device and pick up where they left off, thanks to the fact that it is available across multiple platforms. According to Spencer, “That’s why Minecraft made sense – it’s a viral thing across so many screens, and it’s a conduit for us to learn about what does it mean when people touch your service across all these different screens and what do they expect. It’s something that’s come together over the last year.”

However Spencer adds that not every game is applicable to the unification process and this is something they’re not going to force down the throats of developers. “It’s not something we’re forcing, that a game has to support all the platforms, but more developers than not when we talk to them about the opportunity see it. Why wouldn’t they want someone playing their game whether they’re at home or at work, on their laptop on their television.” What do you guys think? Could unification across multiple devices be something we look forward to in our games in the future?

Tyler Lee
Categories: Gaming
Tags: Microsoft, Minecraft