How Minecraft Surpassed the Game it Copied 

Early 2010 games be like: The Impssible Game > Geometry Dash Infiniminer > Minecraft Crush the Castle > Angry Birds

Although we now know notch didn’t technically invent this sort of game, we know he was the man with the vision. The person to expand it to what we all wanted and its full potential.

Minecraft may be a clone of Infiniminer, but Mojang did the idea WAY better tbh.

This is how stuff is. Someone comes out with an idea or game. Then someone takes that idea(Which is perfectly ok) and builds on that idea. Nothing wrong with it and it shouldnt be demonized

A few things worth mentioning: - Minecraft wasn't Notch's first crack at this game. He collabed on a game called Wurm Online, which is awful and nobody should ever touch, but was also a sandbox. He drew a lot of inspiration from it. Wurm is the reason Minecraft doesn't come with a ton of RPG systems. He's done that already. Even levels for enchanting came much later. - Early access was still novel at this time. The level of excitement people got out of feeling like they were early contributors led to a ton of word of mouth. - Notch farted around in IRC a lot. (Think Discord for old people.) It was really easy to get his attention and talk ideas at first. - It cannot be understated how big modding was for both developers. Zach pulled back from it and Notch saw that. Neither of them were big fans of the idea. Notch used to have a post on his (now removed) blog where he mused about challenging mods legally. Players' obstinate push to enhance the experience helped cement Minecraft as a malleable playground for ideas. Source: me.

Can you make a series on the opposite effect? Games that copies weren’t able to capture the success of the original?

"His tweets become more controversial" *shows a tweet saying it's okay to be white*

Yea this one gonna blow up buddy. RU-vid LOVES Minecraft, u hit the gold mine lol

Great video dude, gave some history i never really knew about i game i love dearly! Impressive deepdive

I'd like to point out something, which is that at 1:45 you said that source code leaking is a game developer's "worst nightmare", which isn't always true. In fact, some developers (less so with games but there are still some examples of this) purposely post their code online, where people can point out bugs and help add features, or even submit code themselves of which the creator can verify and add to the code base. Of course, to some people it can be seen as bad, but my point is that that's not everyone.

I loved this video! I never expected it from you, but I loved it!

its not really a clone, it's pretty different and honestly way more fun. Infiniminer didn't make money because minecraft was a better game and had better advertising. That's it.

Loved the editing! Awesome info 🔥

I love you Henke! Been following ever since your first video!

Thank you for this video. I don't know why, it's just so nice to see a video talking about the controversies of these two games without censoring a lot of things for monetization.

This documentary id extremely well put and made!

Let’s go we love Henke!

How the Hell is anything Notch said in those 3 tweets "controversial"?

Pretty nice channel and video, Henke! I am going to sub

You deserve more subscribers!

this is defo blowing up bro i just got this recommended

Zach's story is really great. I didn't even know he made infinifactory, so I was glad to see a game him and his team made that was really successful. It really shows how dedicated he was to game dev, and how even though he went through trials and tribulations, he made it out on top! Great vid!

these were such good time, looking back at a ten year old version of myself playing Minecraft beta from a friends house in early 2011

Give this man a channel logo.

Sick vid man. Never knew about any of this

Amazing video bro i never knew any of this 😮

They didn't do the idea better they TOOK the idea. Also, he probably quit because every idea was from the community and not his own. The community made the game then as they are now. He can't make a game, he just follows orders, just like the rest of mojang. With this in mind, I don't consider anybody in mojang creative or actual devs.

Bro the second i heard that wii party music in the beginning i was immediately interested in this video

The amount of clickbait is massive.

I found you from your Fall Guys content, keep up the good work!

great video!

9:21 I didn't know saying, "It's ok to be white" was controversial.

This to me is why I love things like modding communities and such. Even though Minecraft was way more than a mod, and that's even more true today, just the sheer fact that someone took a game, and completely flipped it on it's head to the point where it was something completely new is so cool to me. It's unfortunate Infiniminer had to go down the way it did though, cause it looked and sounded like a game I'd have a blast playing with my friend til' this day!

Ur pfp is so good

Infiniminer walked so Minecraft could run, or something idk. I saw a quote like this just a few days ago

Infiminer was much more of a inspiration for Minecraft, infiminer wasn’t even the first game to use the block building mechanics those have been around forever, Minecraft even the classic versions were way different, and when Minecraft was officially released basically the only thing the games had in common was the block mechanics.

As someone who loves open source, I need to clarify something. You cannot directly edit the code unless the owner authorizes it. But... you can fork it and make your own custom version. Also, open source programs can work on any platform, and it also ensures the program is safe, because the users would be able to see the code, thus they could see if it is fishy code.

When a game is copied, it means that the original game is still running at the date it was copied. Minecraft was like an unofficial sequel of infiniminer. The game got abandoned and Notch remade it in his own style. he didn't give up

Good video!

I’m literally watching this while afking in a mob farm in Minecraft

you forgot to mention notch worked on a survival game called wurm prior to this meaning he knew about the appeal of survival crafting games and had firsthand experience in making them

2:18 for all the people saying Minecraft isn't a clone. That's how Notch planned it first until he decided to grow the game.

Wow, what a rollercoaster of a story! It's crazy to think about how one idea can snowball into something as massive as Minecraft, but also how it can affect the original creator. Zach's journey is a testament to the importance of staying true to your vision while also being open to feedback and adaptation. And Notch's story shows the power of seizing an opportunity and running with it. Both faced challenges, but it's inspiring to see how they each navigated their own paths. Ultimately, it's not just about the success or the money, but about finding fulfillment and staying true to yourself. Mad respect to both of them for staying in the game, no pun intended!

HAPPY NEW YEAR

That's why i love to stay in the background and being a "under dog", getting too much attention always messed me up

Now I want to replay SpaceChem !

wait... i geniuenly didn't know spacechem was from the guy that made infiniminer! i have played spacechem before! i am surprised! anyway, good video and very informative!

nice info, nice channel, nice

Awesome analysis as usual brother!

Notch may have "stolen" Infiniminer, but at least he acknowledge that he wanted to make a clone. There are some games out there that are complete ripoff and copies and don't give credit or say it's a clone of another game.

So you telling me, ALL THIS TIME, Minecraft isn't a game of its own?! The original was actually Infiniminer?! Crazy.

This is why saying someone "perfected" something should be a part of everyone's vocabulary. A lot of big innovations people remember are never the first. They're the "perfected" version.

taking inspiration from a game isn't copying it. The games are wildly different in game play. The only thing it copied were the voxels and mining. the gameplay however is WAY different.

Infiniminer had very different gameplay. The game that minecraft, if you have to say it copied something, would be Dwarf Fortress, which is in fact what Notch said he "copied".

It's not a copy really, Minecraft just take the style of the game, both games share nothing in common so in my opinion it's just taking inspiration

How do you clean a huge 70 million mansion? At that point, it's like living in a hotel

Why did you put “it’s ok to be white” as a controversial tweet. How exactly is that controversial?

I was just gonna say "oh that also happened to geometry dash, now do a video on it" And then I realised you already made a video about geometry dash being a clone of impossible game.

wow, this is very interesting, Ive never heard of Infiniminer, or even zach ;-;

I've just realised your the same guy who done the fall guys social distancing challenge

1:46 as a game developer myself, i dont find leaked source code for my games that bad, infact, I was Planning for My games to be open source so people can make mods and forks etc. I Like To Make My Games as Open As Possible

You're telling me Microsoft bought Minecraft in 2014? I still remember the news videos like yesterday. I'm old!

Infiniminer was also a clone. It was a clone of Dwarf Fortress, Infinidrag, and even TF2

most tech enterprises come about this way; at the very least its disrespectful not to credit its original author but it goes further to be detrimental to creators and concept as a whole. Unrecognized effort is painful but worse when somebody runs away with it and gets glorified.

I kinda feel sorry for Zack.

The Oreo Effect

This is some top notch story arch

Imagine a Minecraft server that has Infiniminer gameplay.

wait but notch started work on minecraft a few days after infiniminer was released then

I remember when I first played it, I don't think there were any mobs.

we... already knew. This has been fairly common knowledge for a while now.

1:42 “as a result, he accidentally made one of the best games ever”

Actually notch might of been inspired by infiniminer

honestly seems like a decent game

How you know this from the past history’s?!

Actuallly no Matter how much you earn or not if you are not happy at the end it worths nothing. and for zach he was true to himself and got happy ending.

Minecraft is not a clone, it was called a clone by notch when he started out but it became something mush more. The dev of Infiniminer dropped the game anyway. Everything is a clone of everything, just altered. Geometry dash is like Minecraft, it is a "clone" but it became something much more. Developers are always reusing and changing code to fit their games, Minecraft had a lot more than Infiniminer when Minecraft was first released and was not even close to being like Infiniminer. Thats like calling Wolfenstein 3D a clone of DOOM, or roblox a clone of Lego. My point is, its a stretch to say that Minecraft is a clone of Infiniminer when Minecraft's gameplay was designed to be different. The title of this video paints Minecraft as some super secret pyramid scheme which is wrong. Even if it was a copy it is perfectly ok to take someone's crap game and turn it into something successful, especially if the dev doesn't care. Both Minecraft and Infiniminer's gameplay, style, and goals are not close enough to be copies. Adding two or more idea's to make something better is not copying, this happens all the time. A copy is a thing made to be similar or identical to another (source: google), and by that, Minecraft is not a clone. TL;DR: Minecraft is itself, and was built on multiple ideas and executed perfectly. @Henke just click baited us all, but thats just how RU-vid is...

so is infiniminer still playable or?..

Also there is a reason why people make their software open source, like developers of mineclone2 did. Look at that game its awsome. Microsoft is the wery reason why minecraft stoped being deweloped and we didnt hawe anything new added to the game for years..

This man is the reverse fedora tipper

All Things Start by copying something else in this case infiniminer wasnt even being updated so notch expanded on the idea and made a SURVIVAL/SANDBOX game infiniminer was sandbox and compettitive.

I'd have to work for about 57 thousand years to make what Notch made on that sale. How can society allow this kind of thing? There is absolutely no arguing he "provided that much value"

So all along we were just playing a knock off infiniminer with a bunch of textures and mods, btw nice video

Similar story:- Geometry Dash

If i got a nickel every time someone copied a game made of mostly cubes and became more succesfull than the original i would have 2 nickels. but its weird that it happened twice. (Minecraft and Geometry dash)

Omg I bought space chem back in the day!

you written the title like Notch did something incredibly evil. Witch is not. Notch improved and changed the game he had "copied"

4:24 *sheep jumpscare*

Notch made it and was jaded, i dont think he had it in him to continue with new games.

Played so much infiniminer at LAN parties, it was the shit.

I mean, saying Minecraft is a clone of Infiniminer is very generous to Zach Bart, and I'm saying this as an avid Zachtronics fan

another day, another surpassed video.

Game developer here. Ideas are cheap, execution is everything.

Can you tell us the story of survival craft? it's a clone of minecraft but a good one that is.

What? No Way!! At least *Nintendos Plumber* is fully "Original"

I did not know that

Palworld is about to surpas- "gunshot ! "

what about rubydung?

5:24 what was notch’s day job?

Wow, I never knew Minecraft copied another game. Anyways, Keep up the good work Henke! P.S: I loved your geometry dash video!