Notch Has A New Indie Game! (Minecraft Creator) 

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Buying a mansion in la was the problem. He should have bought a castle.

It's well-documented that Notch was inspired by Dwarf Fortress and Infiniminer for Minecraft. Dwarf Fortress does the procedural world generation thing, and Infiniminer the mining/additive/subtractive voxel interaction mechanics. It was simple inspiration from a couple of sources and combining them. That coupled with the soundtrack, simple graphical texture style and the variety of interesting mobs early on were what made it interesting. Multiplayer and community creativity is what made it stick.

Title starts at 4:00

“Money makes the miserable parts of life a little bit less miserable.” Wise words

Minecraft was originally inspired by a game called Infiniminer by Zach Barth (Zachtronics). So the idea wasn't completely original.

2:28 Yeah, for me too. Would never buy such a massive house to live there alone because the emptiness of big house is always very depressing

Minecraft was one of my first games as a kid and I always wondered if Notch was going to create another awesome game. I hope this new game is something we will be talking about for a long time.

bro if I release a game and it makes me 2.5 billion there is no way in hell that would stop me from making games. There is a whole library of out of scope projects I am never going to be able to achieve as a small solo dev and the only thing holding me back is money

One advantage of building an engine from scratch is that you gain more insight into how it all fits together, how every minute detail works. So even if it is much more primitive than modern ones like Unreal, you know the full extent of its features and adding new features means you are forced to learn them deeply instead of just turning on or off buttons. And with that further insight it becomes easier predicting or using features in other engines, so as a side project it is definitly a good exercise as it rounds you off. For Notch, having that amount of control over his engine makes it easier to implement his artistic ideas as an integral part of the graphics, instead of chaining a bunch of customizable options.

If youre a coder who followed indie games, and the bedroom coder during the 90s until the big boom. You'll understand how Notch thinks, this is totally how coders who love roguelike (nethack, angband, dwarf fortress) in an era where consumer engines doesnt exists would want to make and are used to making their games. He just really enjoys it making it in this way, and as someone who feels the same (and is technically doing the same process) I really love seeing this and the oldschool feeling he gives.

Thought it was well known by now that Minecraft was based on Infiniminer. No Minecraft didn't create the concept of placing and destroying blocks.

5:09 WHAT, i believe making your own engine makes game development more exciting actually Finally getting to use the math you learn at school to do cool techniques is very fun to do and possibly as an exercise to understand some fundamental concepts on how to write performant code

Notch's idea of placing and breaking blocks was not completely unheard of at the time... He took that idea from Infiniminer

"I don't know how he got the idea". He played a game called Infiniminer by Zachtronics, which was 'a first-person competitive mining game that takes place in a procedurally generated [3D] block world'. At the time, Notch had been working on a clone of Dwarf Fortress called RubyDung. He was then inspired to move RubyDung forward more in the infiniminer direction of first person perspective rather than the top down DF style. What resulted was a game that marries the best aspects (for what Notch was making) of infiniminer and dwarf fortress.

7:19 This is a beautiful message and notch's story teaches us that this is indeed the case.

Great last words about the fact that creating my game is probably the most fun things will get for me. I actually don't mind that. Not at all.

I find great irony that Notch was wasting his time with the Hollywood elite. Probably more than any other game, Minecraft spanned the generations and brought children closer to their parents and families. Can't measure that kind of societal impact with Microsoft's billions.

you did no research for the minecraft portion lol

I think the problem with getting rich is people want a life style from it. They want the money to automatically solve their problems when their deeper issues are not money related. Money doesn't buy happiness but it gets rid of the stresses that come from needing money. You will always have food, water and a roof over your head. You won't need to do a job you hate. You have the freedom to do anything. But the more options you have, the harder it is to choose. A lot of artists can relate to this. We have millions of ideas but only enough time on this planet to create a certain amount of those ideas. Point I am making is have a family, make real friends and cherish the people around you. Humans are social creatures and we need companionship like a lot of mammal on this planet. Money is great but it really shouldn't change how you live your life too much. But I too am glad he has found his way again and is making games again. We should all enjoy making games at the very least. Cuz at the end of the day, that is the point of video games. Enjoyment.

If someone said 'Mincraft 2', I'd picture what I see in these screenshots. Honestly, I think it's quite smart to tap into the Minecraft gimmick (at least in terms of visuals). But glad to see him back creating. I followed him for a while on social media after the MS purchase. He didn't seem happy, to say the least.

I'm pretty sure that Minecraft is respected enough as a game that you don't need to embellish its genius by pretending that its mechanics weren't inspired by other games like Infiniminer.

I have a friend who will create a new 3D engine just for his new game, but because he doesn't have money, I told him to learn Unity3D just to have him finish new game faster. Notch, after buying that mansion, he still have enough to work on new game engine. It's really cool that he got back in the game dev scene and trace back his steps again. I still don't understand what he says Borderlands with D20s, should it be like, DnD but everyone use guns?

I'm pretty sure I would be okay living in that house.

With that money I'd use it to start an entirely new project exactly according to what I dream

It’s been 3 months since I started as your student. Been working nonstop and finally have my game studios legal! Thank you Mr. Brush!!!

Oh yeah Notch has such a tragic story.. Cant imagine how tough he had it getting that 2.5b xD

cliff horse is goated

IIRC Notch himself mentioned somewhere that he got the 3D blocks idea from Dwarf Fortress and some other game which I forgot

Cliffhorse was released when he was still at Mojang, Jebb took over on Minecraft at that point, they were still doing their Scrolls card game, which there was beef with Bethesda

5:07 Here's a little secret that a lot of devs don't know about creating your own engine. It's always unique which makes it so charming. And even though custom engines are usually less refined, that jank really adds to the charm.

Bro made a new survival save

Notch actually got the idea of minecraft from a game from 2009 called Infiniminer or something, Notch even mentions it in his youtube video description of cavegame

Idle hands. Glad to hear he’s workin out of it.

voxels turning into spheres

Notch didn't create the idea of stacking and mining blocks. He took Infiniminer by Zach Barth (Zachtronics) and built it out to fill his vision of a game. If you actually go read the forums post by Jebb you'll find that Minecraft's code is an absolute mess. Mainly the parts that were patched together around the old Infiniminer code. Jebb and the team really want to just remake the game from scratch with code that is all theirs and not a mess or nightmare to work with.

The idea of building blocks was taken from another developer. I remeber seeing the other game that looked even worse than an early Minecraft, so I'm glad Notch saw a potential and polished this idea into an amazing game

I wish when content creators spoke about Notch they would also mention. He did NOT just do this out of nowhere. He was a developer for a game called Wurm Online, which he basically made into minecraft but for children. Wurm was a game in its self that was absolutely amazing of an MMO and deserves recognition.

Notch's story: *Tune from Jungle Book Song I Wanna Be Like You* "I've reached the top and had to stop and that's what's bothering me!" But now Now that's he's free from his shackles of depression and corporate life, he can start back from the bottom and work himself back to the top. Being the very best isn't always good. It means no one can surpass you, no one can stand up to you. And that's just no fun.

I feel like I seen this video before was it a reupload? Nice video

1:30 the idea he got it from another game at the time called Infiminer, which had you placing and breaking blocks while fighting and stuff

can't wait until we get to see some gameplay : ) the engine looks cool so far

I'm glad for him moving on from early retirement. I'm trying to make a game myself and it's kind of big, ambitious, but there's so much left to do, doing the art programming and design yourself ain't easy. i often wondered what he thought of MMOs and why not make one. i mean i guess minecraft would count.. it's like... what MMOs should be like in a way. to prevent the MMO from dying, it must have an offline/LAN feature, unlike world of warcraft unless you hosted a private server offline, there's no alternative to a lot of these games. but i do believe there's still many ideas in gaming dev/online not done, they're just niche or risky and "AAA" doesn't roll that route and lean more distopian I guess. Come to think of it, i think someone like notch back in the business has a greater chance of helping the game industry than gta6, that game has no chance after how they did gta5, people easily forget the length of milking.

Real Happiness is inside us (that's one of the main Buddha's teachings). That's why many rich and famous people have gotten depressed and even committed suicide: if you expect to find happiness in fame and money, and then you get those things but don't bring any happiness, you would immediately ask yourself: is this ALL that Life has to offer??? And that's when depression hits hard... There's a phenomenon called "the dark night of the Soul", which is basically that. It is said that you overcome that sudden depression and sadness by practicing Meditation and learning to be more a more Spiritual person (i.e.: less Materialistic)... The upside is that you'll end up like Keanu Reeves, or Jim Carrey: with lots of money and also the Spiritual knowledge to survive in any situation, been rich or even if you loose it all (becoming poor).

Glazing notch so hard bro

i prefer writing my own engine bc of the fine control it gives you, even if it takes a little longer at the start, towards the end you will probably be faster though with all custom tooling etc.

He is the true embodiment of what it means to be a programmer. We are way better off and happier living in a one room apartment programming all day and smashing our heads worrying about nasty bugs than live in a mansion. He got a little bit corrupt, ig, for a few years but now he got back his soul(or so I think)

A Bit Shift is an optimization trick that is top-notch. He probably wants to make a fully optimized game with a proper programming language, using all the most advanced tricks he can to make it run smoothly.

My personal favourite video of yours... This is something I have reflected on a lot after doing pretty well with indie game dev: The money and success feels like the goal, but the real reward is always the act of creating. In my experience, the BEST times in game dev were when I was broke just making things super personal and as an artist... if you are in that stage in game dev, enjoy it, it is pure and magical. Money is awesome, don't get me wrong.... but if I, Thomas Brush, Notch, or any other passionate game dev, had the ultimatum : Have $1B cash BUT you never get to sit on a computer and be creative in game dev again... I bet we'd all pick the computer... or truly regret if we didn't.

More people should create their own engine (if they can afford it)

Hey Thomas.. why don't you have a video on opening a steam page or itch page? So much content here, I feel this is really missing.

I guess he’s planning to make a survival game with elements from Pixel Gun.

01:28 How he got the idea Infiniminer by Zachtronics

I would never expect that guy to buy and spent money on such a house...

Minecraft has been a massive source of inspiration for me and the main thing that comes to mind when thinking about nostalgia. Thanks to him and my love for creating games, I began coding from a young age. Very excited to see what he will make now :).

5:07 "i highly recommend you never create your own engine" Baremettle (Exanima devs): Hold my physics-based tankard

I have a feeling we have another classic on our hands.

Hey, whatever he's got cooking in the kitchen - i'm already drooling with knife and fork

Quote: "It is fun to make money, but I think it gets boring. But I don't think making worlds ever gets boring" - Thomas Brush :) Great words!

I was never a minecraft guy but even terraria, small studio that created somethong that generated close, if not more than a billion dollars OFF OF A $10 GAME!?!? crazy. And they've given their community 10+ years of free updates.

The journey of making a game and seeing it be enjoyed by other people is the pinnacle of gave development, imo at least

It’s about the journey not the destination. It’s cool to finally reach the destination but once you reach it what is there left you do? That’s why you always need to be ready for the next journey.

Looking forward to what he has in store

Why Thomas is such gigaChad irl, damn

Great to see something about Notch that is not about some old tweets.

7:10 the journey is the fun

I believe that making games is the fun part also, yet I'm also stopped at the knowledge part, bc none of my school has any classes I need for unity or C# and tutorials don't work bc I'm a heavy person-person learner, and I can't do any actually good courses bc I'm broke... I have HOURS of just planned out game ideas, probably like 10-20 fully fleshed out game ideas at this point, and I want to make/attempt some of them SO BAD, but I just can't learn... what a shame, I hope all my ideas I worked so hard on don't go to waste, but that's what I kinda feel will happen rn, if anyone has any feedback just pls reply

3:46 thats how I feel, zero motivation at all, because I have accomplished everything I ever wanted to (which is own a computer).

goosebump

Beautiful message at the end of the video. I found that very inspiring :)

I've never seen someone more humble ever. When those that are supposed to be humble prefer to be prideful instead..

does he still use java?

Man I just wish I had the money to create worlds...

so what you saying is that "maybe game development was the friends we made along the way"

I'd argue that there's nothing crappy about infinite freedom!

I think spending a month trying to make an engine in OpenGL is a right of passage for a lot of software engineers lol

He should have bought a bunch of shipping containers and put them together, that would have been better, and more blocky too. Glass mansions are stupid. I really don't like the idea of having huge glass panels leading into the place where I live, you might as well just have a house with no doors.

7:28 ok, now i need to subscribe haha

Hi Thomas!

Gave me chills brother

oh he sold it in 2014, I wonder if there was a noncompete agreement

He got the idea from Infineminer

I have to say I definitely agree not to make own game engine 😂 I am very ambitious person that would be overkill for me. But I can understand that we need to love what we do and the best feeling is looking forward what to achieve. I get so excited thinking about my few stories that I need to write building up the plots and stories, characters looking forward to people reactions even though there will be small number who will read it, the stories i create give me purpose. I just love what I am doing and extremely excited to make many very short indie games and use my storytelling skills to make my game less crappy. 2024 will be a good year to enjoy my creations or least I hope. I am just enjoying the creative process now.

Maybe he can make a free engine for all like godot, he dont need more Money but this could be fun and kindly.

I saw Notch coding on a stream. I'm a good programmer, he is a genius. He was so quick and hard to follow, it was insane.

He says, don't do this thing. But when notch does it, it adds a notch flavor... Thats called originality

Imagine if it blows up as much as minecraft

Bro is literallly rewriting history 😂

Damn. I paid 26 bucks to an anti semetic in 2011. At least he’s still lonely.

Having a game dev who already just has shittons of money and their purpose is to have fun and make great games, that is the opposite of Bobby Kotick and the general AAA industry. Notch could be a second Jesus for the gaming industry, next to Swen Vincke.

I'm really happy for Notch. I think after hitting on such a huge success and getting rich he probably thought he would be happy, but only felt hollow. I mean, it's easy to say I wouldn't mind being in his shoes, but in the end, money can't buy happiness, and I suspect he was happiest making games. I think that getting back to his roots will help him feel fulfilled again.

Well if notch is bored out of his mind he can always give some of his money to me and I'll try my best to develop next "minecraft" game on my own within next 5 years =).

You want to create your own engine for original content.

How about Dwarf Fortress? Also a legit indie game. Not as big as Minecraft though

Its sad that you had to include "Minecraft creator" in the title when it said notch...

Infiniminer was an inspiration for Notch to create Minecraft, so blocks and procedural generation was already a thing.

He got his idea from infiniminer

BTW pigs are beautiful, even without lipstick

nah brah I think I'll take the 2.5 billion, if Notch doesn't want it he can give it to me

I was so excited when I saw notch was making a new game