<story><title>The Story of Microsoft&apos;s Minecraft Buyout</title><url>http://www.wired.com/2015/06/minecraft-book-excerpt/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>baldfat</author><text>&amp;gt; Both are to be extremely passionate about the simple but massively playable games.&lt;p&gt;Have you ever even looked at Dwarf Fortress? It is the most complex non-trival game I have ever layed my eyes on. It takes over 100 hours just to understand the ascii art.&lt;p&gt;Quoting: 
&amp;quot;Dwarf Fortress is one of the most complex computer games in the history of computer games. How complex? In the game&amp;#x27;s discussion forum, one player asserts that after 120 failed games, he can finally &amp;quot;get into the swing of things.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;[&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;arstechnica.com&amp;#x2F;gaming&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;dwarf-fortress-ten-hours-with-the-most-inscrutable-video-game-of-all-time&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;arstechnica.com&amp;#x2F;gaming&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;dwarf-fortress-ten-hou...&lt;/a&gt;]</text></item><item><author>sageabilly</author><text>After reading this story I&amp;#x27;m struck by a bit of a parallel between Notch and Tarn Adams, the guy who writes Dwarf Fotress. Both are to be extremely passionate about the simple but massively playable games that they make, but Dwarf Fortress has a niche following and Minecraft has &lt;i&gt;EXPLODED&lt;/i&gt; in popularity. I can see Notch riding the leviathan for a while but at some point that&amp;#x27;s got to be extremely tiring and every day&amp;#x27;s growth would take him further and further from the &amp;quot;I just want to sit in the basement and make fun games&amp;quot; that got him in the industry in the first place.&lt;p&gt;Regardless of intent, at some point if someone comes along and says &amp;quot;hey we&amp;#x27;ll give you $2B to walk away from this and go back to making fun games in the basement and never having to worry about money ever again&amp;quot; it will be a more attractive offer than trying to deal with the headache that comes with running a large company (which would be compounded by never desiring to have a large company in the first place).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>GuiA</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s a bit of a dramatic exaggeration for theatrical effect. The ASCII art definitely does not take 100 hours to understand.&lt;p&gt;If you use a beginner&amp;#x27;s guide, you can get the basics in a couple hours - after that, you start having fun but of course it takes a very long time to learn and understand all of the subtleties of the game (but that&amp;#x27;s true of any good strategy game).&lt;p&gt;O&amp;#x27;reilly has published a book about the game, I highly recommend it. You can start really grokking the game within an afternoon.</text></comment>
<story><title>The Story of Microsoft&apos;s Minecraft Buyout</title><url>http://www.wired.com/2015/06/minecraft-book-excerpt/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>baldfat</author><text>&amp;gt; Both are to be extremely passionate about the simple but massively playable games.&lt;p&gt;Have you ever even looked at Dwarf Fortress? It is the most complex non-trival game I have ever layed my eyes on. It takes over 100 hours just to understand the ascii art.&lt;p&gt;Quoting: 
&amp;quot;Dwarf Fortress is one of the most complex computer games in the history of computer games. How complex? In the game&amp;#x27;s discussion forum, one player asserts that after 120 failed games, he can finally &amp;quot;get into the swing of things.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;[&lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;arstechnica.com&amp;#x2F;gaming&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;dwarf-fortress-ten-hours-with-the-most-inscrutable-video-game-of-all-time&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;arstechnica.com&amp;#x2F;gaming&amp;#x2F;2013&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;dwarf-fortress-ten-hou...&lt;/a&gt;]</text></item><item><author>sageabilly</author><text>After reading this story I&amp;#x27;m struck by a bit of a parallel between Notch and Tarn Adams, the guy who writes Dwarf Fotress. Both are to be extremely passionate about the simple but massively playable games that they make, but Dwarf Fortress has a niche following and Minecraft has &lt;i&gt;EXPLODED&lt;/i&gt; in popularity. I can see Notch riding the leviathan for a while but at some point that&amp;#x27;s got to be extremely tiring and every day&amp;#x27;s growth would take him further and further from the &amp;quot;I just want to sit in the basement and make fun games&amp;quot; that got him in the industry in the first place.&lt;p&gt;Regardless of intent, at some point if someone comes along and says &amp;quot;hey we&amp;#x27;ll give you $2B to walk away from this and go back to making fun games in the basement and never having to worry about money ever again&amp;quot; it will be a more attractive offer than trying to deal with the headache that comes with running a large company (which would be compounded by never desiring to have a large company in the first place).</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>sageabilly</author><text>I happily admit that at its core, Dwarf Fortress is &lt;i&gt;ANYTHING BUT&lt;/i&gt; simple. And yes, I&amp;#x27;ve played the hell out of it for years and years.&lt;p&gt;However, the concept of Dwarf Fortress is extremely simple- you&amp;#x27;re a band of dwarves, you start out with limited supplies, here&amp;#x27;s this open world for you to go live in, now try not to die. Minecraft is the same way in that regard- here&amp;#x27;s this world you&amp;#x27;ve been plopped down in, it&amp;#x27;s theoretically infinitely big, try not to die.</text></comment>