'Minecraft' is to a large degree about having unique experiences that nobody else has had. The levels are randomly generated, and you can build anything you want to build yourself.
I think the only way I could make something fun and big is if I don't expect it to be.
If you build a car, you can only sell it once. If you paint a fence, you only get paid for it once. If you create a piece of software that's essentially free to reproduce, you can keep getting paid over and over perpetually.
I think the more realistic you try to make the graphics and the experience, the more you limit yourself to a single vision.
Infinite power just isn't very interesting, no matter what game you're playing. It's much more fun when you have a limited tool set to use against the odds.
Just make games for yourself and try to have a critical eye to what you do. If you genuinely like the game, there will be other people who like it as well.
I don't have the relationship that I thought I did with my fans. Maybe I did early on when I had a couple thousand fans, but it's not like us anymore. It's the idea of Notch and the 'Minecraft' community.
I've never run a company before, and I don't want to feel like a boss. I just want to turn up and do my work.
For 'Minecraft,' it actually started with an isometric strategy game.
I'm not an entrepreneur. I'm not a CEO. I'm a nerdy computer programmer who likes to have opinions on Twitter.
When you have the kind of success 'Minecraft' has brought, you can just choose yourself the way you want to do things.
I definitely think 'Minecraft' is a freak thing. There's no way you could replicate it intentionally.
I never really had the fun teens of exploring the world because I was sitting at home, learning programming.
If I had intended for 'Minecraft' to end up on consoles, I wouldn't have developed the game in Java. The decision to port the game to consoles came from a combination of player requests, a desire to play around with the brand on different platforms, and some interesting business deals.
We lived in this area that was basically two circular roads next to each other. There were forests and pastures and stuff. I remember walking around the forest quite a bit.
When I was young, we didn't have indie games. We had 'garage developers' or similar terms, who were just small teams making games out of passion.
I guess people feel like they kind of know me. The game developer me, or the Twitter persona, that's Notch. It's a censored version. The real me is Markus.
I'm a little confused by love.
I first wore a hat after seeing a friend wear a hat. It seemed like a neat way to keep snow off my head without having to wear a beanie, so I tried it on for a while. Turns out I started wearing the hat at around the time people took pictures of me and put them online and in newspapers, so it kind of became part of my public image.
I feel there is this looming cloud over my life.
