Minecraft creator Markus “Notch” Persson says he’s hoping to start work on a new game that would serve as a “spiritual successor” to the block-based sandbox game he first created in 2009.
“I basically announced Minecraft 2,” Persson tweeted shortly after posting a poll asking for players’ opinions on the direction of his current project, which he says is “a traditional roguelike mixed with a tile-based first-person dungeon-crawler.”
I basically announced minecraft 2.
I thought that maybe people ACTUALLY do want me to make another game that’s super similar to the first one, and I’m loving working on games again.
I don’t super duper care exactly which game I make first (or even if I make more), but I do know…— notch (@notch) January 3, 2025
“But then I gots to thinking that maybe there are people who like my work but might not share my taste in retro nostalgia, and would prefer for me to make a spiritual successor thing to Minecraft, and I mean sure, I’d take that cash,” Persson wrote in a post sharing the poll.
Naturally, Minecraft fans went wild, and when asked to elaborate, Persson confirmed he was “100% serious” about a sequel.
“I thought that maybe people actually do want me to make another game that’s super similar to the first one, and I’m loving working on games again,” Persson wrote. “I don’t super duper care exactly which game I make first (or even if I make more), but I do know I’m making one, so I figured I’d absolutely be willing to give it an honest shot in the form of a spiritual successor to Minecraft and put up a poll about it.”
Despite clearly being passionate about the idea, Persson was just as eager to share his fears regarding the ways a Minecraft sequel could potentially go wrong.
“My intentions are to be clear and honest about it,” he said. “Saying that, spiritual successors are usually kind of… you know… washed up. Tragic. [These are] the things I’m fearing my next game is going to be anyway, and try to push myself to avoid. So why not do the thing that people DO want and are willing to give me, somehow, even more cash for?”
Persson added that he’d want any profit made from a potential Minecraft sequel to be “spent for good [things],” adding that despite Minecraft’s popularity and success, the game has also taught him a lot about failure. “Winning is failing until you make yourself succeed,” he wrote.
Before signing off, Perrson stated that he had no intention to “sneakily infringe on the incredible work the Mojang team is doing [with Minecraft] and that Microsoft is successfully doing the Microsoft sh*ttification about.”
“I respect them for doing that,” Persson said of Microsoft, which purchased Minecraft in 2014. “It’s their job. And they, from what I understand, let the studio do things their way, which seems very fair to me.”
In the years since the acquisition, Microsoft has expanded the franchise with spin-offs like Minecraft Legends and Minecraft Dungeons. As for the possibility of a sequel, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer said in the wake of the 2014 buyout that he was focused first and foremost on improving the original game, rather than looking toward a sequel. In 2015, Mojang CEO Jonas Martensson said there were “no discussions [happening] about Minecraft 2 at the moment,” but neither Microsoft nor Mojang have ever said that a sequel was entirely off the table.
Persson hasn’t yet shared any glimpses of his current work with players, so there’s no telling what a Minecraft 2 might look like, though one imagines it would share its predecessor’s cube-covered art style. In addition to a potential playable sequel, Minecraft fans also have a block-based blockbuster to look forward to, with A Minecraft Movie set to hit theaters in April.