It's the end of Minecraft Earth, as we know it

(And I feel fine)

Terrible news everyone; Minecraft Earth is shutting down! No, not the yearly convention wherein new updates for the popular build-em-up game are announced; I'm talking about Minecraft Earth: the mobile mixed-reality app. Minecraft Earth? Anyone? Really? See, I have this weird sort of fascination for those dead and dying game-adjacent ventures, and for the unique strange circumstances surrounding them. I like to find out whether we're talking about a sleeper hit that didn't take off, or a title that scared away it's consumer base, or one that was simply killed off for the sake of keeping company resources free. And that, of course, extends to games that I haven't even heard of before, like this Minecraft Earth thing; What's that all about? Literally the first I've heard of this app is it's last; and now, inexplicably, this thing has been bought alive in the world of my vision, captured in morbid fascination as it falls still in those final eternal moments. (Did I successfully manage to creep you out yet?) So let's take a look.

Minecraft Earth is a free-to-play augmented reality game bought out in late 2019 with the hopes of creating a platform for collaborative online creation and play within a virtual Minecraft overlay. Now to be honest, whilst I never heard of this game in my entire life, I did actually hear about the technology that makes it work, and that's because I first remember it being showcased giddily at a Microsoft showroom event about various alternate reality projects. I recall being amazed at the way a whole depth-realised Minecraft world could exist in the virtual, a whole layer that was just casually superimposed onto our reality, like something out of a David Cage game. For that very reason, I never really expected anything to come of it. I mean, most of what you see in those tech shows are just theoretical and functionally useless, all the really world changing applications are with-held until a army of patents can be written up, so we just get to see the weekend projects that some genius has tinkered with for half an hour as a hobby before deciding to go back to solving cold fusion or something.

And even if this were something that might be coming our way, I always figured it was space age tech; due in years, not months. But... now I come to think about it- I remember going into school the next day and talking to people about that event. Which means it was years ago, and therefore I was just a complete dunce who forgot the definition of 'exponential' when considering the growth of technology. Augmented reality is no longer space age stuff, in fact, we hardly even acknowledge it anymore. It's reached that point in general culture where if we don't quite understand how something works or functions we simplify it or loop it into a concept we understand. Instagram 'Filters' for example; quite a lot of them use Augmented reality, and we don't even bat an eye. Maybe the very fact I find that wild is indicative of my rapidly increasing out-of-touch nature. (I've never even been on TikTok. Oh god...) Whatever the case, this all means that it's not even remotely strange for something like Minecraft Earth to exist.

But what it is? Specifically? Well it's Minecraft Bedrock edition but superimposed into a free-to-play mobile format that has hints of resource collection, some mob fighting, and a crowing jewel of building within a mixed reality environment. As opposed to the showcase I saw when this was achieved through the use of that, still not as widely utilised as I'm sure the developers hoped for, Hololens thing; here anyone could go nuts building with the power of their phone camera alone. Although there's not a great deal of online video content on how the things works (weirdly) as I understand it, there would be certain 'buildplates' which people could make their builds on, and those creations would presumably be there for others to discover and work upon? I'm guessing here. As Free-to-plays go, there were a couple of currencies and likely some timeout mechanics in order to keep the lights on, but for the most part the game was apparently an invitation to creative freedom. So what went wrong?

Well just the other day the official Minecraft website received a forum post written the team claiming that their last update had just dropped and that support for the app would cease by June. And as this was an Online App, that means it will be unfunctioning after support ends, thus cutting off any potential scalper market that may arise. (I remember how much phones were selling for when the original Flappy Bird was killed off) But what was the impetus? Well, that could be anything under the sun to be honest, but before speculation begins we can start by assessing the official reason given in said announcement. There the team are rather upfront, the say that the app was made in a time where it made sense to encourage people to go out and explore, but given the recent worldwide pandemic that just isn't really an option anymore. Thus they thought it wise to reallocate resources (Oh look, one of my predictions was right!) and kill of Minecraft Earth. So basically they're going for 'the Quibi defence', "That Covid killed my app!", seems legit enough.

To believe the statement you have to acknowledge that the very raison d'être for the App is now redundant; communication and making friends with fellow Minecraft enthusiasts (so that you can spend money as a group) has been kyboshed. When you look at it like that, this actually makes a lot more sense than Quibi's failure, thus I'm actually inclined to take their word for it. However, I do know companies and company culture well enough to see when we're only being told most of the truth, because a lie based on truth is much easier to sell. So yes, I'll buy that the App couldn't be used as intended, but I doubt that's the reason the thing was killed off, I believe the very fact this App couldn't be used as intended likely led to a drop in active players to the point where it wasn't profitable, or not profitable enough, to keep the thing around anymore. let's me real, if the thing was still making money than they'd forget about "failing to live up to the vision" in a heartbeat.

Yet even if I'm right, there's is the question to ask of why this App didn't make it through the pandemic whilst other similar one's seem to be managing. It's no great secret that a lot of ideas which make Minecraft Earth work are borrowed from Pokemon GO, but whilst GO is undergoing a little underground renaissance of sorts, (thanks in no small part to their recent HOME integration) Earth is getting the boot. Now Niantic were surprisingly proactive when lockdowns started landing, implementing some features to help players with remotely engaging with the game, (Albeit, never quite enough to forgo the act of gratuitous travel) so that certainly helped somewhat. But I think this really comes down to situation and the way that Minecraft can afford swallowing a team into the wider group whilst letting their mobile venture fall to the wayside; very much unlike Niantic who's whole enterprise rests on Pokemon Go and that Harry Potter game which I hear some people actually play. (Each to their own) If Niantic had to eat some profits for a few months to stay afloat they'll damn well do it, but I'd imagine a corporate overlord like Microsoft (or maybe even Mojang themselves) wouldn't share such patience.

Of course, my words are speculative and my opinions are my own. Who's to say what bought Minecraft Earth down after a measly year and some change of life. (Although 'failure of vision' is a pretty flimsy excuse in my book) The facts are thus, an actually somewhat cool idea is getting the axe and that's a little bit of a shame; I always hate to see a project unceremoniously discontinued. Of course, this may lay the groundwork for such cool ideas to make their way elsewhere, because every ending is a beginning and all that, so let's not let this be so dour, shall we? I suppose at the end of the day the only real surprise in this, the very fact I was interested at all, is because a venture baring the Minecraft name didn't blow up like you'd expect. Isn't that a headscratcher? It makes me wonder if there's room in the world for that 'Minecraft Killer' Hytale afterall...