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So lately I've been hooked on a game called Minecraft. You've probably heard about it; it's a game where the world is made up of blocks representing different types of material, looking something like this (click to enlarge):
It's an excellent game, and there's a lot to it. The game is currently in Alpha status, but despite that it's still very playable. Rather than being free, Alpha is being sold at half-price, making it €9.95. And it's sold a heck of a lot!
Why am I telling you all this? Because Notch (the creator) announced today that Minecraft would be entering Beta status on December 20th. This means a few things:
- After December 20th, Minecraft will no longer be half-price; the price will rise to €14.95, which is 25% off the full price of €20.00. .
- More importantly, the license is being changed to say that you won't get all future updates to the game for free. While the game was/is in Alpha, the license included that line, and it will be honoured for those who bought the game while that line was in the license. However, if a person buys in Beta, they'll get all the updates that pertain to Beta, but once the full game is released, they'd need to pay again for that (though I suspect at a discounted rate).
What does this mean for you? It means that if you want to receive the full game for half-price, your only option is to buy between now and December 20th; if you pay after December 20th, but before the release of the full game, you won't get the full game with that purchase. Personally, I think it's a bit of a crappy move to make people pay for a beta and then not give them the full game when it's released, but I'm not Notch, so.
But let me tell you, this *is* a fun game. I'll probably make a video on the first steps in Minecraft and post it to my YouTube account so people can see what sort of thing is involved. (I'll post it here in my journal too, of course.)