'Minecraft' Marketplace gives fan creators a way to make money
Minecraft fans have another surprise coming in the highly anticipated Discovery Update: the Minecraft Marketplace.
The new in-game store will give Windows 10 and Pocket Edition players access to an assortment of digital goods created by and for members of the Minecraft community. It won't replace the existing in-app purchases offered by Microsoft; it supplements them.
In fact, those in-app purchases paved the way for this latest evolution. When the mobile game received its first paid add-ons -- skin packs -- two years ago, it wasn't even possible to play as Alex, the default female avatar; only Steve was available.
"When we released the feature to [let players] upload a custom skin, we also said let's add ... some premium content," said John Thornton, executive producer for Minecraft Realms.
It was a successful move that led to subsequent content drops: more skin packs, followed by texture packs and -- starting in late 2016 -- world packs. "We felt like the Pocket Edition was an opportunity to get players content because it's really hard to get any unique content on Pocket Edition," Thornton said.
While Minecraft Marketplace will be available to players on Windows 10 Edition, Oculus (which uses the Windows 10 release), and mobile devices, it's the latter group that stands to benefit the most. Where PC players have easy ways to find and install free mods, Pocket Edition players are stuck with what's sold in-app.
That's why the Minecraft team is placing a heavy emphasis on content curation. With only nine community creators in the Marketplace when it launches -- Sphax, Blockception, Blockworks, Eneija Silverleaf, Imagiverse, Noxcrew, Polymaps, Qwertyuiopthepie, and Razzleberry Fox -- it's easier to ensure a certain level of quality across all releases.
Instead of relying on real money, the new online store uses its own currency -- Minecraft Coins -- that players can buy in packs of 300 (for $1.99), 840 (for $4.99), and 1,720 (for $9.99). All currency and purchases carry across all versions of Minecraft that include Marketplace.
Using a custom form of currency like Minecraft Coins comes with some advantages. On the player side, it gives the Marketplace team more flexibility to set prices that fall outside of standard app store pricing denominations: $0.99, $1.99, $2.99, etc. It also lets creators set their own prices on whatever they're selling.
"We want to have more flexibility, [such as] giving away things for zero Coins -- which isn't even possible on some of the app stores we work with," Thornton said. "By decoupling from in-app purchases and going to a coin system, we have a lot of flexibility in how we choose to price things and we can change the prices quickly."
On the creator side, Minecraft Coins makes it easier for those providing the content to see how their income breaks down. Turning builders into businesses is one of the goals with Marketplace, and transparency is essential for creating a trust in these relationships.
"We share in all the revenue with them and we wanted a system that was really easy for us to go through and track," Thornton explained. "What had been sold, how much it had been sold for, and how to pay them out fairly in a way that was accountable and auditable."
Since every app store operates differently, a coin-based system just made more sense. A 30 percent cut of every sale goes to the app store in question -- this is an industry-standard -- and the lion's share of what's left goes to the creators.
"Minecraft needs to take some cut on this because we have a big team of people doing the curation, we have a big team of people building the store, we have servers that we're running 24 hours a day to serve all this content. There are real costs of goods associated with every creator we bring into the program," Thornton said.
"But we wanted to make sure they were getting paid fairly. The easiest thing to say is: over half is getting paid to the creators. The contracts that we have written with them are more precise than that obviously, but that's what we're sharing."
There's an intention to add more creators over time, but never in an "all are welcome" sort of way. A completely open Marketplace would pose a challenge to continuing curation, especially since one of the goals is to let committed content creators turn their Minecraft work into an income-generating business.
"We will be reviewing applications [but] we need people that have a portfolio, we need people that basically have a business license [and are] serious about this as an entrepreneuring thing they want to do," Thornton said.
"We have no plans to do anything that's not curated, I want to be very clear about that," he added. "We plan to scale our team up to review everything as it comes in."
The Discovery Update will be coming to Windows 10 Edition and Pocket Edition with Marketplace and a number of other new features sometime this spring.
Adam Rosenberg is a Senior Games Reporter for Mashable, where he plays all the games. Every single one. From AAA blockbusters to indie darlings to mobile favorites and browser-based oddities, he consumes as much as he can, whenever he can.Adam brings more than a decade of experience working in the space to the Mashable Games team. He previously headed up all games coverage at Digital Trends, and prior to that was a long-time, full-time freelancer, writing for a diverse lineup of outlets that includes Rolling Stone, MTV, G4, Joystiq, IGN, Official Xbox Magazine, EGM, 1UP, UGO and others.Born and raised in the beautiful suburbs of New York, Adam has spent his life in and around the city. He's a New York University graduate with a double major in Journalism and Cinema Studios. He's also a certified audio engineer. Currently, Adam resides in Crown Heights with his dog and his partner's two cats. He's a lover of fine food, adorable animals, video games, all things geeky and shiny gadgets.
