How Minecraft become the best-selling game ever?
Time flies like an arrow. When I was writing this article, the first look of the brand-new, exciting cave & cliffs update just came out with the Minecraft Live 2020. It reminded me of “Minecraft Vs Fortnite” war of popularity in the last year when Minecraft’s popularity seemed to decline. As a seven-year Minecraft player, I always wonder…
How Minecraft suddenly become so popular again, overtook Fortnite for the most popular video game and even became the best-selling video game of all time in the last year?
To find out the reasons behind, I decided to do a case study of Minecraft’s success from the perspective of user experience (UX) design and as a UX student.
What is Minecraft and its design?
Minecraft is a very special product, because it defies so many best practices in the design industry. The game is extremely complex. There’s not always a proper on-boarding experience. The graphics look a bit dated. It almost seems like it’s a success because of some of those quirks, but that’s not necessarily true, either.
-Tobias Ahlin, Minecraft’s Experience Design Director
In other words, Minecraft is a “sandbox” video game of freedoms and exploring. Unlike other games, it doesn’t have any guideline for novice players. Bewildered Players might need to search in the internet no matter new or experienced players.
The Reason behinds Minecraft’s success
Despite its relatively confusing design of the game, Minecraft is still successful and popular because of the flexibility to play, supportive community, fast update etc.
However, I will mainly focus on a neglected, slight but essential factor of Minecraft’s success — the UX design process.
The UX design process?
UX Design process is an iterative process of designing for experiences, products or services.
Here is a common UX process:
Design Council’s Double Diamond:
Discover: What is the problem?
Define: Why is it important?
Develop: How to solve it?
Deliver: Does the solution work?
How the UX process work?
To be short, it helps designers understand and empathy the users and hence, solving the problem of the products efficiently and feasibly.
- The “Discover” stage helps designers think broadly and glean insights into the problem by Interviewing, Surveys, Research or Analysis.
- The “Define” stage helps designers identify the right problem, the “Pain point” by Affinity Map, User Persona or User Flow.
- The “Develop” stage helps designers brainstorm ideas and start experimenting by Sketching, Paper Prototype or Wireframing.
- The “Deliver” stage helps designers executing the right solution with the lowest cost by Usability Testing, Site Maps or Wireframing.
What did Minecraft actually do in UX?
Since 2017, Mojang has shifted the focus from Java Edition to Bedrock Edition. Namely, Mojang decided to focus more on the Minecraft on Xbox One, Windows 10, VR, mobile devices and Nintendo Switch.
In spite of its limitation of modding, Bedrock Edition is more popular and readily available, easier to play with the cross-platform play function. However, it did not grow as fast as expected and there were some complaints about the Bedrock Edition…
In 2018, there was an enormous UI (User Interface) change to Minecraft Bedrock Edition in order to help users navigate Minecraft and get to what they want with ease.
In my opinion, the movement applied the UX process and significantly affected the popularity grow in the following year.
Minecraft’s approach on the UX process
1. Discover — What is the problem?
- In 2018, Mojang was merging the code basis for multiple platform and it leads to a new UI design of Xbox which people don’t like.
- People like the old and the java edition design better than the new one.
When it comes to the success of Minecraft’s design, I try to listen to the community. We’re all on reddit, looking at Twitter, and listening to streamers. We’ve got quantitive data too, of course, but we’re lucky to have such a vocal community that’s constantly sharing what they think about the game.
-Tobias Ahlin, Minecraft’s Experience Design Director
2. Define — Why is it important?
- Bad GUIs, unorganized and not clean menu are the pain points.
- Among the UI for touch, mouse and console, the console one is most unpleasant.
3. Develop — How to solve it?
- Mojang sent a post to encourage the users to redesign the UI for all Bedrock Engine-based platforms with Paper Prototyping Kits and guideline.
4. Deliver — Does the solution work?
- The prototype Menu Screens was showcased at the presentation from the Developer Conference
- This new UI was not adopted eventually but a way to experiment before release.
The result of applying UX process in Minecraft
- Satisfied Players with their experience in Bedrock version.
- Increased player’s conversions and referrals.
- Gained more players in Bedrock version.
- Fully made use of the advantage of cross-platform play.
- Built the cornerstone for the future business.
Takeaway
Although you may say the UX process is not the major reason behind the success of Minecraft, you will agree that any product without great user experience will not be popular.
“Good design is actually a lot harder to notice than poor design, in part because good designs fit our needs so well that the design is invisible,”
― Donald A. Norman, The Design of Everyday Things
The redesigning of Minecraft Bedrock UI made a difference with the UX design process in 2018. The following year, Minecraft became the best-selling game ever.
Reference
Tobias Ahlin, the Experience Design Director of Minecraft, is the one responsible for the amazing UX design of the Minecraft bedrock edition. Check out his Twitter: @TobiasAhlin
Minecraft official post of redesigning the UI for Bedrock edition:
Opinions about Minecraft UI&UX design
