Damn, that's a lot of money. Now I'm interested in seeing what they do with it.

tbh if it was coming to vita, it would have come to windows phone anyway. Even if it wasnt, 2.5bn still isnt worth it.

Sucks, probably in quite a few ways. Also, I'm pretty disappointed if money is the only thing behind this decision (on Mojang's part) but I don't really see any other possible reasons for this either.

You're a fool if you think any of those ideas would make money XD

Seriously though, toys, t-shirts, and other physical merchandise I could see since they already exist and don't try to make Minecraft something it isn't, and maybe a movie, since Minecraft does have a story, but that other bullshit?! HA! Hilarious! But I have a feeling you're being sarcastic, so I'll let it go.

And yeah, Minecraft made $133 million, but a full new release of 2.0 could make billions over it's lifetime. That's where Microsoft will make it's money, if at all. Microsoft isn't so stupid as to try any of those other ideas you mentioned. Notch most certainly would NOT be an idiot to refuse Microsoft here. He has a lot more to gain from Minecraft than Microsoft does.

And no, Notch can't make 100 different weird indie games now. He can make precisely 0 of them, because he's just the owner of the company, except now he's not. Mojang will make precisely 0 indie games as well, because they're owned by a corporation and will be subject to corporate politics and corporate thinking, and that does not lead to indie games, it leads to safe bets, especially in today's gaming industry. Mojang will do one of three things now: 1) Make safe, AAA games that do nothing new, 2) Make Minecraft 2.0, except taking less risks and generally making the game less than it could have been, or 3) make shitty, soulless mobile games that exist to nickle and dime consumers to death. The likelihood of those things happening are 1) 0%, 2) 100%, and 3) 99%, barring Minecraft 2.0 being so unsuccessful that Microsoft gives up on Mojang (not likely). This is the fate of Mojang now, there is no escaping it.

So he stands to make 1.75 billion. For himself.

No, you're right, this is just more proof that every man has his price. Mine would be higher though, and I'm disappointed that Notch's price wasn't higher. Also, if you think $250 million or even $2 billion of liquid cash would secure a future for generations...you're horribly misguided about business and economics.

What who does with it? Mojang? Mojang will do what Microsoft tells them to do, which will be to make the next Minecraft. Notch is the one that gets the $2.5 billion, and he won't be using it to make games, because he no longer owns a game company.

Funny, he tweeted about Windows 8 once that he'd release Minecraft on it only for 2 billion dollars. Apparently 1.75 billion is close enough. Fucking sellout.

You are confusing MS with the XBOX games division. MS now owns this as well as rights to make toys, movies, shirts, posters and everything else that comes with it. This should not affect the XBOX divisions profits/losses.

so they paid 2.5 billion for a one hit wonder studio? Minecraft=Modern Tetris, no one will care in a few years and there is not much more than can do with it.