Microsoft has announced that Minecraft will be making its way onto its Xbox Game Pass subscription service next month.
Gamers who have purchased an Xbox Game Pass subscription will gain access to Minecraft on April 4th and will get to keep the game for as long as they remain subscribed to the service. Microsoft also added that Xbox Game Pass players will be able to access an “ever-expanding array of content”, which is available to purchase through the Minecraft Marketplace.
Minecraft first launched in 2009 and has become one of the most popular games in the world. Minecraft has been released on nearly every platform imaginable, which has no doubt helped gain it the success it has. As of January 2018, Microsoft confirmed that the game had 91 million active players, with over 150 million copies of the game being sold across all platforms.
Microsoft purchased Minecraft back in 2014 for $2.5 billion, resulting in the game’s creator Markus “Notch” Persson becoming a billionaire. Since then, Microsoft has taken Minecraft to new heights and is one of the company’s most profitable titles.
Given how Microsoft has a record of releasing their own games on the Xbox Game Pass service, it’s somewhat surprising that they have waited this long to add Minecraft to their subscription service. Perhaps given how well it has sold previously, Microsoft may feel that the game is starting to peak with regards to sales, so the natural next step is integrating it into Xbox Game Pass.
