Minecraft may be a long-lived IP, but it has only a handful of games to its name. The original Minecraft remains the heart of the franchise, while Minecraft Dungeons stands as its biggest spinoff from recent years. That's hardly a bad thing; the original Minecraft is still a great game after all these years, thanks to Mojang's steady stream of updates. Still, it would be great to see Mojang explore Minecraft's potential through creative spinoffs that feature new game genres. That's why it's great to hear that Mojang may have a new patch of Minecraft spinoffs in development.
According to the LinkedIn profile of Mojang's Director of Franchise Development, Torfi Frans Olafsson, there are multiple new Minecraft projects in the works. Strictly speaking, Mojang hasn't confirmed or revealed any of these theoretical projects, but the implication at least seems credible. If Mojang really is working on new Minecraft games, then hopefully those games take advantage of the sandbox game's reputation for fostering player creativity. Minecraft Dungeons thoroughly covers the action and exploration sides of the Minecraft brand, so future spinoffs ought to work in new spaces. Creativity is a core principle of Minecraft that deserves more attention from future offshoots of the original game.
Game Genres That Minecraft Should Explore
Minecraft may be light on NPCs and characters, aside from friendly villagers, but Minecraft has the makings of a wonderful social sim game in the style of Animal Crossing or Story of Seasons. In these franchises, players get to build a life for themselves, interact with nature, and make friends with local members of their new community. Minecraft may have more action than these franchises, but its cozy atmosphere and emphasis on player agency makes it perfectly suitable for this type of game. Players might move into a Minecraft village and slowly welcome formerly hostile mobs into a community that they physically build up themselves.
A game focused on level editing sounds like a great angle for Minecraft to try too. Nintendo has significantly increased interest in level editors thanks to its Super Mario Maker line of games, which put Super Mario parts in the hands of players and encourage all kinds of playable endeavors. Mojang could consider developing a game where players hand-craft small Minecraft worlds with specific objectives, ranging from puzzle solving to combat trials, and then share them with another, leave comments, compare completion times, and more. In the process, Mojang could introduce all kinds of new Minecraft blocks, mobs, and other tools that enable even more layered level creation than Minecraft already permits.
Why Mojang Should Focus on Creativity
Future Minecraft games should play into these aspects of the franchise because Minecraft Dungeons already covers the action-adventure aspect so thoroughly. Mojang's isometric dungeon crawler pits players against hordes of both familiar and original Minecraft mobs, providing a combat-rich experience for fans who want to battle through Minecraft's overworld in a new way. Mojang may be tempted to release an upgraded sequel for Minecraft Dungeons, but instead, it should look into a different style of Minecraft spinoff in order to diversify the range of games available to fans of the original sandbox title. The Minecraft IP will be more interesting as a whole if it successfully covers a long list of genres.
There's no telling for now if the rumored Minecraft spinoffs are real, and even if they are, Mojang may not reveal them for quite some time. Minecraft Dungeons is still getting updates and events, so other Minecraft spinoffs may still be in early development as Mojang devotes more resources to Minecraft Dungeons upkeep. In the meantime, at least Minecraft fans have plenty of content to look forward to in the base game. The Wild Update is rich with additions that'll improve Minecraft in various ways. Hopefully Mojang has other surprises in store even as it's working on making Minecraft itself a better experience.
Minecraft is available now for PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.