Markus Persson

Markus Persson
Markus Persson
Born	Markus Alexej Persson; June 1, 1979 (age 47); Stockholm, Sweden
Other names	Notch
Occupation(s)	Video game programmer, video game designer
Years active	2000s–present
Known for	Creator of Minecraft, founder of Mojang Studios
Notable work	Minecraft, Scrolls, Cliffhorse, 0x10c, Shambles

Adapted from the English Wikipedia article Markus Persson, available under CC BY-SA 4.0Updated 11 August 2025

Markus Alexej Persson ( , ; born 1 June 1979), widely known by his nickname Notch, is a Swedish video game programmer and video game designer. He is the creator of Minecraft, which holds the distinction of being the top-selling video game ever, and he established the game development company Mojang Studios in 2009.

Persson's journey in game development began early, with notable commercial success coming from an initial version of Minecraft released in 2009. Prior to its official launch in 2011, the game had already surpassed ten million sales. Afterward, he relinquished his role as lead designer, handing over creative leadership to Jens Bergensten. In September 2014, Persson expressed a sense of disconnection from his audience and a reluctance to oversee Mojang’s expanding operations. He departed from Mojang in November that year, selling the company to Microsoft for roughly US$2.5 billion, which elevated him to billionaire status.

Beginning in 2016, Persson attracted controversy due to provocative posts on social media concerning subjects such as feminism, race, and transgender rights. In response, Microsoft issued a reprimand in 2019, removed most references to him within Minecraft, and excluded him from the game's tenth anniversary celebrations. In 2015, Persson co-founded another development studio named Rubberbrain, which rebranded as Bitshift Entertainment in 2024.

Early life

Markus Alexej Persson was born on 1 June 1979 in Stockholm, Sweden, to Ritva, his Finnish mother, and Birger, his Swedish father. He has one sibling, a sister. The family resided in Edsbyn until Persson was seven years old before relocating back to Stockholm. His father was employed by the railroad industry, while his mother worked as a nurse. Following their parents’ divorce around the time he was seven, Persson and his sister stayed with their mother, whereas their father moved to a rural cabin. During this period, Persson reported experiencing monthly food shortages and lost contact with his father for several years.

His father faced significant difficulties including depression, bipolar disorder, alcoholism, and substance misuse involving medication; these struggles resulted in imprisonment for robbery offenses and were factors leading to the divorce. His sister also encountered personal challenges involving drug use and running away from home.

Persson’s fascination with video games began early on, inspired by his father who constructed modems and introduced him to the family’s Commodore 128. Alongside his sister, he played pirated games and manually entered programs from computer magazines. The first game he ever bought was The Bard's Tale. Starting programming at age seven, he developed his initial text adventure game by the time he was eight.

By 1994, Persson aspired to become a video game developer but pursued graphic design studies between ages 15 and 18 following guidance from teachers. Although introverted and somewhat solitary during secondary school, he was well-regarded by peers and dedicated much of his time to programming. He successfully reverse-engineered the Doom engine—a feat he proudly acknowledged as late as 2014. Despite not completing high school, he was considered a capable student.

Career

Persson started his professional path as a web designer before joining Game Federation where he met Rolf Jansson. Together they created the 2006 title Wurm Online under their company "Mojang Specifications AB". Persson exited this project in late 2007; subsequently, the company was renamed Onetoofree AB so that he could retain rights to the "Mojang" name.

Between 2004 and 2009, Persson worked as a developer for Midasplayer (which later became King), primarily programming browser games developed with Flash. He also held a programming position at jAlbum.

Origins of Minecraft

Prior to developing Minecraft, Markus Persson created various small-scale games and actively participated in the independent game developer community on the TIGSource forums. Among his early projects was RubyDung, an isometric 3D base-building game influenced by titles such as RollerCoaster Tycoon and Dwarf Fortress. During the development of RubyDung, Persson experimented with a first-person perspective reminiscent of Dungeon Keeper, but ultimately excluded it due to the pixelated nature of the graphics.

In 2009, Persson found inspiration in Infiniminer, a block-based mining game that reintroduced the first-person viewpoint, the distinctive "blocky" aesthetic, and fundamental building mechanics. The earliest prototype that evolved into Minecraft can be traced back to RubyDung.

Launch and growth of Minecraft

The initial version of Minecraft (later known as the Classic edition) was released by Persson on 17 May 2009 via the TIGSource forums, with continuous updates driven by community feedback. Throughout 2009 and 2010, the game progressed through developmental stages including Survival Test, Indev, and Infdev. The Alpha version became available on 30 June 2010.

While working on these early iterations, Persson maintained full-time employment at jAlbum but transitioned to part-time in 2010 following the success of Minecraft's Alpha release, eventually leaving jAlbum later that year. In September 2010, he declined an employment offer from Valve Corporation to dedicate himself entirely to Minecraft.

By December 2010, the game entered its beta phase and expanded onto additional platforms such as mobile devices. By January 2011, user registrations had surpassed one million, reaching ten million six months afterward. Mojang organized the inaugural Minecon event in November 2011 to commemorate the official launch, establishing it as an annual gathering. On 11 December 2011, Persson transferred creative leadership of Minecraft to Jens Bergensten and began work on a new project titled 0x10c, which was eventually discontinued.

Mojang reported $330 million in revenue with $129 million in profit for the year 2013.

Departure from Mojang

Persson attributed his decision to step away from managing Minecraft and Mojang to overwhelming media scrutiny and public pressure leading to burnout. In June 2014, he announced plans to sell his 71% ownership stake in Mojang, attracting acquisition interest from Activision Blizzard, EA, and Microsoft. Microsoft completed the purchase of Mojang for $2.5 billion in September 2014, elevating Persson to billionaire status. He officially left the company after the transaction closed in November.

Post-Mojang endeavors

Following his departure from Mojang, Persson engaged in several smaller-scale ventures. In June 2014, he co-founded Rubberbrain AB alongside Jakob Porsér; despite an investment of SEK 60 million, no games had been released by 2021. The company was rebranded as Bitshift Entertainment, LLC in March 2024. Since 2020, Persson has expressed interest in establishing a new studio focusing on virtual reality gaming experiences. Additionally, he created +".party()", a series of immersive narrative events utilizing advanced visual effects hosted across various cities.

In early 2025, Persson revealed intentions to develop a spiritual successor to Minecraft, informally dubbed "Minecraft 2", following a Twitter poll. However, he subsequently redirected efforts toward creating a roguelike game called Levers and Chests, which was favored by his development team.

Games

Minecraft

Markus Persson’s most renowned work is the survival sandbox game Minecraft, which was first released publicly on 17 May 2009 and officially launched on 18 November 2011. He left his position as a game developer to concentrate fully on completing this project. By early 2011, Mojang AB had sold over one million copies, achieving further sales milestones subsequently. The development team expanded with Jens Bergensten assuming lead developer responsibilities. After selling Mojang to Microsoft for $2.5 billion, Persson ended his involvement with the game, increasing his net worth to around US$1.5 billion.

Caller's Bane

Together with Jakob Porsér, Persson created Scrolls, a hybrid game combining aspects of board games and collectible card games. While Porsér took charge of its development, Persson’s role was less active. In August 2011, Bethesda Softworks initiated a trademark lawsuit against Persson over the name "Scrolls", citing potential confusion with their The Elder Scrolls franchise. Persson humorously proposed resolving the dispute through a match of Quake 3. Despite this jest, legal proceedings continued until March 2012 when an agreement allowed Mojang to retain rights to the trademark. The title was renamed Caller's Bane in 2018 and converted into a free-to-play model.

Cliffhorse

Developed rapidly within two hours using the Unity platform and freely available assets, Cliffhorse is a comedic game inspired by physics quirks from games like Skyrim, low-effort Greenlight projects, as well as titles such as Goat Simulator and Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing. Released as an early access and honourware title for Microsoft Windows on the opening day of E3 2014, players were encouraged to contribute donations via Dogecoin before downloading; these donations exceeded 280,000 dogecoins.

0x10^c

After concluding work on Minecraft, Persson began pre-production for a space-themed sandbox titled 0x10^c in March 2012. Initially teased on April Fools' Day through a parody website named "Mars Effect" (mocking Mass Effect), it was officially unveiled on 4 April that year. Despite initial development progress, production ceased in August 2013. Composer C418 later released an album featuring music composed for this project.

Shambles

In 2013, Persson created a free-to-play game called Shambles, developed using the Unity engine.

Ludum Dare contributions

Persson took part in multiple Ludum Dare competitions that challenge developers to create games within 48 hours:

In Ludum Dare No. 12, he produced Breaking the Tower, set on an island where players collect resources, construct buildings, and train troops to demolish a large tower; it briefly attracted media attention.
For Ludum Dare No. 18, he developed the platformer Metagun.
Ludum Dare No. 21 saw him create Prelude of the Chambered, a concise first-person dungeon crawler experience.
During Ludum Dare No. 22 (December 2011), he developed Minicraft, a top-down survival game influenced by both Minecraft and Zelda, completed in Java over two days.

Personal life

In 2011, Persson married Elin Zetterstrand, who had moderated Minecraft forums previously. They had one daughter; however, by mid-2012 Persson’s contact with her had diminished significantly. On August 15th that year, he announced their divorce which was finalized later in 2012.

Persson’s father died by suicide in December 2011 after struggling with alcoholism; he considered his father his sole supporter when deciding to pursue full-time game development. He has also been candid about his own battles with depression.

He has criticized major gaming companies for their approach toward piracy, expressing views that "[piracy is not theft]" and considering unauthorized downloads as potential future customers. In 2011 he identified with Sweden’s Pirate Party and holds membership in Mensa.

Persson has made donations to numerous charities including Médecins Sans Frontières; under his guidance Mojang developed ‘‘Catacomb Snatch’’ for Humble Indie Bundle which raised US$458,248 for charity causes. Additionally, he contributed $250,000 to the Electronic Frontier Foundation in 2012 and returned $3 million in dividends back to Mojang employees.

According to Forbes estimates from 2023, his net worth stood near $1.2 billion. By 2014 he ranked among Sweden’s highest taxpayers and resided in a multi-level penthouse located in Östermalm district of Stockholm. In December that year he acquired a Beverly Hills property for $70 million—a record price at that time—reportedly outbidding celebrities Beyoncé and Jay-Z.

Social media controversies

Beginning in 2016, Persson attracted criticism due to his outspoken political and social commentary on social media platforms. In 2017 he suggested establishing a heterosexual pride day and controversially stated that opponents "deserve to be shot," later deleting these posts and retracting those remarks. That same year he labeled feminism as a "social disease" while using offensive language directed at feminist developer Zoë Quinn; overall he expressed criticism toward the GamerGate movement as well. He described intersectional feminism as "bigotry" and dismissed terms like "mansplaining" as sexist slurs. His tweets included statements such as "It's okay to be white," rejecting concepts like privilege as fabricated metrics but simultaneously condemning racial stereotypes.

He publicly endorsed conspiracy theories including Pizzagate in 2017 and supported QAnon during 2019 with tweets affirming "Q is legit" while urging distrust toward mainstream media sources. In March of that year he criticized pro-transgender memes claiming they promote delusion and propagated assertions about fines for misusing pronouns; however he later recognized transgender individuals’ bravery.

Following these incidents Microsoft removed references to Persson from Minecraft’s update released in 2019 and excluded him from events celebrating its tenth anniversary. A company spokesperson stated that his views "do not reflect those of Microsoft or Mojang."

Awards

External links