Editorial: What's next for Minecraft in 2014?

Even though Minecraft became a 'complete' game back in 2011 with version 1.0, the game has hardly stopped adding new features. Not to mention Pocket Edition, Xbox 360 Edition, and PS3 Edition have all been released. But what's next in store for Minecraft in 2014? We have summed up our thoughts on what could happen to Minecraft in 2014 below.

• Minecraft PC Edition: Short term changes, as in changes that could appear as early as Minecraft 1.8, include more items that become stackable, new commands, tweaks to the biome layout and more. Long term changes include rewriting the experience system, making enchantments less random and more specific. Mojang spent a lot of time adding new biomes to Minecraft in 1.7, so perhaps they will now take the time to add new mobs for those (I'm still waiting on monkeys in jungles!).


• Minecraft Xbox/PS Edition: In 2014, new ports of Minecraft to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One will be released. Although 4J promises to keep the PS3/X360 and PS4/X1 editions the same at first, there will almost certainly be features that the new consoles will get exclusively. We know that larger worlds (but still not infinite it seems) and more people playing at once will only be available to the PS4 and Xbox One. We guess that in 2014 all ports will still play catch-up to the PC Edition in terms of features, but the gap between the PC and console versions is getting smaller and smaller with every update.


• Minecraft Vita Edition: In 2014, 4J Studios will release their first port of Minecraft to a mobile console. While the PlayStation Vita handheld console does have substantial hardware that the game could take advantage of, it's still not equal to the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360. We are eager to see what magic 4J Studios can pull off with the Vita's hardware, even if they lower the graphics and reduce rendering distance it would still have more features than Pocket Edition.


• Minecraft Pocket Edition: The original mobile port of Minecraft will see several major new features like infinite worlds, underground caves, and officially-supported skins. With PE 0.9.0 scheduled to come out in the first quarter of 2014 (from now until the end of March), we will see the 1.0 release of Minecraft Pocket Edition at long last. Whether or not that version will be complete, remains to be seen.


• Minecraft for Wii U/3DS: A few days ago Minecraft for Nintendo's Wii U console was rumored to be in development, until Notch put the rumor to rest with a firm "I am not aware of any plans to release a Wii U version of Minecraft." However, in an extended explanation on Reddit he went on to say that he would "personally love to see a Wii U version of Minecraft. Actually, even more so, a 3ds version would be incredible. [...] The reason we’re not doing it is a lack of time and manpower. Sure, we could enlist another third party developer to help us out, but we want to to avoid having too many parties involved with our games." After 4J Studios finishes the new Xbox One/PS4/Vita ports, there is a chance that Mojang could enlist 4J Studios to port the game to the Wii U and 3DS. Only time will tell.


• Minecraft Raspberry Pi Edition: Almost a year ago, Mojang released a free port of Minecraft to the Raspberry Pi micro-computer, designed to be modded using the Python programming language. Although it's main goal is to be used as an educational tool, it has found a niche of players in the Raspberry Pi community. The Pi Edition is extremely limited, lacking features like survival mode, sleeping, and no official skin support. It remains to be seen if this port will ever be updated to 0.2, but we have reached out to the main developer Daniel Frisk for a response.

UPDATE: Daniel Frisk from Mojang has answered our question regarding when a new Minecraft Pi Edition version would be released, saying "yes, but we're not working on it yet." So perhaps a new version will come sometime in 2014 after all.