Why 2024 was a big year for Minecraft

The year 2024 has been massive for Minecraft. Millions of players enjoy the game and new players jump into it. Even after a decade and a half since its release, the base game continues to receive new features. Additionally, the community has made several mods to make the experience even better. This year, however, has been extra special.

Here are some of the major highlights in Minecraft's journey in 2024.

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Minecraft's 2024 highlights

1) Minecraft's 15th-anniversary celebrations

The year 2024 started with Minecraft celebrating its 15th anniversary. The development of the sandbox game started all the way back in 2009. A small team at Mojang, led by Marcus "Notch" Persson, created the Minecraft we know and love today.

In the Bedrock Edition, Mojang hosted a 15-day-long event where players would receive free skin cosmetic items every day, which depicted each update released for the game. It had skin customizations like an End portal hat, a redstone lamp jacket, and guardian boots. The Edition also had a special add-on and a special server to further celebrate the game.

Java Edition players, on the other hand, were offered several new free capes that could be redeemed by watching other content creators play the game on Twitch or TikTok. Some extra skin customizations were also given away through this method.

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2) A Minecraft Movie reveal

Another major reveal from Mojang was the teaser and trailer for A Minecraft Movie. In September 2024, Warner Bros. released the first teaser for the film, starring Jason Momoa and Jack Black. While Black portrayed Steve, Momoa was an ex-gamer who stumbled upon the blocky world with three other real-world people through a portal.

While the reaction to the live-action film about the block game was polarizing, it garnered a lot of attention from the vast community of the game. The studio recently released the first official trailer of the film which is set to release on April 4, 2025.

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3) Major Minecraft Live changes

Mob vote was finally removed from Minecraft Live (Image via Mojang Studios)

Later in the year, players were eagerly waiting for Mojang's annual live event where they revealed the next update and talked about their other developments. Before the live event, however, the developers dropped major news about how they were going to change their annual events.

The first major announcement was the removal of mob vote competitions, something players weren't the biggest fan of. The mob vote competition was a small event that took place before Mojang's main livestream. It allowed players to choose from three new mobs. The mob that received the most votes was added to the next update.

Furthermore, Mojang decided to split the content of its event into two Minecraft Live shows occurring bi-annually. The first one took at the end of September 2024, and the next will likely happen in early 2025.

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4) Mojang's update development cycle change

In the same Minecraft Live announcement, another major news was dropped by Mojang about its development cycle. For 15 years, major updates were released with many new features either annually or several times a year. In the future, however, the studio decided to break down these major updates into smaller, more frequent drops. These are appropriately named game drops rather than updates.

In September's Minecraft Live, Mojang announced the Bundles of Bravery update that only brought bundles to both editions and hardcore mode to Bedrock Edition. It also teased the next game drop that featured a new Creaking mob and Pale Garden biome in winter, before 2025.

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5) Minecraft Experience and first collaboration with MCC

Minecraft Experience and Ender Cup also took place this year (Image via Mojang Studios || Ender Cup)

Lastly, Mojang opened its first real-world, interactive Minecraft experience in Dallas, Texas. Fans of the game could buy tickets for the experience online, head to the location, and enjoy Minecraft in a whole new way by physically walking into different rooms completely decorated and filled with interactive game-related visuals.

Mojang also collaborated with the Minecraft Championship (MCC) event for the first time this year. They hosted a special event named The Ender Cup. MCC has hosted events annually, where popular content creators teamed up and played several in-game minigames against each other. This time, the event was officially in collaboration with the game developers.

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