Markus Persson

Markus Persson Photo

Markus Persson is a famous video game designer and programmer. He owns the video game company ‘Mojang’ which he co-founded in 2010. He has received many accolades and recognition for his contributions to the video game industry.

Persson was born on 1st June 1979 in Stockholm, Sweden. He began developing his programming skills at the age of seven when he got his hands on his father’s computer. At the age of only 8 he created his very first game which was a text-based adventure. In 2005 he got a job at King.com as a game developer. After exhibiting his skills there for four years he left the job to work for Jalbum. Apart from this he has made several other games for Java 4K Game Programming Contest. He is also the co-founder of Wurm Online.

Persson got his recognition from his creation of the sandbox game called ‘Minecraft’ which came out in November 2011. He left his job to devote all his time to this game. The same year of its release, the game sold a million copies and then few months later its second million and then third million. The game was a big hit so much so that Persson had to hire new people in his Minecraft team. He also released a version of the game for iOS and Android which he called the Pocket Edition. A version for the Xbox was also made and released in 2012. The game has sold more than twenty million copies since its release. It has gotten several awards and gotten deals with toymakers such as LEGO. He remained the chief designer of the game till 2011 which was its official launch. After that he passed on the job to Jens Bergensten.

Markus Persson along with a friend got the idea of Scrolls which brought together features from collectible card games and board games. Persson also took part in many Ludum Dare 48 hour game creating competitions. ‘Breaking the Tower’ which he made in two days was for Ludum dare competition 12. ‘Metagun’ for Ludum Dare 18, ‘Prelude of the Chambered’ which was also made in two days was for Ludum Dare competition 21 and ‘Minicraft’ for competition number 22.

He got married to Elin Zetterstrand in August 2011. The name ‘Ez’ is used for her in the Minecraft community and ‘ezchili’ on Twitter. However in August 2012 he changed his relationship status to single on Twitter. He is strongly against piracy and is a member of the Swedish Pirate Party. The thirty three year old Persson has a certain charm; he is not a typical ruthless businessman. More commonly known as ‘Notch’ to his teenage fans, Markus Persson has a net worth of $150 million. When he is not busy in his programming he records music. He has released electronic music using the name Markus Alexei. Persson says that he has no intention of becoming a huge tycoon; he just wants to program and design video games because that is what he is passionate about.