Minecraft‘s return to convention floors will have to wait another year. Concerns over the new coronavirus have convinced Mojang to call it quits on this year’s Minecraft Festival – a deliberate three-day Florida block social gathering for all issues Minecraft this September. Rather than danger the outbreak ending later quite than sooner, organisers are sticking to the online-only format that’s served them effectively the final two years as they put together to do this reside present lark once more subsequent 12 months.
For the previous couple of years, Mojang had ditched their globe-hopping Minecon reside occasions for the wholly-online Minecon Earth. Minecraft Festival aimed to be an explosive revival of the reside format, a three-day affair stuffed with efficiency, interactive displays and event play operating September 25-27 in Orlando, Florida.
But whereas organisers have been ready to go forward as just lately as per week in the past, our previous buddy Covid-19 has hit the brakes on this 12 months’s “blockstravaganza” (their phrase, not mine). Because of the “extensive preparations required to organize a mammoth event like this”, Minecraft Festival organisers have chosen as a substitute to attempt once more subsequent 12 months. It’s nonetheless unclear how lengthy this outbreak will final, they declare, and would quite a clear break than danger ready out the virus.
“In recent weeks, the COVID-19 outbreak has led many organizers to cancel or postpone gatherings and events across the world, as a preventive measure to ensure the health and safety of their guests,” Mojang wrote of their postponement post. “The situation around Minecraft Festival, however, is a little different. September is still many months away, and we are not making any predictions about how long it will take to put the outbreak behind us.”
Despite revealing the occasion final September, it was solely final week that Mojang put up ticket details – gross sales of which have been set to go up yesterday. If there’s any comfort, Minecraft Live – a deliberate, fully live-streamed complement to the conference correct – will nonetheless run forward as deliberate. If Mojang had any shock reveals to announce throughout the fest, it’ll seemingly now happen on-line.
The checklist of exhibits shutting down over the brand new coronavirus has solely grown over latest weeks. The large one, clearly, was GDC’s last-minute cancellation. But from Eve Fanfest to Rocket League Championships and South Korean Overwatch League matches, organisers the world over are taking part in it protected till the outbreak blows over.
Disclosure: In a previous life, I labored as a degree builder at Minecraft’s console porting home 4J Studios. Granted, that was half-decade in the past at this level, however I’m nonetheless mates with just a few artists there and – so far as I can inform – my work continues to be sitting on the Windows 10 model of the game.
