First trailer for 0x10c, the upcoming space strategy game from Minecraft creator Markus "Notch" Persson.

The game is based on the rather complex premise that the space race never ended and the 16-bit computers controlling Earth's space programs in 1988 accidentally used the wrong encoding -- big endian vs. little endian -- thus putting a ship's crew into stasis for billions of years instead of just one.

Now the crew has awoken to a dying universe and has to rebuild using '80s technology. The game even emulates a 16-bit computer.

0x10c doesn't yet have an official release date.

[geeky-gadgets.]

Minecraft creator Markus "Notch" Persson has released the name and synopsis for his next game, an ambitious space strategy title called 0X10C.

The premise is that in 1988, the 16-bit computers running a new deep sleep cell used the big endian byte order instead of the little endian, thus putting a "1" in the wrong place and putting all of humanity to sleep until the year 281 474 976 712 644 AD. Oops!

Now, the universe is on the brink of extinction, and you have to begin the rebuilding process using a ship run by that same 16-bit computer. The really cool part is that the game will actually emulate the 16-bit CPU.

Your computer can be used "to control your entire ship, or just to play games on while waiting for a large mining operation to finish." (Of course mining had to be involved somehow. We're talking about Notch, after all.)

There's no release date or price structure for 0x10C yet, but Notch says it will eventually open for beta and be shaped by player input just like Minecraft was.

[giantbomb]

EA's digital game distribution service, Origin, has taken a lot of criticism from the gaming community, but Minecraft creator Markus "Notch" Persson thinks it's ultimately a good thing -- if only to avoid a monopoly by Valve's Steam.

"I think it's a bit dangerous to only have one digital distribution platform like Steam," he said. "I love Valve, but out of principle, I find the idea of one platform a bit scary. So I like that there are others competing," he said in an interview with GameSpy.

That doesn't mean he thinks Origin is a great product, though.

"Origin does a couple things badly compared to Steam," Notch said, "which is impressive since they had eight years to study Steam.

Origin currently has 9.3 million users, with 1 million active each day -- versus Steam's user base of 35 million - but it racked up many of those users by forcing them to sign up to play any EA game. That's a practice Notch thinks EA should drop if it wants to challenge Steam.

"They should definitely have a chance to do their thing, but they might want to move away from titles that make people use it and show people why they should use it," he said.

[escapist]

In case there was any doubt that Minecraft creator Markus "Notch" Persson is a pretty good guy to work for, he's just announced that he's going to take the $3 million he earned in pre-tax dividends last year and distribute it to Mojang's other employees.

If that doesn't help Mojang recruit some top development talent for their future projects, I'm not sure what will. Real-life diamond pickaxes for everyone?

[wtc]