Minecraft developers Mojang today announced a new online gameplay feature coming soon to the Minecraft: Pocket Edition mobile apps called “Minecraft Realms.”
Realms aims to make it easy to play online with friends, sort of like desktop players have been doing for years running their own servers, but without having to do much more than set up a group of approved users:
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With news breaking today that Minecraft-maker Mojang has officially sold to Microsoft, the first question that comes to my mind is what this might mean for Mac and iOS users.
Microsoft now has the ability and probably much incentive to make future versions of Minecraft Xbox and or Windows-only and, unfortunately, its statement on the topic isn’t reassuring to say the least. Here’s the statement from Mojang on development for various platforms:
There’s no reason for the development, sales, and support of the PC/Mac, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PS3, PS4, Vita, iOS, and Android versions of Minecraft to stop. Of course, Microsoft can’t make decisions for other companies or predict the choices that they might make in the future.
We’re extremely proud of all editions and the awesome things you have achieved through playing together.
That’s far from a promise that Microsoft will indeed keep the game alive on all platforms, and also up in the air is where the company’s current employees and projects will end up after the deal. For now, versions of the game are still available to download for Mac and iOS.
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Minecraft Reality: Minecraft developers Mojang officially announced a new augmented reality iOS app yesterday dubbed “Minecraft Reality” allowing players to view their Minecraft creations in the real world. The app was developed by 13th lab with a little help from Mojang using advanced computer vision and augmented reality tech. Users will also be able to save their creations at specific real-world locations for others users to discover:
The app uses your iOS device’s camera to track the surroundings, before projecting creations onto the landscape. You get to view the mind-boggling results on-screen. You can change the size of your object as you please, and even wander around it to view from different angles… Imagine being able to dump your Minecraft creations into the real world for other people to find. You could put an exploding creeper in your school, a cheeky pig in your garden, or a giant enemy crab on the beach, if you like.
– Optimized for iPhone 5 and iOS 6
– Bug fixes and performance enhancements
– iOS 4.3 or above is now required
Dropbox version 1.5.7: Dropbox gets a few nice new features today including improved video streaming, support for Password-protected Office documents on iOS 6, Italian and Iberian Spanish language support, and more.
• Improved video streaming
• Italian and Iberian Spanish language support
• Support for Password-protected Office documents (iOS 6)
• Various bug fixes and performance improvement
Autodesk FormIt: A new mobile app from Autodesk will allow you to “Use real-world site information to help create forms in context and support early design decisions with real building data.” In other words, the ability to create building design concepts using a gallery of shapes, a searchable map interface, and satellite imagery to “design directly in the context of your proposed building location.” The iPad app is available for free on the App Store.
KORG iPolysix: KORG is releasing an analog polyphonic synthesizer app today for iPad that uses its “proprietary “CMT” (Component Modeling Technology) to simulate the actual electronic circuits” of the 1981 six-voice Polysix analog polyphonic synthesizer. The app is 50% off to celebrate its introduction.
