Markus Alexej Persson, better known as Notch, one of the creative minds behind Minecraft, one of the most popular and influential games over the last couple decades is now developing a new game titled ‘Levers and Chests’.
Levers and Chests aims to be a simplistic voxel-based, rogue-like dungeon exploration game with Notch and his team making good progress.
Minecraft became a phenomenal sensation, taking the world by storm. The vast open-world survival crafting game sold over 54 million units by 2014. That same year, Markus Persson, also known as Notch, sold his company Mojang Studios to Microsoft for an astonishing $2.5 billion, stepping down from his role following this lucrative deal.
Microsoft immediately made significant changes to their newly acquired property, starting with the controversial 1.9 combat update in 2016, which drastically altered Minecraft’s core gameplay.
Subsequent updates continued to transform the game’s flow or “meta,” expanding various biomes, revamping the entire cave system, introducing the ability to fly with Elytras, and devaluing once-precious diamonds.
Many fans found these updates abysmal and mediocre, including the addition of mobs like bees, feeling that they deviated entirely from the essence that initially made Minecraft so beloved.
But I digress. Since Notch made his fortune and stepped away from Minecraft, he has been relatively quiet. He purchased a mansion in Beverly Hills for tens of millions of dollars and has been enjoying life. He earned it. Interestingly, Notch occasionally makes controversial tweets that draw the ire of woke activists. For instance, in 2017, he tweeted “it’s okay to be white,” which sparked significant backlash.
Notch then triggered anti-White racists and progressives by then claiming that privilege is a made up metric used to silence and repress. He has made so many other tweets over the years that have irked the crowd of social media activists, stating that there’s an obvious agenda against White men in modern society.
Notch further provoked anti-white racists and progressives by claiming that privilege is a fabricated concept used to silence and repress people. Over the years, he has continued to irritate social media activists with numerous tweets, asserting that there is a clear agenda against white men in modern society.
Minecraft was once a game for true gamers until the corporate giant Microsoft acquired it and transformed it into an unrecognizable mockery. They imposed strict measures, including banning entire accounts for hate speech, bullying, and harassment. It’s no surprise that one of its original creators, Notch, remains a true gamer at heart.
Since achieving immense wealth, Notch has frequently voiced opinions that challenge activists and their agendas. His complete omission from Minecraft by Microsoft underscores the tension between him and the company. Supporting ‘Levers and Chests’ could be seen as a way to defy those critics on social media, making his next game a success out of sheer spite.
In April of this year, Notch announced the creation of a new studio, Bitshift Entertainment, and revealed that he is developing a new game. A first-person dungeon exploration game. This game is described as a classic rogue-like featuring “cursed items and ridiculously broken mechanics”. However, it is still in the early stages with only a vague direction set.
Since then, he has posted several development screenshots on his Twitter account, showing steady progress.
Notch has shared multiple screenshots of the game in development. These images depict voxel-graphic monsters in the depths of 3D-rendered dungeons. According to Notch, everything is still in a placeholder state.
The dungeon walls use textures from ‘Eye of the Beholder II: The Legend of Darkmoon’, and the monsters borrow voxel models from the ‘Voxel Doom’ mod for DOOM.
Initially, Notch mistakenly posted a screenshot with SSAO (Screen Space Ambient Occlusion) turned off, which enhances the quality of shadow rendering. He later reposted the screenshot with SSAO turned on, showing the dungeon with a more three-dimensional appearance.
He has become very interested in SSAO, realizing potential for optimization and improvement in rendering through this process. Additionally, he expressed interest in implementing Screen Space Reflection to enhance light reflection in his game.
Some users, upon seeing the images, speculated that Notch might be rebooting ‘Legend of the Chambered’, a dungeon exploration game he previously worked on but later abandoned.
Notch responded, “It probably is!” indicating that the new game shares a similar concept but has been renamed ‘Levers and Chests’, a title he likes even as a placeholder.
It’s nice to see that Notch hasn’t decided to call it quits entirely after making a fortune from selling Mojang to Microsoft. While it’s unlikely that his new game will achieve the same level of success as Minecraft, I’m optimistic.
The thought of someone labeled a racist bigot by Twitter activists and journalists recreating the success of one of the most influential games of the modern era is intriguing.
The game is still in the very early stages of development, and it seems Notch and Bitshift Entertainment are taking a relaxed approach to its creation.
Given that Notch is likely funding the entire operation out of his own pocket, there’s no rush. To stay up to date on ‘Levers and Chests,’ it would be wise to follow Notch on Twitter for the latest updates.
