Minecraft Already Lifting Microsoft Game Revenues

Minecraft has made an immediate positive impact on Microsoft's revenues, just weeks after the game was acquired for $2.5 billion in cash.

For the financial quarter of October to December, Microsoft's earnings from first-party games increased by $171 million, or 79 percent. The corporation did not offer a detailed breakdown of how much each of its software releases contributed to the income, but is said that the increase was "mainly due to sales of Minecraft, and the launches of Halo: The Master Chief Collection and Forza Horizon 2."

Microsoft completed its acquisition of Minecraft on November 6, meaning that the positive impact on the corporation's revenues was immediate.

Overall, the company's profits fell more than 10 percent year-on-year, with a net income of $5.9 billion for the quarter. It had shipped some 6.6 million Xbox consoles during the three-month period.

Minecraft's sales come from sales across multiple games consoles and platforms, from PC to iOS to PlayStation 3 and PS4.

Bigger plans lie ahead for Minecraft. During Microsoft's Windows 10 event last week, the company officially announced the Windows Holographic platform and the untethered HoloLens headset. When wearing the head-mounted display, users will be able to see a variety of holopgraphic renderings in the real world, ranging from weather forecasts and social networks, to a rich and immersive version of Minecraft.

Microsoft and Mojang have created two Minecraft HoloLens demonstrations, though they remain very much "work-in-progress," according to developer Jens Bergensten.

Though Microsoft has yet to officially announce any gaming projects for HoloLens, Spencer made it clear last week that gaming will be an important category for the new device.

"To me, there's not a successful consumer electronics device on the planet where gaming is not a primary app category, and I think HoloLens will work the same way; I think gaming will be important," he said at the time. "We're thinking hard about specific scenarios with the Xbox, with things like content streaming, and using it as a display for Xbox."