Mojang co-founder and Minecraft creator Markus "Notch" Persson said via Twitter that across all five platforms – PC, Mac, iOS, Android and Xbox 360 – the company's popular world building game sold 453,000 units on December 25 alone.
As of December 13, the Minecraft franchise had sold over 17.5 million copies, 5 million of which stemmed from Minecraft: Pocket Edition for the iOS and Android platforms. The PC and Mac versions were the dominant sales, pushing 8.3 million units whereas the Xbox Live Arcade version sold 4.48 million copies.
Fans interested in getting an inside look at the development of Minecraft can now purchase 2Player Productions' Minecraft: The Story of Mojang, the official Minecraft documentary. It's offered in two formats: a $20 limited edition DVD set, and an $8 DRM-free digital download. The soundtrack is also up for sale for $7, composed by C418.
"Minecraft: The Story of Mojang is a feature-length documentary that follows the young company over the course of its first year as their profile expanded across the world stage and into the homes of millions of gamers," reads the product description. "Featuring insights from industry icons (Peter Molyneux, Tim Schafer), journalists (Geoff Keighley, Stephen Totilo), tastemakers (Gabe & Tycho of Penny Arcade), and players profoundly impacted by the game (Yogscast, The Shaft, Minecraft Teacher), the film serves as a time capsule for one of this generation's most unorthodox success stories."
"During the editing of what was supposed to be a twenty-minute short, it became clear that an important chapter of gaming history was still being written, and that a feature-length documentary about Mojang's first year would make a powerful statement about what it means to create, release, and play games in the twenty-first century," 2Player Productions said.
Minecraft originally launched as an alpha on the PC in May 2009, and then finally went "retail" in November 2011. The mobile version eventually landed on the Android-based Xperia Play smartphone as Minecraft: Pocket Edition during E3 2011 and later on Google Play in October 2011, followed by an iOS release in November 2011. The Xbox 360 version, co-developed by 4J Studios, didn't crash the console scene until May 2012.