Minecraft goes live during MineCon keynote

Long after becoming a breakout indie phenomenon, Mojang's PC game Minecraft officially launched during the opening keynote address at the MineCon convention in Las Vegas on Friday. The ceremonial flipping of the switch by Markus "Notch" Persson kicked off a two-day celebration centered around the developer's latest efforts, with looks at the publisher's upcoming Scrolls and Cobalt.

Notch had a couple surprises up his sleeve for MineCon.

In addition to the official launch of Minecraft on PC--the game had been in beta to this point--the keynote also hosted an additional look at the upcoming Minecraft for Xbox Live Arcade, and the announcement that Minecraft had arrived on iOS.

Daniel Kaplan of Mojang confirmed that the game had been intended to launch during the keynote address, but logistical problems necessitated it be launched quietly on iOS the day before. Despite the lack of any marketing push for the Thursday release, it had already become the No. 1 paid app in all iTunes stores worldwide by Friday afternoon.

For more from MineCon, check out GameSpot's preview of the Xbox Live edition of Minecraft, as well as first looks at Scollsand Cobalt.