Google celebrates Minecraft’s birthday by blowing you up with a creeper

Few titles can claim to have changed the entire video games landscape, but Minecraft is without a doubt one of them – and believe it or not, Mojang’s phenomenon turned 15 years old this week. There are gamers who’ve played Minecraft half their lives and never plan on stopping. Some are 

Google is jumping on the train of congratulations, paying tribute to Minecraft with one its famous mini-games: Searching for “minecraft” will result in a block of dirt appearing on the bottom of the results, as you can see in the screenshot below.

Clicking on this widget will start the mini-game, putting you into the first-person perspective of iconic Minecraft protagonist Steve. Try “mining” the image section on the right and you’ll reveal different images as well as obtain new tools to mine faster. And, as any seasoned player knows, inevitably a creeper comes along to blow itself up and take you and your hard work down.

It’s not the most elaborate of Google’s mini-games (“zerg rush” will forever be number one), but it’s a nice gesture towards the giant that transformed video games – Minecraft contributed very heavily to trends like the continued popularity of survival-crafting games and the Early Access business model, which have shaped gaming for several years at this point.

Thanks to Minecraft, a whole generation of gamers learned about the joys of custom servers and modding – aspects that might have declined into a more niche position were it not for Minecraft’s inclusion of them.

Minecraft is pretty much available on every possible platform and with even a movie about it on the way it’s safe to say that it managed the jump from a mere video game IP to something more cultural. Happy birthday, Minecraft – and keep having fun being blown up.