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There's a lovely moment very early on in this feature length documentary where footage of the Swedish countryside where Markus "Notch" Perrson grew up segues into the landscape of Minecraft, the bash-and-build indie hit that made his fortune. It's an obvious edit, but one that hints at an all-important connection between tangible reality and virtual fantasy. In suggesting a source of inspiration for Notch's work, it drags gaming from its realm of ones and zeroes and into a more relatable creative sphere, where the artist draws on their own life and experience to create something universal. Sadly, that brief edit is as close of The Story of Mojang comes to unearthing any great truths about this most modern of phenomena.
That isn't to say it's not a pleasant movie. For fans of Minecraft it contains enough harmless glimpses behind the curtain and enough validation of their passion to justify its existence. It's just not terribly illuminating, and has very little to say that hasn't already been said during Minecraft's meteoric rise. The closest comparison would be the direct-to-DVD promotional films that follow the latest boyband around on tour, offering a veneer of candid insight but mostly serving to tell fans what the singer's favourite colour is.
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