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What Minecraft’s Copper Age Update Taught Me About Monetization
Plus: Free Owls???
My nine-year-old burst into my office yesterday morning. “Dad! Minecraft has owls, and they’re free!” He was vibrating with excitement. The owls were free. They perch on your shoulder like parrots. They eat rabbits. That’s basically it. He couldn’t wait to play.
This came just weeks after he’d been counting down to the Copper Age update. Also free. Copper golems that organize your chests, copper armor and tools that sit between stone and iron in the progression curve. He talked about it nonstop before launch, theorizing about builds he’d make and bases he’d optimize.
Two major content drops in two months. Both free. Both generating the kind of authentic excitement that keeps kids coming back to a game they’ve been playing for years.
In most kids’ games today, this level of excitement comes with a price tag attached.
How most “free” updates actually exploit
Walk through any popular kids’ game and you’ll see the pattern. Fortnite drops a new season every few months with a battle pass that costs real money. Roblox floods kids with premium cosmetics and game passes. Even educational games have discovered the power of locking content behind paywalls or…
