Minecraft Dungeons crawls to 25 million players as active support ends

Minecraft Dungeons has reached 25 million players in the three years since its launch in 2020. In a blog looking back on the game, Mojang revealed the milestone for it and Double Eleven's Minecraft spinoff.

Even with that milestone, though, the developer's active support and development for the game has ended with the recent 1.17 update. With an uninterrupted three-year run, Dungeons is one of the most successful spinoffs for the larger franchise.

"Our team has now moved on to new projects that continue to explore experiences in the Minecraft universe," Mojang wrote. "We are happy that so many new players discover and enjoy the game on a growing range of platforms, and ultimately become part of the Dungeons family of heroes."

Unlike the original Minecraft, Dungeons was a co-op dungeon crawler where players could team up to explore procedurally generated dungeons. This new milestone shows an additional 15 million players have picked up the game since it crossed 10 million players in 2021.

Mojang has never given an indication of how the game sold, but its player count indicates it's clearly seen some measure of success over the years.

"It's very humbling to see that so many heroes have picked up the mantle to rid the Overworld of the influence of the Orb of Dominance," the developer continued. "It makes us both proud and grateful for having had the pleasure of building a game together with a community like this one."

The offbeat future of Minecraft

Dungeons is one of a very small handful of spinoffs based on the popular creation game. Previously, Telltale created a two-season episodic game (dubbed Minecraft: Story Mode), and there was a mobile augmented reality game (Minecraft: Earth) that was later shut down due to the pandemic.

Earlier this year, Mojang and Blackbird Interactive released Minecraft Legends, the first new spinoff since Dungeons. At the end of August, Blackbird laid off 41 employees and canceled several unannounced projects. 

With Minecraft Legends being a strategy title and Dungeons a dungeon crawler, Mojang has found a way to keep the Minecraft brand fresh without having to release a full-blown sequel that may replace the original game.