Minecraft Viewed More than Beyonce on YouTube

Minecraft has become a video game phenomenon. Now it seems that the game was one of the most searched terms on YouTube last year.

In 2014, Minecraft was the second-most searched term on YouTube in 2014. The game beat out Disney’s hit movie Frozen, and singer-songwriter Beyoncé. In a post on Think With Google titled “Think Gaming Content is Niche? Think Again,” Gautam Ramdurai explains that video games have become “tightly woven” into our pop culture. Ramdurai lists the top YouTube searches of 2014, showing that Minecraft was ranked below only the broad search “music.” Behind Minecraft was Frozen, Drake, and Beyoncé. PewDiePie, one of the most popular Let’s Play celebrities, followed behind those searches. Some of the most popular gaming channels were PewDiePie, Machinima, and Sky Does Minecraft. Ramdurai writes: “Sometimes watching someone else play a game can be as much fun as playing yourself. In a recent Google Consumer Survey, viewers often cited the ‘reactions’ and ‘commentary’ of the YouTube creator as a big draw for this kind of content. One respondent said, ‘It’s a shared experience with a favorite creator.'”

Originally released in 2011, Minecraft has been available to the public since 2009 in the form of an alpha version. The game was originally released on PC. The game has now expanded to Android, iOS, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, and PS Vita. The game has been a commercial success, with over 60 million copies having been sold across all consoles, with 12 million of those sales being on the Xbox 360 and 17 million on PC. In September 2014, Microsoft purchased the ownership of the game’s intellectual property for $2.5 billion. The main appeal to the game is the fact that players can essentially build anything with their imaginations being the only limit. This has led to some amazing creations by those that are willing to dedicate themselves to the game. Along with this Creative Mode, players can also participate in a Survival Mode, Adventure Mode, and Spectator Mode.