It was natural that the recent boom in video game adaptations would yield a new film based on the best-known virtual universe of the modern era. Minecraft, the Microsoft-owned digital sandbox that holds the record as the bestselling video game of all time, is finally taking its place in the annals of beloved gaming franchises--like Super Mario Bros. and Sonic the Hedgehog--that have earned the Hollywood studio treatment, celebrity stars and special effects and all. Helmed by Napoleon Dynamite director and friend of Slate Jared Hess, A Minecraft Movie throws Jack Black, Jason Momoa, Danielle Brooks, Emma Myers, and Jennifer Coolidge into the titular game's pixelated universe, subjecting their real-life bodies to the simplistic physics, creative engineering, and bizarre supernatural life forms that make up the expansive worlds of Minecraft. It took about a decade to get this flick off the ground, so the anticipation is high--especially among younger gamers addicted to the online playgrounds that gained such traction during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. Already, the film is breaking box-office records held by previous game adaptations, and if you have a child who spends a lot of time playing on the computer, chances are they're definitely ready and excited to catch A Minecraft Movie--even if you barely know what Minecraft is.

If you or your children like to run mods on the Windows or Linux version of Minecraft, you might want to check those installation folders. According to public disclosures from the popular CurseForge and Bukkit mod platforms, both were used to upload compromised versions of popular Minecraft mods infected with malware installation tools. The full extent of the damage has yet to be assessed. According to Bleeping Computer, popular individual mod developers' accounts on the platforms were targeted, after which the Fractureiser spyware was smuggled into updated versions of their user mods. API systems automatically updated some of the mods immediately, some of which have millions of recorded downloads.

Lydia Winters shows off Microsoft's "Minecraft" ahead of the Electronic Entertainment Expo, in 2015. Cybersecurity experts say Minecraft players were quick to exploit a critical flaw in widely used software that intelligence firms raced to patch Friday. Lydia Winters shows off Microsoft's "Minecraft" ahead of the Electronic Entertainment Expo, in 2015. Cybersecurity experts say Minecraft players were quick to exploit a critical flaw in widely used software that intelligence firms raced to patch Friday. BOSTON -- A critical vulnerability in a widely used software tool -- one quickly exploited in the online game Minecraft -- is rapidly emerging as a major threat to organizations around the world.

You are free to share this article under the Attribution 4.0 International license. Researchers have developed a Minecraft modification that uses artificial intelligence to help players improve their in-game architecture skills. Minecraft is a popular 3D video game where players build and navigate their own digital environments. The modification will tell players whether their buildings fit into certain architectural styles and offer ideas for how the structures could be improved. "One of the things that's important to learn when you're a kid and throughout life is creativity, abstraction--how to envision what you want and then create it," says senior author Ross Knepper, assistant professor of computer science at Cornell University.

Minecraft players on Nintendo Switch will soon build massive forts and slay monsters with more of their friends. The sandbox phenomenon will get cross-platform support when the Bedrock update arrives on the console June 21 -- gamers can play with their buddies across Switch, Xbox One, PC, mobile and VR. The update brings the Switch version on par with those other platforms. It gives players access to the Minecraft Marketplace, now letting them buy skins, texture packs and maps created by the community. Minecraft will also support achievements and Gamerscore on Switch.

Minecraft is about to enter its final form. In August, the Better Together update will land and unify the game across nearly every platform, from iOS and Android to Xbox One and Nintendo Switch. This unification comes courtesy of the Bedrock Engine, which currently powers all mobile, Windows 10, Amazon Fire and VR versions of the game. Now, it won't matter which platform your friends use to play Minecraft -- every version will be the same, they'll share DLC and updates, and all players will be able to create new worlds together. The PlayStation 4 and Xbox 360 versions of Minecraft are not included in the initial Better Together update.

It could be "game over" for Minecraft fans who downloaded unauthorized mods (modifications) for their Android smartphone or tablet. Instead of finding new content or tools to tweak the wildly popular Minecraft: Pocket Edition mobile game, more than 80 malicious apps -- disguised as Minecraft mods -- contained Trojans that bombarded users with advertisements or redirected them to scam websites, says ESET, a Slovakia-based cybersecurity company. Lukas Stefanko, the malware researcher who discovered the fake mods, says there have been nearly 1 million downloads of the malicious apps from the Google Play store. "Users often fall for phony apps because they're promising to deliver something new for a famous game like Minecraft, plus many have positive – but fabricated – ratings," says Stefanko, in an interview with USA TODAY. Once launched, the apps displayed a screen with a download button, which didn't install a mod but took users to a web browser with "scareware" messages on them, such as falsely notifying users of a found virus on their device, and promoting them to download a new app.

A scene from'Minecraft: Story Mode,' which launches later this year. It could be "game over" for Minecraft fans who downloaded unauthorized mods (modifications) for their Android smartphone or tablet. Instead of finding new content or tools to tweak the wildly popular Minecraft: Pocket Edition mobile game, more than 80 malicious apps -- disguised as Minecraft mods -- contained Trojans that bombarded users with advertisements or redirected them to scam websites, says ESET, a Slovakia-based cybersecurity company. Lukas Stefanko, the malware researcher who discovered the fake mods, says there have been nearly 1 million downloads of the malicious apps from the Google Play store. "Users often fall for phony apps because they're promising to deliver something new for a famous game like Minecraft, plus many have positive – but fabricated – ratings," says Stefanko, in an interview with USA TODAY.

When Microsoft bought Mojang, the makers of the insanely popular Minecraft, in a surprise 2.5 billion deal in September 2014, nobody knew what to think. The game seemed an odd fit for Microsoft, whose biggest moneymakers are its productivity software and Windows PC operating system. Minecraft's millions of players fretted that the game was destined to be ruined under its new corporate parent, or that Microsoft would restrict the game to its own Xbox and Windows platforms. Two years later, Minecraft is more popular and widely available than ever. Since the beginning of this year, Mojang says, people have bought 53,000 copies of Minecraft every single day.

The blockish and slightly dorky computer game Minecraft may turn out to be a great place for humans and AI to learn how to work together. An experimental new version of the game, released by Microsoft researchers this month, can be used to train an AI to perform all sorts of tasks, from crossing bridges to building complex objects. The new platform, called Project Malmo, makes it possible for a learning algorithm to control a Minecraft character that's normally operated by a human player. But it also provides ways for human players and AI agents to work together, and a chat window through which a person can talk with a nascent AI. "In the long run I want to work toward AI that can be taught by any user to help them achieve their goals," says Katja Hofmann, a researcher at Microsoft Cambridge in the U.K. who leads the project. Hofmann, who gave a demo of the software to AI researchers at an academic conference in New York last week, says that human-AI collaboration is a key goal for the project: "We've built in all the capabilities that a researcher would need in order to work toward collaborative AI." Malmo is geared toward testing reinforcement-learning algorithms, a way of training a computer to perform a task by providing simulated rewards.