Video game programmer biography

(1979-)

Who Is Markus Persson?

Markus Persson was writing computer code by the time he was 8. Although he never finished high school, Persson landed a programming job when he was 18.

It wasn't long before he was creating his own games on the side, and his first release, Minecraft, would be a massive international success. Persson eventually sold his software company, Mojang, and the game that put him on the map, to Microsoft for $2.5 billion.

Early Years

Markus Alexej Persson was born in Stockholm, Sweden, on June 1, 1979.

Game programmer skills

He grew up in the small town of Edsbyn, surrounded by forests that would influence his biggest game creation, Minecraft, decades later. Growing up, he was an obsessive Lego builder, until he was 7 and his father brought home a Commodore 128 computer.

Persson latched right on, and he would fake stomachaches to stay home from school and write code. By the time he was 8, he had written his first computer program.

Persson never finished high s