Mojang has postponed its Minecraft Festival over coronavirus concerns.
As announced in an update, despite the event being planned to take place in December, organisers are not willing to predict how long it could be before the Covid-19 outbreak passes.
"In recent weeks, the Covid-19 outbreak has led many organisers to cancel or postpone gatherings and events across the world, as a preventive measure to ensure the health and safety of their guests," said Mojang.
"The situation around Minecraft Festival, however, is a little different. September is still many months away, and we are not making any predictions about how long it will take to put the outbreak behind us. This decision is rather a result of the extensive preparations required to organise a mammoth event like this.
"Our partners, producers, and exhibitors are based in all corners of the world, and right now, we can't meet and collaborate in the way we need to. Without knowing exactly when we can resume planning, we have decided to postpone. That way, we can make sure that next year's event will be the amazing one that our community expects and deserves."
Building blocks
However, despite the event cancellation, Minecraft Live will still take place. The live stream will feature Minecraft news, announcements and behind the scenes exclusives. A date for the live stream is yet to be announced.
Last month, Mojang teamed up with Mattel for a range of NFC-enabled Minecraft Earth toys. As of November 2019, the augmented reality title has been installed 2.5 million times. In China, Minecraft was nearing 300 million registered users in November 2019.
Epidemic
The Minecraft Festival is not the first event to be cancelled due to the coronavirus. Last month, GDC 2020 was officially postponed. Before that, multiple companies, including EA had pulled out of the event.
The ESA has confirmed that E3 is still going ahead, despite Los Angeles being declared a state of emergency. However, Iam8bit has pulled out of the event.
Due to Covid-19, multiple companies such as Google and Facebook have asked their employees to work remotely. Two Microsoft employees have been confirmed to have contracted the virus.
This story was orginally on PCGamesInsider.biz.
