The term "Hard Sci-fi" carries a lot of dorky stigma, but Minecraft creator and Mojang Specifications founder Markus "Notch" Persson is one developer that doesn't need to concern himself with mainstream appeal. Following up the moderately amusing MARS Effect April fools gag, Notch has now confirmed that Mojang's next game will actually be a space-faring affair, and that the feature set listed on the joke site was actually a reasonably accurate summary of their actual intentions.

With a name as niche as the genre, 0×10c (Notch still won't share it's intended pronunciation) appears to be an extremely hardcore space sim, set in the year 281 474 976 712 644 AD, where players control ships with 80s style computer hardware via intense micromanagement to explore the galaxies, perform deep-space mining operations and do... well we don't really know what else.

Here's the hopeful feature list from the official site:

• Hard science fiction.
  
• Lots of engineering.
  
• Fully working computer system.
  
• Space battles against the AI or other players.
  
• Abandoned ships full of loot.
  
• Duct tape!
  
• Seamlessly landing on planets.
  
• Advanced economy system.
  
• Random encounters.
  
• Mining, trading, and looting.
  
• Single and multi player connected via the multiverse.

A release window or intended launch platforms are yet to be revealed.