Just a few months after making its grand debut at this year’s E3, Minecraft has finally made its way to the Android Market, much to the delight of cube fans and all those who love to waste time. With this new, Pocket Edition app, Mojang is hoping to faithfully recreate the Minecraft experience on mobile platforms, with a special emphasis on the game’s artistic side. Version Alpha 0.1 will allow users to explore random worlds and invite friends to join their worlds, and save multi-player realms to their mobile phones. They can also manipulate 36 different kinds of blocks from the convenience of their touchscreens. For the moment the game will be available on Sony Ericsson’s Xperia Play, though Mojang plans to make it available for other Android handsets “in the near future.” It’s available now for $6.99. You can download it from the link below or read the complete press announcement here. MC NAME

Say hello to Minecraft – Pocket Edition

Today we’re launching the first version of Minecraft – Pocket Edition. The game will be exclusive to Xperia Play for a limited time and will be made available to other Android devices in the near future.

The first version (Alpha 0.1) will focus on the artistic aspects of Minecraft. We’ve tried to incorporate in features that are appropriate for playing on a mobile device while preserving the fundamentals of the Minecraft experience. You can choose blocks with the touchscreen, or scroll through them using the circle and square buttons on your Xperia Play device. The first version also supports multi-player on a local wireless network allowing you to create a world with friends and invite them to create a community. This version supports:

* Randomized worlds

We plan to keep the Pocket Edition in development for as long as possible as it is similar to the PC/Mac/Linux Minecraft version. We’re interested in hearing what the Minecraft community thinks about our new game and what features you want to be able to see in future updates.

Minecraft Pocket Edition Pocket Edition is now available in Android Market (only visible to Xperia Play devices) for $6.99