Minecraft was made by Markus "Notch" Persson in November 18, 2011 back then it was called "Cave Game" there wasn't very much hype for it becuase the company had just started out and had not gotten very much attention but by 2013 the game was skyrocketing in popularity but after 3 years from that inital skyrocket it fell downhill in 2016 the game was losing popularity
Check out Wikipedia for more!