Er, mine does that by default
Mine stays running for some reason?
And are you sure yours is closing or is it being minimized to the taskbar like mine is?
And are you using Java 8 or 7 ?
It does by default, you should look in your settings tab in the launcher.
I had first Java 7, then 8, at both the Launcher closed at start.
Is it closing or minimizing... I bet its minimizing.
And there is NO option to close the launcher when you launch the game.
My launcher closes. It doesn't minimize, it closes.
I tried Java 7 and 8... yeah the launcher looks like it closes but if you check you will have a small icon on your taskbar for the launcher.
It does NOT close.
That's the console window still running the actual launcher is closed
This is your confusion OP.
There's an option in the launcher to change weather or not to display the console.
I have had zero issues with the console, I use it constantly for debugging things
Yeah, It's good to have the console running and visible if you are running into lag or are getting booted from your SSP world. You can look at the console as it's running to see what kind of errors it's throwing up.