I've been playing Minecraft since I was just 8 Earth years old in 2010, it's easily one of my most favorite games and I will probably continue to play it regularly until I die. The first time I played Minecraft, my relative was visiting for the holidays and he had me try it out on his laptop. I was instantly hooked! I completely ignored my family the entire time they visited because I was too busy playing Minecraft T-T
Then I got my first touch-screen device that Christmas, a generic tablet, and promptly downloaded the infamous Minecraft Pocket Edition: DEMO. It would be funny to say I was disappointed but honestly I was just so happy to play any version of Minecraft, I'll get to the great disappointment in a moment. Anyhow, my caretakers didn't believe in paying for apps so I played Minecraft DEMO for probably about a year until I discovered what I can only presume to be a straight-up pirated copy of Minecraft PE for free on google play. For those of you who are clueless, back in the day the google play appstore was a wild west of copyright infringement, indie developer uniquity, and plain garbage; IT WAS BEAUTIFUL! The copy was exactly like the full version of Minecraft only it was titled with random letters and there was no multiplayer compatibility. It eventually disappeared from the appstore entirely, but not before I installed it on my siblings devices as well.
Now onto the great disappointment! You see, I was perfectly content with my bootleg Minecraft PE on my tablet but I still longed to play the same Minecraft all my favorite YouTubers were playing. Unfortunately, my pea-sized child brain knew nothing about game parity (or the lack-thereof). I saw that they had much more content and I thought it was because they paid for the full version but they were playing Java which might as well have been an entirely different game. So the next year I begged and begged my caretakers for a playstore gift card so I could buy the real Minecraft PE and have wolves and villagers and endermen in my worlds. They gave in and when I unwrapped that gift card Christmas day I was ECSTATIC, I ran straight to my tablet and started the download right away...
...only there were no wolves. There were no villagers. There were no endermen in my first world on the full version of Minecraft Pocket Edition because it was in fact nearly the exact same as the bootleg copy I had been playing on for the last several months and I had spent my giftcard for nothing.
I played Pocket Edition for years until I got an xbox 360 in 2015, I've been playing Bedrock Edition on various consoles ever since. You may have heard of the "Two Week Minecraft Phase", well I am not afflicted by this. My own personal Minecraft cycle looks more like a 7-8 month Minecraft phase when I'm not spending all my time outside during Spring and Fall. Unfortunately, I have moved so frequently and lost my previous consoles so I do not have any long-term worlds to show for my long history with this game. However, I was inspired by my favorite YouTuber & streamer, LuvstarKei, and started my first Forever World which I will take extra care to preserve and maintain forever!
