How Minecraft: Pi Edition Is Being Brought Back From The Dead
TheBrokenRail
Posted on December 9, 2020
Wait, what? I never heard of a Minecraft: Pi Edition!
If you have never heard of Minecraft: Pi Edition, I wouldn't be surprised. Its an obscure version of Minecraft from 2013 that only received one update and only ran on Raspberry Pis. Yeah, it was obscure. Minecraft: Pi Edition is a modified version of Minecraft: Pocket Edition Alpha v0.6.1 that run son the Raspberry Pi. A scripting API was added and many Minecraft: Pocket Edition features lie Survival Mode were removed, presumably so there wasn't a free version of Minecraft: Pocket Edition floating around.
Why was it abandoned by the community?
There were many reasons for its abandonment. The first was the lack of normal Minecraft features like Survival Mode. Without these features, it just wasn't that fun. It also never received any updates, so it was permanently stuck with only the blocks and items in Minecraft: Pocket Edition Alpha v0.6.1. It also only ran on the Raspberry Pi, severely limiting the amount of people who could play it. The last straw however, was when the scripting API was ported to Minecraft: Java Edition, and then Minecraft: Java Edition was ported to the Pi. Now there was no reason to use it whatsoever.
What Changed?
What changed was the 2020 global pandemic. Now millions of people were trapped in their homes, and very very bored. These people decided to team up, to do something truly challenging, they wanted to revive Minecraft: Pi Edition.
First Steps
The first step was the release of MCPIL. A community launcher for Minecraft: Pi Edition made for the purpose of uniting the few existing attempts at modding the game. For instance, it had built-in support for the infamous Survival Patch from 2013 and its mod containing extensions to the scripting API.
Next Steps
The spark started to transform into a roaring wildfire with many new projects join the group. With things like MCBES (a WIP proxy to allow Pi Edition to join modern Bedrock Edition) and various implementations of RakNet (the packet protocol used in Minecraft: Pocket/Pi Edition). Later MCPI-Reborn was released, allowing Minecraft: Pi Edition to run on desktop Linux and including a more refined Survival mode mod.
What Next?
Currently there are multiple projects in development including a rewrite of MCPIL. Any contributions are extremely appreciated!
Links
Posted on December 9, 2020
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