Masterfireheart
Retired Staff
Welp.
October 27, 2012, I finally got my hands on a PC copy of Minecraft, after about a year of pocket edition. One of the first things I do is browse PMC and I find HHG way way down on the list. The moment I joined my life changed. HHG is and will always be the best Minecraft server, hands down. I played almost every day, racking up thousands and thousands of hours parkouring, skyblocking, and chatting. I watched as HHG grew from having 10 people online to having 1000 people online, being a part of basically every major event in its history. I've witnessed countless faction wars come and go, the rise and fall of my tree shop, which made me the richest person in the entire server; the hub and all it's variations, the rise and fall of various rogue staff, the coming and going of youtubers recording videos and bringing their fanbases with them, and everything in-between. I remember when EnderDUDES fell to VIPUnited. I remember when the server was griefed, and after a week of downtime I joined to see Zainos alone, us chatting with each other while I continued to fall into the void again and again. I remember when I first became a staff member. Being a staff member was it's own journey. I've seen many staff members come and go, sometimes coming back, sometimes going back, once even coming back again (or should I say, coming Bach?
). I've been the longest running staff member as of today.
But days end, and today is no different.
I'm leaving HHG.
This wasn't a sudden decision, I didn't get in trouble or fight with someone or something. I've wanted to do this, write this forum post, for a long time. Now as the server passes 5 years and I approach 5 years, I feel like more than ever I need to do this, to finally clear my head and push myself free. It's a complicated scenario, one that I've thought about for many many months, but I'm done waiting and I'm done wishing.
Minecraft is dying.
HHG is dying.
For over a year now, many of you have noticed my inactivity, it began as a result of my Discord network growing huge, but the series of events afterwards planted a thought that burrowed deep in my mind. People began leaving. People I knew very well began leaving. At first, the server seemed to start to degrade. Reflecting on it, it was probably due to those over the age of 14 all leaving, thus making it seem like there were more sub-14 year olds when really it didn't change.
The big reveal though was when I figured out the forums.
Around that same time, I began checking the forums less and less as it began to seemingly rapidly degrade over time. I used to check it literally multiple times a day and it would be one of the first tabs I open when I got home from school/work. But then I would spend weeks and months without even looking at it, only doing so ironically. It was one night where I was thinking about how the forums could have possibly gotten so bad compared to the old days. Especially off-topic, which I remember being a fun place to meme, seemed so terrible now. But I decided to compare, and check back on those old times when I actively posted there. And then I realised something. Through all the posts from the old days, even the ones I made, I felt the same level of cringe as I did for the ones posted recently. And it hit me.
The forums didn't change at all.
I just grew up.
This revelation completely changed the way I saw my situation with the server, and set the stage for the end of my HHG tale.
As staff chat never left Skype, I was unable to access it for large amounts of time, and my motivation for moderating that I previously had left me. By mid-2016, all of the enjoyment of the server had sadly vanished from me, the only reason I logged on was to moderate, talk to people, and parkour while doing so. I watched the user rate rapidly decline to 1/10th of what it used to be, and every time I logged on more and more people I knew so well and had so many great memories with had left; and more and more people I talked to on parkour stopped recognizing me and I had less and less conversations. I knew the server was dying, but I desperately didn't want it to be. I never forgot (or will forget) all the great memories I had in the old days, and didn't want to let those go.
I grew a delusion, I thought that someday, I would magically be active again on the server, having fun with all of the old community members and becoming the big figure in the community again. I never quit because I continued to have this delusion for such a long time, fueled by all the complications that set this up. Every flaw that ever built itself up was ready to crack. I realised that in my time as a staff member, I had become so ingrained with the role that I couldn't imagine myself not being a staff member. Early demotion might have meant permanently leaving for me. This built right alongside the constant guilt I had deep down, the feeling that I was letting down HHG by being inactive, and the fact I was still a staff member was only because of pity or not letting go of old memories. There's so much I could write about the reasons I'm leaving. There's so much I could write about HHG in general, the history alone could make up a nice book, but not all arts are tuned to everyone, and some arts become harder the more you feel.
And I feel.
Writing this out has seen me tear up multiple times, hell just thinking about writing this up a few days ago made me full on cry for a few minutes. I have never really cut ties with something that I've been a part of for as long as HHG before, and it's given me this sense of depression and sadness constantly in my gut. But to further perpetuate the sadness is the fact that deep down, I know all this has already happened. The community's dying, my inactivity, and most of all, me losing interest in Minecraft, finally being burned out after literally tens of thousands of hours.
When I think about it logically, I shouldn't be sad at all for leaving. I've already basically left, just never officially. And yet this whole thing still gives me a great sadness. I know it will never be the same as I remembered it, but I still hold on to that hope and if I'm ever going to end the delusion, I have to do this.
I originally imagined myself writing more, but I've never been the best at expressing myself due to ADHD, and I'm running out of things to write :/ I'm going to end this with the usual mentions.
To everyone who worked at my shop;
Minecrafters360 (Guardian_Echo)
Creeper1363
kingofcons2000
Willeeklund
legop62519
flame1534524
tmcardle1221
scubabrayden
CRICO637
12rayman12
amelean
rayado56
Jshagar
and WizzardDestroyer
You guys were the best. If my tree shop didn't grow to the size it did, I might not be here right now writing this (and I don't regret one moment of it.) Thanks so much for everything :,)
In particular;
Guardian_Echo if you ever read this, you were an absolutely amazing partner to work with in the shop and I appreciate all the work you helped me with
WizzardDestroyer you were probably one of my favorite people on the entire server ever. Lending me a room in your hotel was one of the critical things that got me to where I am now, and every moment we hung out after that, including on your personal server where I was admin and we wrecked everything all the time, was memorable to no end. Please hit me up on Discord someday, I'd love to catch up on things!
To everyone I ever had a lasting friendship with;
Thanks for all the great conversations, games, debates, and memes we've shared over the years, you guys made up the bulk of my internet friends for a long time and all of you are special to me :,)
In particular;
(I'm terrible at names, especially now feeling this emotional so if I don't explicitly mention you don't worry, you haven't been completely forgotten to me)
michalthekid It's always fun talking to you on Discord, looking forward to our next musical collab
Cheez all the destruction we caused on Wizz's server was amazing, thanks for that lol
TheCakeGod we had some good times, keep barfin' rainbows my dude
Kaios You were a damn good staff member and a pretty chill guy, thanks for giving me inspiration to write Chaos
BachAtItAgain god DAMN dude you are AMAZING. You are one of the most devoted staff I've seen on the team ever, and
obsidianwolf9999 It's been awhile but you were pretty cool back in the days of Factions, so thanks
To everyone who disliked me;
Particularly XV_Scorpion_VX Anchezz and Mother_Muffins
I'm sorry we could never get along. I don't feel any resentment towards anyone anymore due to my leave so take that as you will. I wish you all the best with life.
To imtotallychris,
It's been a long time since we talked, but you used to be one of my best online friends. We shared a lot with each other and I'm glad we did, you were a good friend and I hope everything turns out for the best.
And finally, Zainos
This was hard, this was really really hard, writing all this actually took me over 8 hours.
I have a huge amount of respect for you and the way you persevere with improving HHG despite the bleak outlook for Minecraft as a whole. Keep at it man, don't let go of everything you worked so hard for.
You have known me longer than anyone else on the server, and I could say the same towards you
There's a lot I want to tell you, a lot I want to say and express and explain, but for now, I have this:
Thank you. Thank you for creating the server that gave me thousands of hours of fun social interaction. Thank you for maintaining the server that grew into the community I later had the absolute honor of moderating, and thus giving me serious community building experience. Thank you for consistantly creating new things to do and new gamemodes to enjoy; at the height of my HHG experience, they were all the rave in the community, and some of my favorite experiences have come from them.
Thank you. Thank you so much Zain, for everything.
And thank you to everyone else who read this. Many of you might not recognize me or remember me (heck, many of the people I mentioned in this either already left or got banned lol) but ultimately it doesn't matter, I appreciate you reading this and taking your time to listen to me rant about my feelings for hours. This is the most "out with a bang" I'm gonna get, so I'll take it.
Someone on the server suggested that there be an NPC statue of me standing on top of the fountain in parkour so that basically nothing would change :^) Honestly though that would be neat lol.
Finally:
I will be returning to the forums one more time, exactly 1 week from today (5/19) to check and reply to responses to this thread. I will also play on the server then for one last time.
I do not know if I will ever return after next week. I'd like to someday, but I do not know.
I will never forget you guys.
I fucking love all of you.
As I used to say:
C ya laterz!
October 27, 2012, I finally got my hands on a PC copy of Minecraft, after about a year of pocket edition. One of the first things I do is browse PMC and I find HHG way way down on the list. The moment I joined my life changed. HHG is and will always be the best Minecraft server, hands down. I played almost every day, racking up thousands and thousands of hours parkouring, skyblocking, and chatting. I watched as HHG grew from having 10 people online to having 1000 people online, being a part of basically every major event in its history. I've witnessed countless faction wars come and go, the rise and fall of my tree shop, which made me the richest person in the entire server; the hub and all it's variations, the rise and fall of various rogue staff, the coming and going of youtubers recording videos and bringing their fanbases with them, and everything in-between. I remember when EnderDUDES fell to VIPUnited. I remember when the server was griefed, and after a week of downtime I joined to see Zainos alone, us chatting with each other while I continued to fall into the void again and again. I remember when I first became a staff member. Being a staff member was it's own journey. I've seen many staff members come and go, sometimes coming back, sometimes going back, once even coming back again (or should I say, coming Bach?
). I've been the longest running staff member as of today.But days end, and today is no different.
I'm leaving HHG.
This wasn't a sudden decision, I didn't get in trouble or fight with someone or something. I've wanted to do this, write this forum post, for a long time. Now as the server passes 5 years and I approach 5 years, I feel like more than ever I need to do this, to finally clear my head and push myself free. It's a complicated scenario, one that I've thought about for many many months, but I'm done waiting and I'm done wishing.
Minecraft is dying.
HHG is dying.
For over a year now, many of you have noticed my inactivity, it began as a result of my Discord network growing huge, but the series of events afterwards planted a thought that burrowed deep in my mind. People began leaving. People I knew very well began leaving. At first, the server seemed to start to degrade. Reflecting on it, it was probably due to those over the age of 14 all leaving, thus making it seem like there were more sub-14 year olds when really it didn't change.
The big reveal though was when I figured out the forums.
Around that same time, I began checking the forums less and less as it began to seemingly rapidly degrade over time. I used to check it literally multiple times a day and it would be one of the first tabs I open when I got home from school/work. But then I would spend weeks and months without even looking at it, only doing so ironically. It was one night where I was thinking about how the forums could have possibly gotten so bad compared to the old days. Especially off-topic, which I remember being a fun place to meme, seemed so terrible now. But I decided to compare, and check back on those old times when I actively posted there. And then I realised something. Through all the posts from the old days, even the ones I made, I felt the same level of cringe as I did for the ones posted recently. And it hit me.
The forums didn't change at all.
I just grew up.
This revelation completely changed the way I saw my situation with the server, and set the stage for the end of my HHG tale.
As staff chat never left Skype, I was unable to access it for large amounts of time, and my motivation for moderating that I previously had left me. By mid-2016, all of the enjoyment of the server had sadly vanished from me, the only reason I logged on was to moderate, talk to people, and parkour while doing so. I watched the user rate rapidly decline to 1/10th of what it used to be, and every time I logged on more and more people I knew so well and had so many great memories with had left; and more and more people I talked to on parkour stopped recognizing me and I had less and less conversations. I knew the server was dying, but I desperately didn't want it to be. I never forgot (or will forget) all the great memories I had in the old days, and didn't want to let those go.
I grew a delusion, I thought that someday, I would magically be active again on the server, having fun with all of the old community members and becoming the big figure in the community again. I never quit because I continued to have this delusion for such a long time, fueled by all the complications that set this up. Every flaw that ever built itself up was ready to crack. I realised that in my time as a staff member, I had become so ingrained with the role that I couldn't imagine myself not being a staff member. Early demotion might have meant permanently leaving for me. This built right alongside the constant guilt I had deep down, the feeling that I was letting down HHG by being inactive, and the fact I was still a staff member was only because of pity or not letting go of old memories. There's so much I could write about the reasons I'm leaving. There's so much I could write about HHG in general, the history alone could make up a nice book, but not all arts are tuned to everyone, and some arts become harder the more you feel.
And I feel.
Writing this out has seen me tear up multiple times, hell just thinking about writing this up a few days ago made me full on cry for a few minutes. I have never really cut ties with something that I've been a part of for as long as HHG before, and it's given me this sense of depression and sadness constantly in my gut. But to further perpetuate the sadness is the fact that deep down, I know all this has already happened. The community's dying, my inactivity, and most of all, me losing interest in Minecraft, finally being burned out after literally tens of thousands of hours.
When I think about it logically, I shouldn't be sad at all for leaving. I've already basically left, just never officially. And yet this whole thing still gives me a great sadness. I know it will never be the same as I remembered it, but I still hold on to that hope and if I'm ever going to end the delusion, I have to do this.
I originally imagined myself writing more, but I've never been the best at expressing myself due to ADHD, and I'm running out of things to write :/ I'm going to end this with the usual mentions.
To everyone who worked at my shop;
Minecrafters360 (Guardian_Echo)
Creeper1363
kingofcons2000
Willeeklund
legop62519
flame1534524
tmcardle1221
scubabrayden
CRICO637
12rayman12
amelean
rayado56
Jshagar
and WizzardDestroyer
You guys were the best. If my tree shop didn't grow to the size it did, I might not be here right now writing this (and I don't regret one moment of it.) Thanks so much for everything :,)
In particular;
Guardian_Echo if you ever read this, you were an absolutely amazing partner to work with in the shop and I appreciate all the work you helped me with
WizzardDestroyer you were probably one of my favorite people on the entire server ever. Lending me a room in your hotel was one of the critical things that got me to where I am now, and every moment we hung out after that, including on your personal server where I was admin and we wrecked everything all the time, was memorable to no end. Please hit me up on Discord someday, I'd love to catch up on things!
To everyone I ever had a lasting friendship with;
Thanks for all the great conversations, games, debates, and memes we've shared over the years, you guys made up the bulk of my internet friends for a long time and all of you are special to me :,)
In particular;
(I'm terrible at names, especially now feeling this emotional so if I don't explicitly mention you don't worry, you haven't been completely forgotten to me)
michalthekid It's always fun talking to you on Discord, looking forward to our next musical collab
Cheez all the destruction we caused on Wizz's server was amazing, thanks for that lol
TheCakeGod we had some good times, keep barfin' rainbows my dude
Kaios You were a damn good staff member and a pretty chill guy, thanks for giving me inspiration to write Chaos
BachAtItAgain god DAMN dude you are AMAZING. You are one of the most devoted staff I've seen on the team ever, and
obsidianwolf9999 It's been awhile but you were pretty cool back in the days of Factions, so thanks
To everyone who disliked me;
Particularly XV_Scorpion_VX Anchezz and Mother_Muffins
I'm sorry we could never get along. I don't feel any resentment towards anyone anymore due to my leave so take that as you will. I wish you all the best with life.
To imtotallychris,
It's been a long time since we talked, but you used to be one of my best online friends. We shared a lot with each other and I'm glad we did, you were a good friend and I hope everything turns out for the best.
And finally, Zainos
This was hard, this was really really hard, writing all this actually took me over 8 hours.
I have a huge amount of respect for you and the way you persevere with improving HHG despite the bleak outlook for Minecraft as a whole. Keep at it man, don't let go of everything you worked so hard for.
You have known me longer than anyone else on the server, and I could say the same towards you
There's a lot I want to tell you, a lot I want to say and express and explain, but for now, I have this:
Thank you. Thank you for creating the server that gave me thousands of hours of fun social interaction. Thank you for maintaining the server that grew into the community I later had the absolute honor of moderating, and thus giving me serious community building experience. Thank you for consistantly creating new things to do and new gamemodes to enjoy; at the height of my HHG experience, they were all the rave in the community, and some of my favorite experiences have come from them.
Thank you. Thank you so much Zain, for everything.
And thank you to everyone else who read this. Many of you might not recognize me or remember me (heck, many of the people I mentioned in this either already left or got banned lol) but ultimately it doesn't matter, I appreciate you reading this and taking your time to listen to me rant about my feelings for hours. This is the most "out with a bang" I'm gonna get, so I'll take it.
Someone on the server suggested that there be an NPC statue of me standing on top of the fountain in parkour so that basically nothing would change :^) Honestly though that would be neat lol.
Finally:
I will be returning to the forums one more time, exactly 1 week from today (5/19) to check and reply to responses to this thread. I will also play on the server then for one last time.
I do not know if I will ever return after next week. I'd like to someday, but I do not know.
I will never forget you guys.
I fucking love all of you.
As I used to say:
C ya laterz!
