Minecraft Players Craft A Heartfelt Tribute To Server Owner That Passed Away From Cancer
Minecraft ruled the gaming scene for years with its kid-friendly gameplay style and overwhelming sense of community. Despite the takeover of other sensations since Minecraft’s launch in 2011 with the likes of PUBG, Fortnite, and Apex Legends, the sense of kinship within the game remains as strong as ever. Flocking to a server that was once held by a long-time member who has since passed away from cancer, players leave heartfelt messages and tributes in his honor.
Owner of the well-known Emenbee server, which hosted a remarkable 10 servers at a time with a 1500 concurrent players at its peak, Bryan “Pendar2” Heffernan, recently lost his fight against cancer. For all the time and heart he placed into Emenbee, his impact on the community was not lost. As his health declined, Heffernan shut down all of the servers left… save for the central hub. It is here that other Minecraft players gathered amongst themselves to pay tribute to an influential member of the online game.
The Owner of a once popular Minecraft server recently passed away. The hub has been turned into a memorial. from r/gaming
In addition to the touching nod to Pendar2, his friend Mod_masta made a blog post on the official Emenbee website. It reads:
Pendar2 (Bryan) started Emenbee back in October 2011. For years, he dedicated his life to creating a Minecraft server that many of us called our home for a while. It started out as a survival server, and eventually grew to have up to over 10 different servers and 1500 concurrent players. For the last couple years of the server’s life, Bryan was not very active and many of you thought he had given up. The truth is that he was diagnosed with cancer. He endured chemo and surgery for several months, and eventually we thought he had been cured. But towards the end of last year, it unexpectedly came back. Recently, Bryan passed away.
To me Bryan was a partner, a friend, and an amazing server owner. Working with him for several years, I learned how much of a genius he truly was, in both his knowledge that allowed Emenbee to become so popular and in how he excelled at developing with so little experience. Our time spent together on Emenbee together were some of the best years of my life. It was truly an honor to have a friend like him. He did so much more for the server than most players thought he did. I could not have done anything without him.
Without Bryan there would never have been an Emenbee, and so many of us would have been deprived of so many fun and exciting experiences. Bryan will be remembered as a genius, a compassionate person, and our hero. He accomplished so much in so little time and influenced more people than most others have throughout their lifetime.”
For those who wish to donate funds in Heffernan’s name, his family set up a crowdfunding campaign. All proceeds will go to the Bryan P. Heffernan Scholarship Fund to offer financial support to computer science students graduating from Groton-Dunstable Regional High School. To make a contribution, you can head on over here.
Do you still enjoy Minecraft shenanigans? What do you think about online gaming tributes to friends who have since passed away? It’s simultaneously heartbreaking and moving to see people band together during hard times. Let us know what you think in the comments section below or start a conversation on Don’t Feed the Gamers Facebook page. To stay up to date on gaming and entertainment news as it happens, follow us on Twitter! Here are some of our latest:
Hoi Duong2131 Posts
Hoi is an elusive figure at DFTG, whose favorite past-times include chillin' in the Fade, reading manga, watching anime, collecting novelty items, and gaming.
