It makes no sense to me that there are two versions of the game. I'll be watching a youtube tutorial video, and suddenly they'll say "this doesn't work on bedrock".

Ugh! Then you find out it's not just a simple ARM vs x86 issue. They function SLIGHTLY differently too. And they can't coexist with crossplay. Bedrock is the nuetered version.

Just combine the games. I get console can't host a server, but at least let them join servers!

Microslop is not allowed to monitise java. Thats why they made the bedrock edition. They also neutered the bedrock edition of mods because (free) mods would mean less money.

But there are servers that allow crossplay, but its a hassle for the owners & they cant use any java mods then, only plugins

I'm curious what their plan is into the future. It must be hard maintaining two separate codebases for the two different games

Because Microsoft bought Mojang and likes to gatekeep everything they can for profits sake. There is an educational version of Minecraft too.

First of all, Bedrock is on PC, but only through the Microsoft Store. Which should be the first hint at the answer to your question.

Bedrock is the neutered version, and that's intentional, it's supposed to be neutered. It's completely locked down and fully controllable by Microsoft. Nobody else has the keys, and it's up to Microsoft to open the door to allow anyone or anything inside that they want. The non-neutered Java edition is not the goal it is the problem. The goal is to kill Java, or keep it alive solely as an advertising pipeline that feeds the next generation of children into Bedrock. Bedrock can be monetized and controlled and creates an ecosystem that people become trapped within, unable to escape as their purchases, their data, their characters, their accounts are all held hostage inside.

It doesn't matter that it's objectively worse. All that matters is that it's the first Minecraft you will see when a parent goes to buy it, not knowing the difference. Eventually, it will probably be the only version you can buy. It will be (already is) full of microtransactions and subscription services and paid mods and servers and Microsoft will inevitably take their generous cut of everything in the Microsoft and Minecraft stores just like Steam, Fortnite, Roblox, Play Store, and all the other predatory marketplaces out there.

This is not about delivering value to customers, this is about delivering value to Microsoft. You are looking at things the completely wrong way around.

Can you even get a game made entirely in Java running on a console? 🤔

The Java version of the game runs like ass comparatively and is only smooth on our souped up x86 CPUs

With enough effort you can get Java to run pretty much anywhere. You just have to be willing to port the JVM there if one doesn't already run on it

While Bedrock performs way better than Java, Java will run on anything that has a JVM and I've had the vanilla version run just fine on an M1 MacBook Air.

If you use community mods like Sodium for increased performance, I'm pretty confident it would run on a Raspberry Pi

I mean i get the move from Java to C. You can make more performant games with C. So thats likely the engineering answer. A chance to remake the code base from scratch, less tech debt, and more performant language.

The problem is its owned by microslop, and they spent more time making it part of their version of the walled garden and adding Epstien's microtransactions to it versuses getting it up to feature parity.

Java runs on like 3 billon devices doesn't it? At least that's what the installer told me

There is a technical reason. The Java version was never designed to run on mobile and consoles. So they had to rewrite the game with normal game dev tools. This allows crossplay between iOS, Android, Windows, Xbox, Switch, and PlayStation which is pretty neat.

The second reason is content moderation for consoles. Microsoft doesn't want you to be able to view unapproved content by joining a random server on your console (or viewing something that would regularly be a paid feature). However, this limitation can be worked around by spoofing a DNS record to allow consoles to connect to private Bedrock servers. I have hosted a private server on my own machine and had Xbox and Switch players connect which was fun.

Sorry, I should have been more specific. They've made many optimizations since the decision to make a C++ version.

They're fully allowed monetizing Java Edition. Look at Realms for example. They own Mojang AB, and Mojang owns Minecraft.

I meant the base game but you are also right