I know. I've seen a lot of videos on the differences between Java and Bedrock, how Bedrock came to be, modding on Java like Feed The Beast, and multiplayer servers like 2BT2 (for those that don't know FitMC has some good vidoes on 2B2T; it's a neat rabbit hole to go down if you want to kill sometime).

What I am saying is I am surprised that Microsoft is still updating Java when there's so much money to be made nickle and diming players in Bedrock edition. Like paying for skins for example. It would definitely piss off a lot of the player base but I don't know if it would cause them to lose money in the long run. I imagine a lot of casual players are content using Bedrock and unaware of why Java is important.

Kids are all playing Bedrock on their Switches and iPads. Microsoft is just passing the long game.

Java is quite popular online due to all the mods and the videos people upload to YouTube using those mods, but I believe in terms of number of users, Bedrock outscores it quite a bit. The barrier to entry is lower – $7 on iOS/Android and most people have phones.

In what world is c++ better for cross platform than Java?

Good thing we have Minetest and Vintage Story!

Because Bedrock runs on phones, tablets, consoles, and a host of other random crap

And it also removes Linux support. Typical Microsoft.

There's also the fact that Bedrock patches bugs that the Java community freaks out about patching. Several chunk update glitches and undesirable redstone behavior are exploited by the Java players, and they go nuts over the idea of fixing the issues. Bedrock, being a new codebase, obviously didn't port over old crusty bugs and therefore doesn't have to carry over those expectations.

Also swapped performance issues with more bugs that were there years ago and still persist because they are almost impossible to fix.

In the end, we all know it was done either because they wanted to shove microtransactions down our throat and/or had some kind of deal to maintain the Java edition without microtransactions.

Or, maybe, just maybe, they though "it's just a block game, what could be so hard to rewrite it?" and absolutely failed what a single person got right almost immediately back in the day (like not falling through the floor all the time).

Only if you're incompetent. Otherwise just not optimal.

Starsector, Rise to Ruins and Project Zomboid run well and are made in Java for example. It's harder to pull off but it can be done. (still needs native libraries though)

Yea, back in the day I dreamt about a Minecraft that didn’t run on Java and thus better on the low end hardware I had. In my dreams it just still had all the benefits of the Java edition which is why I now dream of old Java Minecraft

Yes. They're called datapacks.

"Oh! Those aren't mods!"

Well, they modify the game, so they're mods.

"Mod Support" means (or at least, it used to) the game has structures in place to allow modifications, not that the company is paywalling mods that they "approve". I'm not sure what the latter is called, but I'm quite sure there'd be a massive uproar if MS/MJ did that for java edition. I know I'd never play the game again, that's for sure.