Hi Shelf, Thanks for sharing this.
I really enjoyed being a part of the platform as well even if I was rather late to the party having joined around two years ago.
The main reason why I also am sentimental about it is because the platform represented a part of Minecraft which simply isn't viable anymore for large scale multiplayer experiences.
The server was a sandbox where anything felt possible (Including but not limited to building several castles in MobWars, Beating people up with a fish in Survival Games, and myself using the guns from Quake in Skywars due to a bug I capped on a private stream. Good times!) and despite thousands of people joining at any moment, There still was a tight-knit sense of community present through the ways in which players could communicate and specifically how people communicated with each other.
BrokenLens was simply an ethical and accommodating platform. Their most expensive rank was a "Buy it for life" plan which provided cosmetics and quality of life improvements to those who financially supported the owner and sole developer of the platform.
This was a breath of fresh air from the world of monthly subscriptions for basic features, crate keys, and other predatory and Eula-violating means of monetization commonly seen on other networks although it likely was one of the key factors which also led to the closure of the platform from the financial struggles that it faced.
In terms of how accommodating the platform itself was, It was clear that it prioritized the player experience first with the large variety of modes and play-styles available and with how everything was integrated.
That was what personally lead to me being interested in the platform despite my initial skepticism on the way it managed offline users.
I've been proactive throughout my time on the platform with archival of what's up with stream archives and just way too much gameplay footage locally saved. Been thinking for quite a while about making a big video project regarding my experience and involvement with the platform and what that meant although I still am not comfortable with publishing my work online in general even if I did produce a collection of videos shared for platform's official social media accounts behind the scenes.
Also while I have a lot of background and information on the platform, There still are many questions I have unanswered and I'm still thinking about exactly how I want to visualize and represent things. Definitely overthinking it though. lol
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