Minecraft has been updated with a tribute to the popular streamer Technoblade, whose death from cancer was announced by his family last week. The splash image for Minecraft in the game’s launcher now features a pig wearing a golden crown — a callout to Technoblade’s Minecraft character, a royal pig-man wearing a bejeweled crown.
The Minecraft team tweeted on Friday that the team was ”heartbroken over the loss of Technoblade,” writing that he “brought so much joy” to the game’s community.
We have been trying to find the words, but all of us here at Minecraft are heartbroken over the loss of Technoblade. He meant so much to our community and brought so much joy. He will be missed dearly. ️
— Minecraft (@Minecraft) July 1, 2022
Technoblade was a hugely popular Minecraft streamer, with more than 13 million subscribers on YouTube, and was part of the hit server Dream SMP. In a YouTube video published last Thursday, Technoblade’s father read a message from the streamer and discussed the work that had gone into making this final video as he was struggling with cancer. As of this writing, it has more than 54 million views.
Tributes to Technoblade have poured in from other streamers and members of the Minecraft creator community. In the days since, countless pieces of fanart have been posted to Twitter in commemoration, too.
The Minecraft team hasn’t directly acknowledged the splash screen updated yet, but it’s clearly pushed out this small change in tribute. The original version of the launcher image still features a pig in the same position, but it lacks Technoblade’s trademark crown.
