HeroSteve

HeroSteve is the non-binary ship between Herobrine and Steve from the Minecraft fandom.

Canon
The character Herobrine has never existed in the game itself, but has been acknowledged multiple times by Mojang. Ironically, their insistence that "Herobrine was never real" had them acknowledge the existence of the character and it has since become something of an in-joke between the developers and the players. Reactions to Herobrine from the developers ranged from "It was funny at first", "I like him" to "No opinion". Herobrine still made a few official appearances, like appearing at the far back of some promo images as an easter egg and having a few statues made to be displayed at Minecon. It became something of a running gag that Mojang "removed Herobrine" on the changelogs starting in the beta and continuing well into the current versions. Even Minecraft Earth got in on it by having the question "Is Herobrine in this game too?" answered with "", though it was later removed.

Fanon
HeroSteve is the most popular ship for "vanilla" Minecraft, overshadowing the canon-compliant Stelex.

Origins of the character
The Herobrine myth started on 4chan's paranormal board as a now-unknown player of the game reported seeing a nameless entity in a single player world, hidden in the fog. Initially mistaking it for a cow, upon closer inspection, the entity turned out to be the default skin ("Steve") but with empty eyes. He looked at the player and then ran off into the fog, when the player pursued him, he was gone. Continuing to play in the world like nothing happened, the player noticed strange structures that tread the line between being natural and man-made, like perfect 2x2 tunnels, perfect pyramids in the ocean and trees with all their leaves cut off. The player felt Herobrine's empty eyes staring at them, but never got a better look at him. The player then saved and went to the forums, trying to start a discussion about the entity, only to have it deleted faster the sooner they posted it. The final time, they received a PM from a user called "Herobrine" simply saying "Stop.", but when checking the user's profile, the site crashed. That is how Herobrine got his name. They later received an email from another user and started a conspiracy about the "mystery player with no pupils". A month later, the player's informant received a clue about the name "Herobrine" being frequently used by a Swedish gamer, who was supposedly the brother of Markus Persson (aka Notch), the original developer of the game. Emailing Notch, asking if he had a brother, Notch supposedly replied saying "I did, but he's no longer with us". Having not seen the "mystery man" since then, the player could only provide evidence by showing a screenshot they happened to take on the first encounter: It shows a foggy Overworld, a chicken in the foreground and what is assumed to be Herobrine standing far left in the background, one has to really look to see him.

Brocraft streams
It would be until the Brocraft streamer "Copeland" caught on to the myth until it started getting major popularity. Altering a painting's texture to resemble what Herobrine supposedly looked like and setting up a jumpscare by avoiding that room for the majority of the stream and pretending that Herobrine is standing in his house. Another streamer "Patimuss" then showed Herobrine standing in a player-created lava pool, but also revealing that he's just trolling his followers. Copeland was adamant about insisting that Herobrine is real and gave his followers a link to the now defunct site "ghostinthestream.net", showing a gif of Herobrine's face with moving, realistic human eyes and a coded message underneath, which reveals itself to be an unrelated creepypasta when decoded.

Further mutation
The Herobrine myth was a hit in the Minecraft community and is still considered to be a staple of it years later. The popularity of it caused a number of headcanons to pop-up. Fans often tie Herobrine to the abandoned mineshafts, at the time the only constructions hinting that the player character (Steve) is not alone in the world. That spawned the idea that Herobrine is the ghost of a dead miner. Others really like to play up the ghost angle by having Herobrine be able to possess passive mobs and being the cause of the undead mobs. Sometimes, he's depicted as all powerful, capable of reshaping the overworld on a whim, not unlike Bill Cipher or the Collector.

Portrayals usually tend to split between "Stalker Herobrine", who follows the players around for unclear reasons and "Griefer Herobrine", who deliberately tortures the players by trapping them in his dungeons or stealing their items (a characterization previously given to Creepers). The idea that Herobrine can be "summoned" with gold blocks and redstone torches is also popular. As a result, Herobrine is often seen as the inspiration for the Endermen and (sometimes) the Wither.

Portrayals outside of the game, like machinimas and fan animations often cast Herobrine as the main villain, though some only reference him or even make him comedic by playing up his stalker angle and believing that he simply wants to be Steve's friend. Fanart often gives Herobrine a more demonic edge, giving him horns, unusual skin or black wings in addition to his blank-white (often glowing) eyes.

Some divorce the idea that he's Notch's dead brother and instead try to tie him closer to Steve, having him be a dead relative or close friend or be his actual inner demon, both of which explain why they look so alike. To distinguish him from Steve, some fanartists give him longer hair and the beard Steve used to have. Others give him a complete outfit change.

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