It was a simpler time. A time when flash games still dominated my gaming experience; a time when our hulking, beige machine in the living room woke me up every morning with the sound of the windows 7 logon effect. A time when my steam library had more free-to-play titles than paid ones, and a time when the screaming fan of a radeon HD 4890 and an i3 was drowned out only by the sound of my feeble attempts to play Skyrim on such modest hardware, railguns firing in the distance on the off-day where I would play Quake Live, and... the fast paced, pounding Boss 1 music.
It had been my obsession for the last few days. One of the few games that had actually been gifted to me on Steam. And a gift it was. I cleaved through Cthulu's eye, vilethorn'd the Eater of Worlds with ease, and cracked Skeletron's skull like an egg. All that was left was to develop my world, and mine out everything I could. This was all there was, and for the time being, there was nothing left for me to do. And there I sat, waiting for something new to do. The intermittent period between release and 1.1 felt like forever.
And then, one day in 2012, I logged in to steam only to see something strange: a download. I investigated, only to notice that Terraria had began auto-updating. I was shocked -- I hadn't expected the game to progress any further than I had got. I checked the wiki, and was astounded to see an entire new mode. The new mode was supposedly extremely difficult, with a whole host of new weapons and armor, with new, more difficult bosses. It was a sort of... hard-mode. I started a new character, and, using the lessons from my previous run, made it all the way to hell with ease.
But the massive, eldritch horror I had found in hell was giving me quite a bit of trouble. No matter how much I crawled the wiki, farmed jellyfish, assembled arenas, and bought grenades, the Wall of Flesh truly was an enemy my character wasn't strong enough to face. The bridge felt like thousands of blocks long, my buff count could have been in the double digits -- and it wasn't enough. Until one day, when I had been pumping myself up for ages, buffing as much as I could, filled out my hellstone armor, and reforged all my accessories, it happened.
In a rush of adrenaline and shock, I finally saw an explosion of gibs. It had been enough. The spirits of light and dark had been released, and there was no going back. Had I tried any harder, I would have broken my poor computer. But the important part was that I had won, and could finally call myself good at this game. I had conquered Normal Mode, and it was time to go big or go home. I was coming for the mechanical bosses, and I wasn't going to stop until I was walking on top of the heaping, metal carcasses, souls in hand. It was time to not only behold, but to conquer the mechanized beasts of terror.
The twins were first. A clockwork assault rifle, adamantite armor, and cursed bullets. Weaved through the lasers and cursed flames with no problem, and I didn't let up until retinazer was dead, and I could focus on Spazmatism. And finally, with enough dodging and patience, He went down, too. With a newfound hallowed repeater and some stocked up Jester arrows, the Destroyer was a joke. My DPS was beyond ridiculous, and he must have went down in under a minute. The megashark was easily the most fun I could possibly have with a gun. The very same night, I crafted a mechanical skull. Skeletron Prime's arms were of little challenge, and dodging the head was trivial. No match for cursed bullets. Morning arose, and I emerged from the house, flamethrower in-hand.
And then, the waiting happened again. Sure, on and off, I would play, if not just to erect some more buildings, invent new challenges, and wire up new useless crab engines. But the wait was on. I was certain that Terraria would be dead forever, and sink to the bottom of the Steam store, never to be heard from again. "Oh, well..." I thought to myself. 5th grade was over, and it was time for me to get serious with my schoolwork. Middle school was upon me, and I figured I wouldn't have anything to do anyways. I had fun with the seasonal updates, but for the most part, I was just minding my time for two years.
And then, one friday in 2013, I decided to log on to Steam with my parents' new (!) desktop computer, and, once again, noticed something downloading. Overjoyed, I waited for the loading bar to finish, made sure "begin playing when finished downloading" was checked, and sat, giddy, waiting to see what 1.2 had in store. And soon, much to my disbelief, I discovered, that everything --- everything -- had been more than worth the wait.
Slanted blocks. New mobs. New bosses. New armor. New NPCs. Too many new weapons to count. It was like Christmas in September. I must have sank another month into Terraria. I decided to switch from my usual ranger play to something more mage-oriented, just to change things up. I created a new world, and, using my developed character, blazed through pre-hardmode and crushed the mechanical bosses. I went jungle delving, and upgraded my armor to chlorophyte. With minimal setup and a stack of mana potions at the ready, I used cursed flames to char Plantera's leaves -- and emerged victorious. The ominous pop-up about the dungeon was interesting, but I was far more interested in the temple. Lihzahrd were easy at this point, and Golem was a fun fight, but left something to be desired. I made my way to the other end of the world, and braced myself.
The dungeon became a hotspot for absurdly powerful mobs, but I had a very specific set and weapon in mind: the Shadowbeam Staff, and a Spectre set. After days of being crushed by Paladin's hammers, shot in the dark by snipers, and roundhouse kicked by Bone Lees, I finally got a Shadowbeam staff, and I had ground so much ectoplasm that I had enough for a Spectre set. My determination had paid off, and I had my new, perfect loadout. It was fun, but I had no more goals in mind at the time. Unfortunately all great things must come to an end.
Lucky for me, this end was temporary. Another long two years, another bountiful update full of content and color. The Moon Lord gave me trouble, but eventually, I had once again beaten Terraria. I turned to the modding scene, and had fun with Calamity et. al. I enjoyed plenty of servers. I made some interesting circuits with the new logic gates. And up to this point, the rest is history. I had fun. I want to keep having fun. I appreciate Re-Logic for such an incredible piece of work, and I appreciate Resonance Array for the wonderful soundtrack they composed to it.
tl;dr All ~1600 hours I have put into Terraria I enjoyed. It's been a fun 8 years. I hope this universe keeps going, and I hope Re-Logic keeps breathing new life into this wonderful game.