Something like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pidgin_(software) ?

Pidgin 2.x (latest stable branch) is unfortunately over a decade behind at this point. The developers are working on a big rewrite (3.x) but it's nowhere near complete or ready for use yet.

In short, I wouldn't recommend Pidgin for someone who wants a modern messaging app.

Pretty certain pidgin relies on gtk2 which is pretty dead. Most of the supported protocols are also dead, or woefully outdated like XMPP and IRC.

They've been working on a version 3 for years but no idea if that will ever happen.

See pidgin.im/plugins for modern protocol support.

As for version 3, yeah turns out that things take a very long time a tiny team that has zero financial support.

You must be joking