WEBVTT Kind: captions Language: en 00:00:00.620 --> 00:00:06.020 No one: Literally no one: 00:00:06.060 --> 00:00:09.440 *Record Scratch* 00:00:09.480 --> 00:00:15.840 Oh, come on! You gotta be kidding me! 00:00:15.840 --> 00:00:19.880 Hello, Internet. Welcome to Game Theory. 00:00:19.940 --> 00:00:22.860 Call it nostalgia. Call it a return to a more innocent time. 00:00:22.860 --> 00:00:29.960 Call it a desire to trend right off of PewDiePie's success playing the game that just overthrew Fortnite. Rest in Peace, Juergen. (IT'S JOERGEN!) 00:00:29.980 --> 00:00:33.639 But I have been digging through a lot of Minecraft lore lately. 00:00:33.660 --> 00:00:36.300 Oh, and you absolutely heard that right. 00:00:36.300 --> 00:00:42.280 According to Google Trends, Minecraft is now on top of Fortnite, both in terms of web search and here on YouTube. 00:00:42.280 --> 00:00:46.020 It's like the Grover Cleveland of video games. 00:00:46.020 --> 00:00:50.840 And by that, I mean a game that was king, gave up its crown to someone else, but then snatched it back. 00:00:50.840 --> 00:00:56.400 Just like old Grover C. did when he was elected president. History's only double president, for that matter. 00:00:56.420 --> 00:01:04.400 Honestly, it's like the only thing Grover Cleveland's known for. Heck, this 10 fascinating facts article on him couldn't even come up with anything remotely interesting. 00:01:04.400 --> 00:01:07.510 Let alone fascinating. What was I talking about again? 00:01:07.510 --> 00:01:14.079 Oh, yeah! Minecraft on the other hand is endlessly fascinating because for a game that's now 10 years old, 00:01:14.120 --> 00:01:18.340 Happy anniversary, by the way. Its lore still hasn't been cracked. 00:01:18.340 --> 00:01:22.260 Oh sure, there's plenty of speculation and lots of really good ideas. 00:01:22.300 --> 00:01:30.220 But my knowledge no one has truly been able to piece together a final, all encompassing, all mysteries of this world tied together lore solve. 00:01:30.220 --> 00:01:33.399 And so today I, don't really plan on doing that. 00:01:33.400 --> 00:01:41.060 I'm not even gonna pretend. I'm starting to learn that people take it really seriously when I say stuff like "Today, we're solving this." 00:01:41.060 --> 00:01:47.460 So, let me instead, say this quite honestly to you. I'm gonna do my best to start us on a journey to solve this thing. 00:01:47.460 --> 00:01:52.240 I want to start a conversation with all of you where we can pool our knowledge and figure this out together. 00:01:52.240 --> 00:01:57.600 I want to put together my thoughts on pieces of evidence that stood out as particularly interesting to me, 00:01:57.600 --> 00:02:03.789 propose to you what I interpret that to mean, and then leave further discussion in our collective communal hands. 00:02:03.789 --> 00:02:09.549 It's a theory. It's always a theory, and like any theory, it's meant to be discussed, analyzed, 00:02:09.950 --> 00:02:13.700 criticized, added to, tested. And because it's a theory about video games, 00:02:13.700 --> 00:02:15.800 It's meant, most importantly of all, to be fun. 00:02:15.800 --> 00:02:20.320 And if along the way we solve some deep-seated lore mysteries, great! More power to us. 00:02:20.320 --> 00:02:23.100 These games at the end of the day are puzzles to solve. 00:02:23.100 --> 00:02:26.660 And so I'm gonna do my best to lead that charge in solving those puzzles. 00:02:26.660 --> 00:02:33.320 But I want you to be there with me every step of the way. And so our first step when it comes to solving Minecraft, 00:02:33.320 --> 00:02:41.040 is tackling the Endermen. Originally programmed into the game as a joking reference to Slenderman, these tall, dark and handsome creatures... 00:02:41.060 --> 00:02:43.360 Well, just tall and dark, I guess. 00:02:43.360 --> 00:02:47.380 ...have become The Cornerstone upon which all other lore in this game is built. 00:02:47.380 --> 00:02:55.740 Solving what the Endermen are is essential if we have any hope of truly coming to the definitive solution as to the hidden backstory of this game. 00:02:55.740 --> 00:02:59.560 And after exploring the design of survival mode, the gameplay decisions, 00:02:59.910 --> 00:03:04.160 even ancillary canonical content and books like the Mobestiary. Surprise, surprise. 00:03:04.160 --> 00:03:07.060 I have myself a theory as to what they actually are. 00:03:07.060 --> 00:03:14.640 Admittedly, it's not a new theory, but what it lacks for in originality, it more than makes up for in evidence and observation 00:03:14.640 --> 00:03:19.970 It is my proposal to you today that the Endermen aren't aliens, they're not ghosts, 00:03:19.970 --> 00:03:25.459 I almost thought that they were insects, but that one didn't pan out. No, what they are is human. 00:03:25.459 --> 00:03:31.219 They're brilliant humans. Humans who are in trouble. A literal fight for their lives and needed an escape. 00:03:31.220 --> 00:03:38.119 But in the process, they suffered a horrific fate, reducing them to the moaning shadows of a fallen civilization that they are now. 00:03:38.120 --> 00:03:43.360 So in the true spirit of Minecraft, let's start building ourselves a theory, shall we? 00:03:43.360 --> 00:03:44.299 What do we know about these creatures? 00:03:44.300 --> 00:03:49.400 Well, first we know that they're one of the game's neutral mobs, meaning that they're not gonna attack you, 00:03:49.400 --> 00:03:51.140 unless they're actively provoked. 00:03:51.140 --> 00:03:56.480 This is already interesting because it means that in many ways, they come in peace. 00:03:56.480 --> 00:03:59.540 I mean, look at the list of mobs and all of their behavior patterns. 00:03:59.540 --> 00:04:04.900 Anything else that's nice to you is either an animal, a Villager, or a Zombie Pigman, which is weird, 00:04:04.980 --> 00:04:07.600 and honestly merits an episode of its own for another day. 00:04:07.600 --> 00:04:11.920 Everything, and I mean everything else, is hostile. 00:04:11.920 --> 00:04:15.320 Except for the Enderman. So already, there's a bit of an odd 00:04:15.320 --> 00:04:20.520 tenuously peaceful relationship between us and the Endermen, but it gets even weirder when you consider 00:04:20.520 --> 00:04:25.740 that they're the only other creatures other than Steve or Alex able to move blocks. 00:04:25.740 --> 00:04:31.780 Sure, they're kind of picky about what blocks they pick up but carrying blocks is an ability only shared between 00:04:31.780 --> 00:04:35.120 our character and the Endermen. As the Mobestiary says, quote: 00:04:35.120 --> 00:04:43.380 "They will not just pick up any block but will choose only clay, dirt and sand, flowers and other plants, and, rather oddly, TNT... 00:04:43.380 --> 00:04:47.640 ...some claim the enderman is indulging in a form of play or attempting to communicate." 00:04:47.640 --> 00:04:53.699 Speaking of communication, we also know that they can talk, or at least had the ability to talk. 00:04:53.700 --> 00:04:57.140 Listen to some of the sound clips from when Endermen are idling near you. 00:04:57.140 --> 00:05:01.340 *Endermen Sound Clips* 00:05:01.380 --> 00:05:08.480 Hear it? There's clearly a language here. A real language that we, as humans, can understand. Listen again. 00:05:08.480 --> 00:05:10.060 You should be hearing: "Hey" 00:05:10.060 --> 00:05:11.860 *Enderman Sound Clip, Runs Twice* 00:05:11.860 --> 00:05:12.360 "Hello" 00:05:12.360 --> 00:05:14.020 *Enderman Sound Clip, Runs Twice* 00:05:14.020 --> 00:05:16.600 This next one is really clear. "What's up?" 00:05:16.600 --> 00:05:18.720 *Enderman Sound Clip, Runs Twice* 00:05:18.800 --> 00:05:20.900 ...And "Look for the eye" 00:05:20.900 --> 00:05:21.860 *Enderman Sound Clip* 00:05:21.880 --> 00:05:29.400 Which, presumably is referencing Eyes of Ender. The items that allow you to find strongholds, where they're used to activate a portal to the End. 00:05:29.480 --> 00:05:33.420 Home of the Endermen, and the game's final boss; the Ender Dragon. 00:05:33.420 --> 00:05:37.740 So we have ourselves neutral creatures who are able to move blocks, just like us, 00:05:37.740 --> 00:05:42.920 and have language abilities far beyond what we hear elsewhere in the game from characters like villagers. 00:05:42.920 --> 00:05:51.460 It's certainly a lot of odd similarities to be sure, but far from airtight evidence that the Endermen are somehow related to men, men. 00:05:51.460 --> 00:05:55.340 But now let's take a minute to actually look at their home, The End. 00:05:55.349 --> 00:05:58.799 The End is a weird final dimension for Minecraft. 00:05:58.800 --> 00:06:02.099 It honestly feels to me like where the game started to run out of money. 00:06:02.160 --> 00:06:04.220 (Not that it could ever run out of money) 00:06:04.220 --> 00:06:09.920 With the whole thing just being a bunch of end stone and purpur blocks, ugly purples and yellows everywhere. (Royal Colors) 00:06:09.920 --> 00:06:16.600 Huge chunks of landscape missing, and giant cities that you can visit far off in the distance. All of which are eerily empty. 00:06:16.930 --> 00:06:19.199 This is the home of the Endermen, sure. 00:06:19.199 --> 00:06:25.060 Even the Mobestiary says it but look closer and you see that while the Endermen may call this dimension home, 00:06:25.060 --> 00:06:27.980 and they certainly wander around in the empty open landscapes, 00:06:27.980 --> 00:06:32.540 these giant, looming, Thanos purple buildings aren't for them. What do I mean by that? 00:06:32.580 --> 00:06:35.840 Well, let's take a look inside the end cities. 00:06:35.840 --> 00:06:38.440 There's tons of great loot hidden all over the place. 00:06:38.440 --> 00:06:43.420 Inside the chests, you can find everything from enchanted swords to saddles and armor for your horse. 00:06:43.420 --> 00:06:48.920 The Minecraft Gamepedia breaks down everything that we can find here, but something's wrong with that list. 00:06:48.970 --> 00:06:52.649 None of these items are actually useful to the Endermen. 00:06:52.710 --> 00:06:56.860 They don't wear armor, they don't attack with swords, and they certainly don't ride animals. 00:06:56.860 --> 00:07:04.720 Heck, there are no animals in the end to ride. Even the fact that the items are kept in chests should be a huge red flag here. 00:07:04.720 --> 00:07:10.139 Remember Endermen are only picking up certain blocks and none of those blocks entail chests. 00:07:10.140 --> 00:07:18.900 They can't use these things or the thing that stores those things. All of this points to the idea that The End's cities weren't built by the Endermen. 00:07:18.900 --> 00:07:25.259 They were built by and for someone else. Some other ancient people who managed to get to The End. 00:07:25.259 --> 00:07:29.620 But who? When you start up a new survival mode game you enter a blank world. 00:07:29.620 --> 00:07:32.159 Immediately you notice that you're the only one of your kind. 00:07:32.160 --> 00:07:36.620 Oh sure, as you adventure, you'll come across NPCs like the villagers. 00:07:36.620 --> 00:07:44.880 But they're not like you. They don't look like you. They can't build like you. You and the villagers are fundamentally different. 00:07:44.880 --> 00:07:47.120 It's almost as if you're a different species. 00:07:47.140 --> 00:07:52.560 This fact is even supported by zombie attacks. When bit, a villager doesn't transform into a normal zombie. 00:07:52.690 --> 00:07:59.190 It turns specifically into a zombie villager. Regular zombies and zombie villagers are different. 00:07:59.190 --> 00:08:07.380 In fact, the only times that you ever really see anything that looks even remotely like you, it's always in the form of undead enemies. 00:08:07.440 --> 00:08:13.560 Zombies, Drowned, Husks. It implies that once upon a time there were other humans here. 00:08:13.560 --> 00:08:15.120 But they all died en masse. 00:08:15.120 --> 00:08:21.820 It's a strange detail that you probably noticed, but you shrug it off and you continue on your journey. Then you start discovering pre-existing structures 00:08:21.820 --> 00:08:26.680 Mineshafts. Temples in the desert. Monuments underwater. All abandoned. 00:08:26.680 --> 00:08:28.900 All of them lost to time. 00:08:28.900 --> 00:08:34.280 Again, you're the only person who can build things in this world, and you certainly didn't build any of these things. 00:08:34.280 --> 00:08:40.100 So where did they come from? Making things even more suspicious is the fact that ruins like desert temples are 00:08:40.140 --> 00:08:46.600 protected by cleverly designed booby traps, elaborate fake floors complete with pressure plates & grids of TNT. 00:08:46.600 --> 00:08:51.620 It all points to one thing: An advanced society of builders once lived in The Overworld. 00:08:51.630 --> 00:08:54.960 But have since disappeared, so that begs the question. Where did they go? 00:08:54.960 --> 00:09:00.380 Maybe they all died which in turn led to the armies of the undead mobs that we have to guard against every night. 00:09:00.380 --> 00:09:03.560 And while I certainly think that that's part of it, it's not the whole story. 00:09:03.560 --> 00:09:06.120 Because we know that they went somewhere. 00:09:06.140 --> 00:09:11.080 Teleported somewhere. And while they could have gone any number of places, we know for a fact, 00:09:11.080 --> 00:09:15.040 that one of the places they ended up was The End. How can we be so sure? 00:09:15.040 --> 00:09:16.460 Strongholds. 00:09:16.460 --> 00:09:20.920 Strongholds are the hidden ancient ruins that contain massive portals to The End. 00:09:20.920 --> 00:09:26.760 Whatever this ancient society was, they were so advanced that they could figure out how to build these things. 00:09:26.760 --> 00:09:30.460 Which in turn makes them more advanced than even you the player. 00:09:30.460 --> 00:09:36.420 In Survival Mode, you can't craft the end frames necessary to construct this thing. In order to travel to the end, 00:09:36.420 --> 00:09:41.680 you must find these portals hidden within the stronghold. And let's stop there for a minute. 00:09:41.880 --> 00:09:43.880 I mean, have you ever thought to question that name? 00:09:44.360 --> 00:09:46.911 Stronghold? It's a pretty odd choice. 00:09:46.911 --> 00:09:53.460 Personally, I would think it to be like the portal room or the Gateway room or the altar or something, anything like that. 00:09:53.460 --> 00:10:01.319 But instead the designers of Minecraft named it "stronghold." A term that refers to a highly secure structure built for defending against attacks. 00:10:01.660 --> 00:10:03.220 And there's that idea again. 00:10:03.220 --> 00:10:07.920 An ancient civilization of advanced builders that was quickly dying. 00:10:07.920 --> 00:10:14.200 A group of builders just like our player who were being threatened in the Overworld, and needed an escape. 00:10:14.200 --> 00:10:17.320 And what they created was a portal to another dimension. 00:10:17.320 --> 00:10:23.160 The End, where wouldn't you know it, they built cities to store the items and armor from their previous world. 00:10:23.160 --> 00:10:25.940 But there was one thing that they didn't expect: 00:10:25.940 --> 00:10:33.599 That this would be a one-way trip. That the portal would close up behind them, leaving them stranded in a strange and barren wasteland. 00:10:33.600 --> 00:10:36.620 Sure, they were safe from whatever was killing them in the Overworld, 00:10:36.620 --> 00:10:41.600 But now they were trapped in a wasteland. A wasteland guarded by an unstoppable dragon. 00:10:41.600 --> 00:10:47.840 And they came unprepared. Based on what we see in the chests, they came in with swords and armor and horses. 00:10:47.840 --> 00:10:51.440 Effective weapons to be sure, but not against an otherworldly foe. 00:10:51.440 --> 00:10:56.430 A giant foe that flies around and attacks with towering beacons that restore its health. 00:10:56.430 --> 00:10:58.410 They couldn't defeat this thing. 00:10:58.410 --> 00:11:02.279 Hence why it's still living when we arrived, and as we know from the game, 00:11:02.280 --> 00:11:06.420 the only way out of The End is through defeating the Ender Dragon. 00:11:06.700 --> 00:11:13.020 And since they couldn't, they were stuck. Trapped there for generations. They learned to live in harmony with the dragon. 00:11:13.020 --> 00:11:19.770 They make a new life with whatever limited resources they have. They're building homes using the strange end stones and purpur blocks. 00:11:19.770 --> 00:11:21.960 They run out of food and soon have nothing to eat, 00:11:22.290 --> 00:11:25.080 so they turn to the strange chorus fruits found there. 00:11:25.080 --> 00:11:33.119 Chorus fruits, which funny enough, have teleportation properties. And over time, they begin to change. They adapt to their new surroundings. 00:11:33.160 --> 00:11:35.456 Oh sure, they retain some human features. 00:11:35.456 --> 00:11:43.289 According to the diagrams in the Mobestiary, their brains are very human-like, and they have the flat faces and wide eyes, indicative of humans. 00:11:43.290 --> 00:11:45.899 They still do vaguely look like our player character, 00:11:45.900 --> 00:11:51.080 but they evolved to grow taller, which makes picking the tall stalks of chorus fruit easier, 00:11:51.080 --> 00:11:58.680 similar to how [the] giraffes' necks got longer to more easily reach higher up leaves. The fruits teleportation abilities starts to rub off on them, 00:11:58.680 --> 00:12:04.940 so instead of having to rely on Ender Pearls to teleport around, they instead naturally gain the ability from their diet. 00:12:04.940 --> 00:12:07.740 Over time, they slowly forget their ability to build. 00:12:07.740 --> 00:12:12.660 I mean, why build when there's no escape? When there's not even many resources with which to craft? 00:12:12.660 --> 00:12:17.879 But they still retain the ability to pick up blocks. Though their skill for speech gets forgotten, 00:12:17.880 --> 00:12:23.500 they do retain a rudimentary language still speaking in those distorted words. 00:12:23.580 --> 00:12:27.260 This once great, builder society slowly, 00:12:27.340 --> 00:12:29.400 generation after generation, 00:12:29.410 --> 00:12:31.560 transforms into the Endermen. 00:12:31.560 --> 00:12:35.369 Even some of their memories may still remain. One odd detail of the Enderman, 00:12:35.369 --> 00:12:38.460 is that wearing a pumpkin on your head prevents them from becoming aggressive. 00:12:38.460 --> 00:12:45.600 Maybe it reminds them somewhere deep down, of a simpler time or of the friendly golems that they would construct back on the Overworld. 00:12:45.900 --> 00:12:48.660 Regardless, the civilization is stuck there. 00:12:48.660 --> 00:12:57.220 Oh sure, some are able to teleport out into the Overworld or into the Nether, but most are forced to live there under the rule of the dragon. 00:12:57.220 --> 00:13:03.720 And we know this isn't by choice, because when you finally arrive in The End, when you finally defeat their oppressor, 00:13:03.720 --> 00:13:06.980 The achievement we receive is Free The End. 00:13:06.980 --> 00:13:12.939 The Endermen at this point are so far gone from the people they once were that they're no longer able to appreciate what's happened. 00:13:12.940 --> 00:13:18.540 But in defeating the dragon, you as the player have brought closure to this oppressed civilization. 00:13:18.540 --> 00:13:25.240 One that was forced to flee to a new dimension in order to survive, only to wind up trapped yet again. 00:13:25.240 --> 00:13:28.690 And that my friends, is the story of Minecraft. 00:13:28.690 --> 00:13:36.000 You're a builder and you follow in the path of the great builders who came before you, discovering their work, learning of their enemies, 00:13:36.080 --> 00:13:41.000 unlocking their technology, and ultimately freeing them from their greatest oppressor. 00:13:41.000 --> 00:13:47.420 Now admittedly, there are some difficult things to explain here, like how this ancient civilization got access to the ender pearls 00:13:47.420 --> 00:13:52.980 necessary to craft the eyes of ender, required to build a portal to the end, if they themselves become the Endermen. 00:13:52.980 --> 00:13:55.140 It would require some sort of time loop, 00:13:55.140 --> 00:13:57.460 which honestly there isn't a whole lot of evidence for. 00:13:57.460 --> 00:14:04.920 Instead, my thought here is that the ender pearls are items that they learn to create before becoming Endermen. Before going to The End. 00:14:04.920 --> 00:14:09.260 I mean, think about this. We know that this ancient civilization was able to access the Nether. 00:14:09.260 --> 00:14:13.780 End Rods and Eyes of Ender both require Blaze related materials to craft. 00:14:13.780 --> 00:14:19.989 So this civilization had definitely visited that dimension, and thus knew how to access the powers of teleportation. 00:14:20.030 --> 00:14:27.489 So maybe they learned how to harness that in a smaller portable form. i.e. the ender pearl, before ever making it to The End. 00:14:27.490 --> 00:14:33.460 I'm not 100% sure. It's honestly just speculation to try and solve for this Theory's biggest problem. 00:14:33.460 --> 00:14:37.869 Anyway, I want to know: What do you think? Did you like it? Did you not? Let's build it out from there. 00:14:37.870 --> 00:14:41.290 Why do they hate endermites? Where'd the villagers come from? 00:14:41.290 --> 00:14:49.660 And seriously, what is the deal with the Zombie Pigman civilization? Like I said the Endermen are just the start to the puzzle that is Minecraft, 00:14:49.660 --> 00:14:51.880 but there are still plenty more here for us to discover. 00:14:51.880 --> 00:14:52.980 So until then, 00:14:52.980 --> 00:14:55.140 Remember, that's just a Theory. 00:14:55.140 --> 00:15:00.220 A Game Theory! Thanks for watching. 00:15:00.220 --> 00:15:00.720 Hey, 00:15:00.730 --> 00:15:06.930 If you enjoyed that, start picking away at the box on the left to check out my video on what Minecraft Creepers really are. 00:15:06.930 --> 00:15:09.089 It's an older video and it's more scientific, 00:15:09.089 --> 00:15:16.280 But it's one of my favorites. Or heck, chip away at the box on the right to watch as I prove that Minecraft's block world is actually round. 00:15:16.280 --> 00:15:21.960 I'll see you all next weekend for that FNaF episode you requested. joy...