What does the ending to Minecraft actually mean?

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  • Опубліковано 3 жов 2024

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  • @shreyaspamaraju262
    @shreyaspamaraju262 Рік тому +42

    I see the player you mean
    (player name)?
    Yes. Take care. It has reached a higher level now. It can read our thoughts.
    That doesn't matter. It thinks we are part of the game.
    I like this player. It played well. It did not give up.
    It is reading our thoughts as though they were words on a screen.
    That is how it chooses to imagine many things, when it is deep in the dream of a game.
    Words make a wonderful interface. Very flexible. And less terrifying than staring at the reality behind the screen.
    They used to hear voices. Before players could read. Back in the days when those who did not play called the players witches, and warlocks. And players dreamed they flew through the air, on sticks powered by demons.
    What did this player dream?
    This player dreamed of sunlight and trees. Of fire and water. It dreamed it created. And it dreamed it destroyed. It dreamed it hunted, and was hunted. It dreamed of shelter.
    Hah, the original interface. A million years old, and it still works. But what true structure did this player create, in the reality behind the screen?
    It worked, with a million others, to sculpt a true world in a fold of the [scrambled], and created a [scrambled] for [scrambled], in the [scrambled].
    It cannot read that thought.
    No. It has not yet achieved the highest level. That, it must achieve in the long dream of life, not the short dream of a game.
    Does it know that we love it? That the universe is kind?
    Sometimes, through the noise of its thoughts, it hears the universe, yes.
    But there are times it is sad, in the long dream. It creates worlds that have no summer, and it shivers under a black sun, and it takes its sad creation for reality.
    To cure it of sorrow would destroy it. The sorrow is part of its own private task. We cannot interfere.
    Sometimes when they are deep in dreams, I want to tell them, they are building true worlds in reality. Sometimes I want to tell them of their importance to the universe. Sometimes, when they have not made a true connection in a while, I want to help them to speak the word they fear.
    It reads our thoughts.
    Sometimes I do not care. Sometimes I wish to tell them, this world you take for truth is merely [scrambled] and [scrambled], I wish to tell them that they are [scrambled] in the [scrambled]. They see so little of reality, in their long dream.
    And yet they play the game.
    But it would be so easy to tell them...
    Too strong for this dream. To tell them how to live is to prevent them living.
    I will not tell the player how to live.
    The player is growing restless.
    I will tell the player a story.
    But not the truth.
    No. A story that contains the truth safely, in a cage of words. Not the naked truth that can burn over any distance.
    Give it a body, again.
    Yes. Player...
    Use its name.
    (Player name). Player of games.
    Good.
    Take a breath, now. Take another. Feel air in your lungs. Let your limbs return. Yes, move your fingers. Have a body again, under gravity, in air. Respawn in the long dream. There you are. Your body touching the universe again at every point, as though you were separate things. As though we were separate things.
    Who are we? Once we were called the spirit of the mountain. Father sun, mother moon. Ancestral spirits, animal spirits. Jinn. Ghosts. The green man. Then gods, demons. Angels. Poltergeists. Aliens, extraterrestrials. Leptons, quarks. The words change. We do not change.
    We are the universe. We are everything you think isn't you. You are looking at us now, through your skin and your eyes. And why does the universe touch your skin, and throw light on you? To see you, player. To know you. And to be known. I shall tell you a story.
    Once upon a time, there was a player.
    The player was you, (Player name)
    Sometimes it thought itself human, on the thin crust of a spinning globe of molten rock. The ball of molten rock circled a ball of blazing gas that was three hundred and thirty thousand times more massive than it. They were so far apart that light took eight minutes to cross the gap. The light was information from a star, and it could burn your skin from a hundred and fifty million kilometers away.
    Sometimes the player dreamed it was a miner, on the surface of a world that was flat, and infinite. The sun was a square of white. The days were short; there was much to do; and death was a temporary inconvenience.
    Sometimes the player dreamed it was lost in a story.
    Sometimes the player dreamed it was other things, in other places. Sometimes these dreams were disturbing. Sometimes very beautiful indeed. Sometimes the player woke from one dream into another, then woke from that into a third.
    Sometimes the player dreamed it watched words on a screen.
    Let's go back.
    The atoms of the player were scattered in the grass, in the rivers, in the air, in the ground. A woman gathered the atoms; she drank and ate and inhaled; and the woman assembled the player, in her body.
    And the player awoke, from the warm, dark world of its mother's body, into the long dream.
    And the player was a new story, never told before, written in letters of DNA. And the player was a new program, never run before, generated by a sourcecode a billion years old. And the player was a new human, never alive before, made from nothing but milk and love.
    You are the player. The story. The program. The human. Made from nothing but milk and love.
    Let's go further back.
    The seven billion billion billion atoms of the player's body were created, long before this game, in the heart of a star. So the player, too, is information from a star. And the player moves through a story, which is a forest of information planted by a man called Julian, on a flat, infinite world created by a man called Markus, that exists inside a small, private world created by the player, who inhabits a universe created by...
    Shush. Sometimes the player created a small, private world that was soft and warm and simple. Sometimes hard, and cold, and complicated. Sometimes it built a model of the universe in its head; flecks of energy, moving through vast empty spaces. Sometimes it called those flecks "electrons" and "protons".
    Sometimes it called them "planets" and "stars".
    Sometimes it believed it was in a universe that was made of energy that was made of offs and ones; zeros and ones; lines of code. Sometimes it believed it was playing a game. Sometimes it believed it was reading words on a screen.
    You are the player, reading words...
    Shush... Sometimes the player read lines of code on a screen. Decoded them into words; decoded words into meaning; decoded meaning into feelings, emotions, theories, ideas, and the player started to breathe faster and deeper and realized it was alive, it was alive, those thousand deaths had not been real, the player was alive
    You. You. You are alive.
    And sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the sunlight that came through the shuffling leaves of the summer trees
    And sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the light that fell from the crisp night sky of winter, where a fleck of light in the corner of the player's eye might be a star a million times as massive as the sun, boiling its planets to plasma in order to be visible for a moment to the player, walking home at the far side of the universe, suddenly smelling food, almost at the familiar door, about to dream again
    And sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the zeros and ones, through the electricity of the world, through the scrolling words on a screen at the end of a dream
    And the universe said I love you
    And the universe said you have played the game well
    And the universe said everything you need is within you
    And the universe said you are stronger than you know
    And the universe said you are the daylight
    And the universe said you are the night
    And the universe said the darkness you fight is within you
    And the universe said the light you seek is within you
    And the universe said you are not alone
    And the universe said you are not separate from every other thing
    And the universe said you are the universe tasting itself, talking to itself, reading its own code
    And the universe said I love you because you are love.
    And the game was over and the player woke up from the dream. And the player began a new dream. And the player dreamed again, dreamed better. And the player was the universe. And the player was love.
    You are the player.
    Wake up.

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  Рік тому +6

      Thanks for sending the full poem here. Did I forget to hyperlink it? I’ll pin this comment, appreciate it!

    • @shreyaspamaraju262
      @shreyaspamaraju262 Рік тому +4

      @@AshsDen Your welcome! i noticed that i didn't seethe hyperlink to the poem in your references so i just pasted it here!

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  Рік тому +3

      @@shreyaspamaraju262 silly mistake on my part! I’ll definitely keep this here and also add a link in my description :)

  • @orange_turtle3412
    @orange_turtle3412 2 місяці тому +5

    Its a damn shame so many people skip this poem, playing it off as some random bullshit just to fill space or something. In reality, it is explaining the meaning of life. As you said, there is no answer to the meaning of life, but the poem explains that there is no ONE answer to the meaning of life. Its not about minecraft, its about how minecraft reflects real life. How your unique journey to the "end" reflects your unique journey to the end of life. There is no one meaning to life, its different for each person. Some people speedrun minecraft and cut corners to reach the end as fast as possible. Some build massive cities over the course of years. Some just wander aimlessly and take in the beauty of the game. Minecraft is a different experience for each individual, and everyone can make the game whatever they want it to be. And once you have completed the final trial that the "short dream" of minecraft has placed before you, the game tells you that the same thing is possible in the "long dream" of life. Its telling you to live your own life, make your own experiences, and find your own value and the meaning of your own life. You are just as much a part of existence as everything else that exists. And, like everything else, your existence has a purpose. You've found the purpose of your existence as a digital character in the vast infinite world of blocks, now go and find the purpose of your existence on the ball of molten rock flying through space.

  • @AshsDen
    @AshsDen  2 роки тому +15

    Hello there! So, this was a drastically different video than what I've ever made before. I would very much appreciate any and all feedback, whether it would be on the script, the audio, or the presentation of it all. Thank you so much for watching!
    This was a video I've been trying to make for months now and I'm so happy it has finally come to fruition.

  • @data_glitch
    @data_glitch 2 роки тому +21

    This was definitely a wildly different kind of video, but I enjoyed it! I remember finding the end poem fascinating the first time I ever experienced it.

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому +5

      It's a very unique piece considering the philosophy behind mainstream games. I found it so intriguing that I made a 15-minute video of it haha

  • @Somethinginterestingthatiscool

    One theory I hate is that people say that the player/character dreamed everything but I view dream as creativity and as you mentioned a kind of metaphor.
    Also one line is, " those who didn't play ", I believe that goes to the lore of Minecraft I.e. the ancient builders theory.

    • @orange_turtle3412
      @orange_turtle3412 2 місяці тому

      It has nothing to do with the "lore of minecraft." It was added before any semblance of lore even existed, and Notch didnt even write it. He asked a guy named Julian Gough to write something deep and philosophical and this is what he came up with. If the poem has any ties to the "lore" it was the lore that came from the poem, not the other way around.

  • @kagoyamargret3442
    @kagoyamargret3442 Рік тому +5

    "it dreamed it created. it dreamed it destroyed." i have a theory about this. what if the player made something that wiped out the ancient race and the gods punished it by killing the ender dragon. thats why it respawns every time till it fights the ender dragon

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  Рік тому +2

      Hmm that’s an interesting theory. This video is more about the nature of the poem and less about the lore, but that is certainly a good idea

  • @TheHillDragon
    @TheHillDragon 2 роки тому +3

    i haven't thought about this poem in 10 years.

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому +2

      I hadn’t fully read it until a few months ago haha. Always skipped it

  • @KingZee
    @KingZee 2 роки тому +9

    This was such a good video! I could easily see you doing more of these types of video. You have a wonderful talent, Ash. Looking forward to seeing more soon!

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому +3

      Much appreciated, Zee. I may try more things like this in the future, who knows? I loved analyzing this poem

  • @sufi09853
    @sufi09853 Місяць тому

    I always think those two voices (Blue and Green) are both Gods that exist within the Minecraft World. Gods that made this world.

  • @alinraymondgherghel9478
    @alinraymondgherghel9478 Рік тому +2

    I love this poem it's really fascinating... Ty for your personal explanation I Hope more people find out how really good and Deep this ending is

  • @Rageuke
    @Rageuke 2 місяці тому

    I find that the song Alpha that is played during the poem makes it way more impactful

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 місяці тому +1

      I agree. I should revisit this poem/song. I think I could make a stronger analysis (even though I’m still quite happy with this one)

    • @Rageuke
      @Rageuke 2 місяці тому

      @@AshsDen Oh, it's a great and interesting analysis! I have always been fascinated by the end poem. Maybe you should try to add what the author of the poem has said about it, I remember an atricle on his old blog where he explained what the poem meant to him and all the struggles he had faced with the Mojang team.

  • @Im_GP
    @Im_GP 2 роки тому +4

    Phenomenal video Ash. You sent shivers through my bones multiple times throughout the video and really got me thinking. Thank you!

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому +1

      That’s exactly the feeling I was going for. It gave me the exact same chills and I love the poem so much! It makes Minecraft that much more special :)

  • @ni__wolf143
    @ni__wolf143 3 місяці тому +3

    My personal interpretation of this is that the two entities, are effectively everything, they are the universe, they are existence, they're not even really sentient, they are everything that exists, and they say that the player, is essentially one in the same, they're saying that every single person, object, planet, creature, every single thing is the same, it, and you, and everything else, is part of everything that exists, it doesn't disprove religion or try to say its own answer, because either way, the belief of those religions exists, the thoughts of those religions exist, and it's all just as real as the trees, the grass, its basically saying that everything exists, and everything is equivalent, even video games, nothing can be greater or lesser than something because everything exists, and due to that everything is the same.
    But that's just my personal interpretation.

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  3 місяці тому +1

      That’s a cool interpretation. The belief that everything that can be thought of existing is a philosophy I remember reading about, but can’t recall the name. I think this interpretation was intended by the author, especially that last line. Really hits home the idea

    • @ni__wolf143
      @ni__wolf143 3 місяці тому +1

      @@AshsDen I explained this really horribly so I just wanna make sure I explained it properly, the idea is that the two beings are one thing, the universe, but talking to itself to make it simpler to explain things to the player, and the beings tell the player that essentially, they are part of the universe, meaning they ARE the universe, and everything else in the universe is also part of the universe, meaning its the universe, and essentially it says that everything is equivalent, everything is important, because everything is the universe, and the universe is arguably the most important thing, it denies the idea that humans are insignificant in the grand scheme of things, instead saying that in the grand scheme of things, everything is equally significant, as its all part of the most important thing, or something like that, the beings are often referred as god-like but since the beings are essentially existence itself, if a god exists, then by their word, god and every individual person are equally as important, that isn't talked about at all during the poem but it's a nice little thing that would technically be true from this interpretation of the poem, but also video games exist, and thoughts exist, and because of that, all of these things are just as important as everything else, every game is simply a small life that you are experiencing through something else, meaning it's equivalent to real life in a way, and every thought is a sliver of a life that you are experiencing through your brain, meaning it's equivalent to real life, that's more or less what I mean, every experience is part of a person's life, meaning they're just as real as everything else, along with everything in the universe being part of the universe, in turn being one with it.

  • @yelov7349
    @yelov7349 2 роки тому +4

    this video was great! im really suprised you dont have 10k+ followers haha, i also really like this new style of videos. looking forward to seeing afterlife s5! (:

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому +3

      Eventually :)
      I may try more videos like this in the future. AfterLife season 5 soon!

    • @yelov7349
      @yelov7349 2 роки тому +1

      @@AshsDennice

  • @Artorvian
    @Artorvian 2 роки тому +3

    Interesting analysis here! Great job! :D

  • @AwzTurtle
    @AwzTurtle 2 роки тому +2

    i didnt even know the poem was that log

  • @alexmunn4420
    @alexmunn4420 2 роки тому +1

    Fantastic video, editing, and commentary. Loved it!

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому +1

      Thank you! I’m glad you found it enjoyable!

  • @CoryCorey
    @CoryCorey 9 місяців тому

    This is the best video I’ve seen this month thank you for making my night

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  9 місяців тому

      That is so kind. I am very happy you enjoyed! ❤️😇

  • @Real_Moon-Moon
    @Real_Moon-Moon 2 місяці тому

    The End Poem is my favorite ending in any game ever, period. It fits perfectly with Minecraft. A game all about achievements. Not just the hard coded ones. But those you make yourself.
    It’s wholesome, existential, and vague. It works beautifully for a game like this. A tool like this. An engine like this.
    I wish more players would give it the respect it deserves.
    Thank you Julian Gough.

  • @fightme3368
    @fightme3368 2 роки тому

    Great video! Gud editing too!:D

  • @dasdlfkjasf9565
    @dasdlfkjasf9565 Рік тому

    amazing video!

  • @HughBone
    @HughBone 2 роки тому +1

    5:25 DREAM???????????????

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому

      dream SMP?????????

  • @fresh6843
    @fresh6843 2 роки тому +2

    Kids game moment
    Nice vid bud, definitely a sick style of video

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  2 роки тому +3

      Dude Minecraft’s ending is on a whole nother level it’s kind of crazy

    • @fresh6843
      @fresh6843 2 роки тому +1

      @@AshsDen facts

  • @ShaedTheMoron
    @ShaedTheMoron Рік тому +1

    No, I'm sorry but I gotta.
    The game was not released on 11/11/11. That would be The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (AKA my favorite game).
    The official full version of Minecraft, 1.0.0, was released on November 18th of 2011.
    Sorry, but I just couldn't leave that.

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  Рік тому +1

      Wait I said that in the video? Lol I'm an idiot my bad

  • @kristileigh7336
    @kristileigh7336 3 місяці тому

    This was beautiful. ❤

    • @AshsDen
      @AshsDen  3 місяці тому

      Thank you!