another thing that keeps the server alive is that most viewers follow 3-5 hermits at the same time, so a hermit can take a break(like mumbo did) and it doesn't hurt the server or the viewers, and when they come back they can just go on as if nothing happen because the viewers will still be interested in watching them.
I'd heard of Hermitcraft for awhile, but I never watched it until season 9 when I decided to watch Grian's video, since I'd watched alot of his other videos. In his episode I saw someone had built an Eagle, and I love birds so I had to find out who made that, and it turned out to be False, so I started watching her videos, and now a few months later I'm subscribed to all the hermits and watch like half of the videos.
What I love about Hermitcraft is how healthy the environment is. Not only in their schedule and self-care, it's genuinely just a server played with friends. It's all so natural, the banter, the games. They don't forget that it's all just a game but at the same time, they acknowledge how much effort the others put into their stuff. There's a near-perfect line they set for each other and it's honestly incredible to watch They entry system too! From what I heard, if even one hermit doesn't agree on a new candidate, it's instant rejection. They build a fun and healthy environment not only for themselves, but for the viewers too. Some of the pranks they pull won't even make it in videos and they only reason fans would know about it is because of streams. It shows that even off-camera, they're just a bunch of people enjoying time with each other. And I think that's what drew most people into it and what kept us here. Don't think I'll get tired of them any time soon
True, Just looks at scar's fandom, they don't even care if he takes a 1 year break. as they know his condition, and what issues he faces. He has been met with nothing but support even when he felt sorry when he did not make a video 1 week in a row.
@@topiaz sadly not quite true Grian was a real issue early on. Well that's a bit of dig actually Grians fan base prior to Hermit Craft was the real issue. He had to call out a vocal minority a few times during the civil war arc for bombarding a few colleges with really defamatory comments made well out of context. A obvious side effect of what was at the time a unhealthy almost cult of personality with a younger audience. This resulted in a few hermits effectively distancing themselves from him insitu because any growth wasn't worth the possible backlash. Now that's very much water under the bridge and you can see he is much more contrite and gives preambles warning what he expects of his community if a little manufactured drama is planned on Hermit Craft/Empires or ofcourse any of his spin offs like 2nd/3rd life.
Also, the hermits are actually good at communicating with their viewers as well. If the viewers are getting more toxic, during the "lore" some will try to shut it down as soon as possible, unlike some creators most notably Dream. You can see that in some of Grian's videos, you can see him controlling the younger viewers actions and reduce toxicity overall. Another example is Xisuma, he usually communicates his feelings about some situation with his viewers through his life streams and clips in the Xisuma 2 or says channel. Like the one about the over use of meme comments.
Yeah, I remember a few years back people were kind of making fun of Xisuma, saying he must be an A.I. because he does so much all the time until he started calling it out and saying how he didn't like that. After that, people stopped making those kinds of jokes.
Yeah, I used to be annoyed at Grian constantly going, "Stop, be nice, this isn't about showing hate, we're all in this for fun," But now, I get it, cuz so many viewers go out of their way to cause unnecessary harm over trivial things, and Grian gotta do his best to control it.
The biggest and most important aspect of Hermitcraft is maturity, the hermits are mature and decisive individuals and this quality reflects in their content and playstyle. The hermits have adapted really well, introducing new things to keep their self interests burning. They entertain the audience but also entertain themselves and have kept that as a priority which as a result keeps the content entertaining aswell.
@@JavaRivers well I'm sure they are but we don't have enough sample size. We have years of hermitcraft whereas Empires is a relatively new server. Hermitcraft has made it way thru the ups and downs of social media, Minecraft, SMP culture and controversies while Empires is riding on the peak popularity of the game. But I'm sure that the Empires server will prove itself with time.
@@mr.mastermind3969 Mm I see what you're saying there. I've been watching fWhip Sausage & Gem for years longer, and I can attest to their general maturity
@@JavaRivers yeah same I do believe the same. And I do think empires is pretty much gonna be like hermitcraft. But it's how you handle things as a group and I'm looking forward for empires to show me the coordination which they've got. And most of them are irl friends which only contributes to the likelihood of empires being stable.
that last part is the main reason why s8 wasn't very liked by the community, it ended way too quickly and hermits were rushing to get their bases done in time.
@@Blackilykat S8 was the "first" hermitcraft season I fully watched from start to end. I had previously watched the start of s7 but I didn't watch it after the 1st ep so I don't relaly consider it my first season.
@@Blackilykat it's because the new minecraft update is going to be released not far too long from the release of season 8. Because the new update added more structure and completely new game mechanics, it could mess up the season 8 world. So they had to finish it sooner because of the update. It's really a shame that season 8 is really short. I really wanted to see the completed midnight alley.
Don't forget to mention the incredible funds they collected through the charity event recently. I mean when a creators' community achieves their charity target even before the actual event starts, you know it is huge.
As someone who wants to get into content creation, I'm taking notes on how they deal with analytics, how they approach creation and their community. I watched a video tracking their growth and let me tell you it was so encouraging to see how many of them where making videos to no one for months even years yet they stuck to it and got where they are now.
I think another aspect that really shows how perfect of a plan this server has is the seasons themselves. rather then have the server grow through each update, they restart the server when the creators want a fresh start, allowing them to completely change how they play and interact. mumbo can go an entire season with the goal of never killing a mob, and can make creative ways to get the items that become inaccessible as a result of his decision, he can ask friends for help and can barter or trade with them, he can make machines to do it for him, he can even mutate into a potato man because of the number of spuds he ate, but once that gimmick has run its course he waits for the next season and goes back to killing. the new seed and updates allow the hermits to completely change, and then once the season is done they release a copy of the final world so that viewers can explore their bases, find secrets, and have fun. The creators themselves are also just fun. ive seen a lot of tumblr posts just compiling fun facts that the hermits have mentioned in their videos and livestreams. Along with the hermits being really positive overall, they all support each other, encourage each other, and respect each other. when mumbo took a break, grian was very respectful about making sure people understood what was happening and he only wished for mumbo to be back in a "i miss my friend, but im glad hes taking care of himself" way. overall you can really tell that none of the hermits are doing it for money or fame, and pretty much all of them would keep going even if they didnt get any views, because thats not what hermitcraft is. it also helps that a lot of them already did make content for years before blowing up, and most were doing youtube as a hobby or side project while still working a "main" job until recently.
I love the duality of Hermitcraft. While the Hermits are insanely dedicated to the game, they somehow seem to remember that its just a game. This is something that you rarely get to see from people. Their sense of balance carries over to literally anything they do, and it's so perfect. I could've never thought that I'd spend a good part of my life just watching a group of friends play a videogame together for years and years, but here I am. Great video as always, Ani. Absolutely loved it.
While I agree with what you're saying, calling Minecraft just a game (while true) feels like it makes it a little bit more insignificant. I think the game is more of an experience than just a game. Like a creative ground on which you can create whatever you desire.
The current hermitcraft x empires crossover is very similar to the base swap in the previous hermitcraft season. It's making fans want to catch up on all members of both seasons to get every angle of what's happening. Like I mainly watched grian, but now I'm not only watch new empires channels like Jimmy & lizzy but I'm also watching hermits I've never really watches before.
i´ve started with Mumbo and Grian, watched other Hermits too and now many of them are so good to not to watch. Zedaph, Scar and Tango are funny, DocM is top notch in breaking the game and X is a troll, who´s also get trolled by his chat.
I agree, I had heard of Empires due to a couple of the hermits such as Gem and False being on there. Never was interested enough to check them out until this crossover. Now I am starting to follow the Empires gang as well!
Coming from Empires I feel that too. I always wanted to find a Hermit to watch regularly. I couldn't find the time tho, b/c I just wasn't invested in that world or those people. Now that they're unified I can try out a Hermit here and there while still getting an angle on my favorite series ❤️
That mumbo jumbo big base swap video was the one that got me in to hermitcraft from mumbo to scar to grian to zed. I found this rabbit hole with so many absurd Easter eggs like it always got me hooked and excited.
Ha! That was how I found Zed too! I was like, "This dude is FUNNY!" Then shortly after that on a stream Impulse was telling chat if they are looking around for more Hermitcraft content go check out Zed cause he's always doing wacky stuff and is really funny doing it. So i did ... and did not regret it :)
this is what I've been saying! the fact that the hermits interact with eachother helps them to grow, I started with just watching Grian in s8, I thought the boatem people were all really cool so I watched all of them, through Impulse I discovered Tango, who went to 'the chamber' from Zed, I thought this was a really cool concept and wanted to see more, and now Zed is my favorite hermit! I think it's so good to see them all interacting with people they don't normally interact with, like the base swap, which makes you interested in the others and helps both sides grow! hermitcraft is such an amazing smp with an amazing community and I love every single hermit for that
One more thing i love about this SMP is they equally respect everyone. TFC was one of my favourite hermits. Gods rest his soul in peace. His videos might be average, his builds might be below average but every hermit gave him the respect he deserved irrespective of the quality of content he posted which is beautiful. If this was another stupid SMP they would have surely made like giant statues and what not as their tribute for the legend TFC. But NOT HERMITCRAFT. They just kept it simple and they never wanted to monetize on their friend's passing away and they didn't. Each hermit payed their respect in their own way, some talked about him more than other while some just showed a beautiful gesture and moved on. This is how it should be. This shows that this SMP is run by mature real people. Not some desperate kids trying to get views from the internet.
I will be honest, it was a bit of a culture shock for me when I started watching the Hermits after the Dream SMP. I was a very invested Dream SMP fan. I stopped watching them after a big number of creators just stopped posting anything bcs they got burned out. It got to the point where there were like 2-3 people online on average every time someone streamed bcs literally no one wanted to log on. Even if they create a totally new world, I really don't think they will ever fully make an active server. I think the reason the Hermits are still active with keeping their smp alive is that they support each other. They get out of the way to create interactive mini-games and shops and always complement each other bases. Dream smp never had a support system like that. Most creators just sit in their own friend groups. Some bigger creators with more popular lore would even sometimes speak down on the lore of the smaller creators or be dismissive of them and their rp. It may be just little things said without ill intent, but little things like these did create a demotivating atmosphere there. One of the instances I thought really separates the two were the Mycelium war on Hermicrafy when both parties very patiently waited for their opposing sides to finish the traps in their bases. It gave us the funny ravager trap in the HEP headquarters and Bdubs trying to fight Doc's hog with an item frame. Even though they were "at war", both parties let the other finish what they intended to do. Instead of making a video with them being all smarter and stronger than their enemies, they just messed around and showed how truly impressed they are with their friend's traps. Edit: it also says a lot how every Hermit has a voice when it comes to new members, but on the Dream smp only Dream (who doesn't even log in) can add new ppl.
i totally get what you mean by 'culture shock' , i started watching s7 in 2021, as i was getting out of dsmp more and remember thinking to myself 'oh they'd have such an advantage if they just broke in before the traps were complete' and thats really missing the point of the server i think despite being exactly what someone on dsmp would do
@@Z.O.M.G yeah, there were so much intances of People Just mindlessly destroying each other based and calling it a prank. I never liked that about dsmp. The hermits always think about compensation when they do stuff like that. Like Grian making a set or Diamond armor and tools before pushing LD in the void to compensate any of her possible lost items. Or Tango destroying Falses copper Shop and then rebuilding it in a more convenient place +giving her extra copper as an apology for the prank
@@Z.O.M.G truth...unless Techno was actively involved...when Techno decided it was time for a lore stream...then everybody logged in...man do I miss that pig...
i've been here since season 6 and man it's only grown. i love the wholesomeness, the way any hermitcraft animatics get creator attention and the comments they leave is so sweet, they genuinely feel like nice people.
ive also been here sense season 6 and that's when I had disovered grian and mumbo, honestly I think that if it was not for them I would not be the person I am today
On top of that, it isn't scripted. Unlike the Dream SMP, it doesn't feel fake, or like they are pretending. And also, they won't run out of ideas because there are none to run out of.
They definitely script in some cases, but they're good actors and mix it in with improv, so it can be hard to tell. It's most obvious recently when they first came to empires and had to pretend it wasn't extensively planned haha.
Great video as always! It explains a lot about why I just suddenly started watching Hermitcraft over Dream SMP (even if indirectly). The organization was actually there and I didn't realize how important it was for me in the DSMP. I would just have Lore overload from watching one stream and I missed out on the actual Minecraft. When I watch things on Hermitcraft, there is always a healthy balance of building, shenanigans, and lore.
The whole “every hermit is connected with every video, meaning that everyone gets good views” thing is kinda similar with Empires too, though it’s on a MUCH smaller scale due to empires being newer and having a smaller viewerbase, with Hermitcraft being IN empires currently, it gives empires a good cut from Hermitcraft as well! Hermitcraft fans are also getting into empires, myself included, and vice-versa! Not to mention Hermitopia is one of the few times where ALL of the hermits are all recording together at the same time (other than season starts and events and such)
Hermitcraft is so unique. It HAS to be to of continued this long. And there's a lot of reasons for it, some of which you touched on in this video, but some you didn't. The biggest is probably how they handle the seasons. They don't just stick to one world indefinitely, they switch to an entirely new world, an entirely fresh start, every year or so. Because if you stick to the same world things will just naturally get boring. There's only so much you can do. But restarting from the bottom means hermits can do new things, they aren't just stuck in one place. Each season different groups arise, some of whom haven't really interacted closely before. It gives you new interactions, new - or just more frequent - interactions between hermits. Which, naturally, allows viewers of one hermit to get attached to another they weren't before and channel hop to watch them as well, thus growing everyone involved. I mean, just look at Grian. He's consistently been grouped with Mumbo, but he also had Iskall with Sahara in Season 6, several other hermits in the Mycelium Resistance in season 7, Boatem in season 8, and now he's with all the hermits who jumped to Empires (which ALSO serves to allow empires viewers to jump to hermits and vice versa, growing the viewership of all involved). Everything on Hermitcraft shifts with every new season. the Hermits can try out new building styles they didn't last season - like Scar, switching from steampunk style to literally building Disney World - they can interact with new groups, and they can play with new storylines, be they server-wide stories or small scale stuff. If they'd just stuck to a single world, I doubt they would still be around. Maybe 2 or 3 hermits would still be playing on it, but it wouldn't be as big as it is today, it would of simply faded into obscurity. Switching seasons also makes it easier for new fans! If they had stuck to the one world, it would be nearly impossible to catch up. But a new fan can jump in whereever, be it the start of Season 9, or rewatching any past season. If you were to just jump in at, say, the start of Etho's season 9, you wouldn't be missing anything. Compare this to something like DreamSMP, where if you jump in anywhere other than the start of L'Manburg you'd be left confused and floundering for information, needing to spend hours upon hours revising just to watch a Minecraft SMP.
Scar is part of what makes hermitcraft so fun. I love watching all of the hermits and the way they interact with each other. But when they interact with scar you never can expect or predict what he is going to say or do. He always adds the wild card that makes everything so much more fun.
One thing I think shows how close the community is, was when one of the member Tinfoilchef, passed away. Seeing them all mourn in their own way was nice. RIP TFC
Every single hermit is also downright amazing at one or two facets of the game as well...and Ethoslab might actually be the best all around minecrafter period. They have amazing builders, redstone geniuses and even some that are amazing at pvp/combat. The thing about a hermit for anyone is true and they're all at the top of the heap for what you're looking for.
He's great at Minecraft but his most impressive acomplishment are his videos. Funny, snappy editing, tons of running gags, efficient, informative commentary, musical montages with noteblock remixes he made himself, masterful blend of the formal and informal- unmatched minecraft entertainment.
this is such a well made video. its interesting to me how communication between the hermits and dsmp ppl work since i never thought of it. maybe it has something about the hermits actually treating it as a job? or their experience outside of content creation that makes them more "professional" with their meetings and such. also 9 seasons to learn what works and what doesnt, made them what they are.
The care they take to select new members is an even bigger deal. They avoid any of the drama/annoyance other servers deal with when they let a new guy on, only for them make like 2 videos and leave. And they are VERY selective, *GRIAN* of all people was vetoed on a few occasions, for reasons ranging from "inexperienced in Survival (wels)" to "too lore heavy (can't remember)". And he's pretty unanimously popular now. But they waited to make sure he'd fit with no issues, which is much better long term
Getting into Hermitcraft is like trying to win a talent show with around 20 judges and everybody has everybody's out buzzers. But the prize of winning is ~20 chill and sometimes chaotically friends
I'm 43 and although I played console games from a young age, I didn't take it past an xbox. I'd heard of Minecraft and just passed it off as a boring kids game with mastersystem graphics. last year when my son was 5, we were watching UA-cam and he saw a Minecraft based thumbnail from wadzee and asked to watch it (it was a biome swap one I think), then we went to a Grian hermitcraft pranks video. He became obsessed, and so did I, I watched all grian hermitcraft episodes to date. Then went back to watch other hermits that I'd seen interact with grian until now, I've gone back to pre-grian hermitcraft. The series is great! I bought Minecraft for my son to play on this year and have started my own game, now I'm wondering if people would be interested in watching me learn the game as I've not actually got to fighting the dragon or a wither, I've got a mob farm, iron farm and a load of villagers to trade with but that's about it.
It's kinda crazy how there have almost been different generations of Minecraft players. When you mentioned that all the hermitcraft guys are in their 30's and not like the 18-20 year olds blowing up on youtube, I was thinking to myself "THOSE guys were the 18-20 year olds who originally blew up on youtube for minecraft". It's hard to believe they've been going so long, but they've always had good content.
This video doesn't even mention the fact that they frequently reset (all the different seasons). When they feel things slowing down because there's nothing left to do, they start a new world/season, which keeps both themselves and viewers engaged.
With the crossover going on right now. I have definitely been watching more than one hermit, than I usually do. found it really fun and interesting, to see all sides of the story and even some empires. cuz I didn't really watch any of them before the crossover.
This is exactly my experience with Hermitcraft. I started watching through following Mumbo Jumbo's channel. I watched the odd episode but was a bit lost on who everyone was and the scale of what had gone before. Then a new season started and introduced Grian to the crew. Before that I only knew Grian from his aesthetic build tutorials and wasn't very keen on that content. Hermitcraft was a platform that really showed Grian's personality more and his interactions with Mumbo drew me to him. I was now following 2 hermits... A short way into the season Mumbo needed some interesting landscaping done and felt that wasn't his strong suit so called in a favour from GoodtimeswithScar. I watched Mumbo reveal what Scar had created and decided I wanted to see the design process from Scar's point of view... Scar is absolutely lovely and very amusing... Now I follow 3 hermits. As the series progressed, Grian's impish nature led to more and more innocent pranking of fellow Hermits. Often I would be interested in seeing the other Hermit's reaction to these pranks. The pranks escalated into a "Civil War" with a lot of cross overs between the Hermits. By the end of the Civil War I found I was following around 15 Hermits. This season Mumbo has taken time off from Hermitcraft but I continue to follow a large selection of Hermits (and a couple of members of the Empires SMP thanks to crossover events). I find there is a wide variety of content being produced and I get something different from each creator but, as you point out, it's the interaction between them all that creates some of the most engaging content.
great analysis, I especially loved mentioning the hermits maturity and experience compared to many other smps, its definitely their strongest reason for staying so drama free and consistent. however mumbo is not the youngest nor 26. pearl and gem are both 26 (or 27) but pearl is slightly younger making her the youngest. I'd love to see more videos about hermit craft because while its certainly gaining popularity, there is a lot to still be said about it and its creators (especially the more under appreciated ones, there's a heavy emphasis of mainly just grian, mumbo and scar which while amazing creators have left many equally talented ones not talked about as much until they're brought to the light like you mentioned with Zedaph)
i had to google this lol but mumbo's bday is december '95, so the man's still a got a couple of weeks of being 26. i get their slip up though, even though i know gem and pearl are around the same age my brain still hasn't fully shed the "mumbos the baby of the group"
Mumbo is definitely not the youngest, that's why he said in the video that "Mumbo is actually AMONGST the youngest," which implies that Mumbo is not the youngest player overall, but belongs in the youngest age group in the server (26 to 28-29). Thanks for listening! (or reading, in this case lol)
I think it’s most notable that Hermitcraft as a whole doesn’t even massively suffer from burnout. Because there are so many creators with overlapping draws to their videos, if one creator like Mumbo stops uploading for a while, there are plenty of other hermits you can watch. I watch The Hermitcraft Recap every week. And when Mumbo stopped uploading I had more time to watch something else. And I filled that space with ImpulseSV. Who does similar technical based stuff and is great fun to watch. Now, even if Mumbo comes back to Hermitcraft. I’m not gonna stop watching Impulse because I’ve grown to really love his stuff. Just watching one video of a hermit you can get entranced. The first hermit I watched was Mumbo. I had been watching his other stuff for a bit. And started watching near the end of season 7. Then when they switched bases. I saw him move with GoodTimesWithScar. And then I went to watch Scar’s videos. Then I went to Grian. Then season 8 started. I saw Gem join who I recognised from Empires as well because I also watch Smajor. And over and over I got attracted to more and more hermits. Now I watch Mumbo, Scar, Grian, Gem, Impulse, BDubs, Zedaph, Doc, Etho, Iskall, Joe, Stress, Beef and Xisuma, every episode they make. I also occasionally watch some of the others if there is a collaboration. I like to watch all perspectives if it’s particularly interesting. I’ve been drowned with stuff to watch with the Empires Crossover. But I mean to say that the collaboration led me now to go from consistently watching 1 Hermit. To consistently watching 11. That there is growth, even in a Let’s play format. They slowly share their views. Bring it together enough that $429,000 can be made for charity when the communities collide.
honestly, I love this channle so much! like you are so good at putting scrambled ideas into neat and easy to understand videos, I love the kind of chaotic but also organized nature of them, I love how when you talk it feels naturally even though its probably a script, also you pick the best topics to talk about!!!
I’ve been thinking more about this, and found a pattern with Hermitcraft that many people haven’t noticed. Since season 5 (I think) there has been a pattern where 1-2 hermits get added one season, and go without a new member the next. To add more context, Grian was added in season 6, but nobody in 7. Pearl and Gemini was added in season 8, but nobody in season 9. I may be over stating, but I think it’s one of the reasons why Hermitcraft took off in season 6. (It might be just Grian, though). It gives that extra boost of energy for the views when a new season starts. At the end of a season, Hermitcraft gets less popular. I believe that they add a member or two to last them a season and about 2/3, then repeat. It might just be a coincidence, since this system hasn’t run for too long, but if season 10 has a new member, then my point may be proven
Grian is such a chaos amidst of tranquility. He is been a Hermit for three seasons yet it feels like he has been one for ages. I was always a building fanatic so Grian was my go-to for any inspiration and knowledge. Now I follow mumbo, tango, zed, bdubs, scar, and almost all the hermits. I also found red stone interesting through Impulse and Mumbo.
I don’t normally comment on videos like this, but you said that if I make it to a certain part of the video I have a good attention span. I would like to make it very clear I do not have a good attention span and your video was just that good to keep me involved. Very few videos can do that for me nowadays, and now you have earned my subscription. (Not that it mattered lol)
Funny part is I thought about that too and with empires being so young having hermitcraft people on there to help show them on how to build farms or how they basically run their smp while making it a fun new twist for both smps allowing both worlds to live and yes I do know that there are some permits already on that show but everybody brains a new creativity to the game and I'm pretty sure hermits learning something new
Man, you were the one channel that introduced me to Hermitcraft because of the Grian Lore video.. kinda ironic which is a huge thing because of the HC x Empires crossover. Thank you truly. I have now watched all of Grian's HC videos and slowly watching other Hermit's perspective of HC. It is so bizarre..
Expanding into the twitch stream section quite alot of hermits who do publish VODs for people who likes long form videos to discover there videos from there 2nd channel
The best part about hermitcraft that i feel is the interaction between the hermits, be it pranks, the fun talks, funny fights which is never real and the colab in all the videos, i mean i don't think there is even a single creator who post a single video without anyone else in his/her video
bro i was so hyped about the hcbbs bc zed and grian are my favorite hermits and they've never really collabed before that. zedaph being zedaph during season season 7 was so focused on his lil knick knack cave didn't really venture out that much despite all of the bases being near each other. anyways yeah that was such a genius idea
I've had some of these thoughts swirling around for a while, but you put it into words so well - Hermits approach UA-cam and creation differently from just about every other creator in the game, and it shows in their work. Great video Ani 👏👏
One of my favorite things about hermit craft is the behind the scenes communication. I love watching everyone go to war and prank each other but knowing everyone’s on board and it’s never going to tern into real drama. The knowledge that everyone’s in on it and no one is getting hurt.
Good point about the family-oriented nature of HC. My family of six will watch some separately, some together. We haven't watched any Marvel since a couple episodes of Moon Knight, nor any StarWars since Boba Fett. BUT, we are watching HermitCraft.
i have another example like the HBBS getting people to watch other hermits. the king ren storyline in season 9 is the sole reason i am watching all hermitcraft uploads now. i started watching hermitcraft in june and when ren came out with server quests mid july i was HOOKED. i wanted to see people participate in this quest competition thing. it really made me branch out which is why i hold the whole rentheking storyline close to my heart. also before that, when gem went to get her stats in beef's card game, i subscribed to him immediately. these collabs are just so great for everyone. especially now that unexpected collabs are much easier to come by because they have proximity chat.
To add. They also collaborated with Empires SMP and made it easier for some Hermits like Pearl, Gem and False to pump out content. Basically 2 birds in 1 stone. As well as introducing Hermitcraft viewers to Empires SMP. As of recent I have never missed a single Mythicalsausage episode, he is my favorite Empires member.
finally mythicalsausage love in these comments! :)) he is also my fave empires member which is why i was over the moon when keralis, one of my fave hermits teamed up at first in the crossover.
I also love how in each season the hermits dont always stick with the same group they spread out and hangout with everyone. Though we have the iconic trios and friend groups. They still take the time to chat with everyone. And with lore wise its never as heavy and deep enough for the fan base to start hating on that creator like on the dsmp. Its a similar situation to the Empires Smp
Something also should be said about the projects the hermits keep doing as well. Decked Out for instance is a level of interactive game play engineered entirely by players that just isn't in Minecraft normally. Many of the builds are taking on whole new levels such as Bdubs massive building of mountains before we even got them or the sheer oddity of community items like the Boat'em Hole.
It good you mentioned xisuma videos/streams mentioning the backend working of the smp, which i believe could be very useful to the new creators. I remember watching one of his streams recently where he mentioned how everyone was an underdog when they joined hermitcraft and why they, as a community, would never allow popular/famous/well known new member into the hermitcraft smp and rather add some underdogs who can potentially display much more. I mean that talk he gave in his stream shows a lot about how maturely they take the decisions in running this SMP and are not running to get more views by following trends or other famous creators. And if you don't know there are alot of famous youtube minecraft players who have said it multiple times that they would do anything to be a part of this hermitcraft community.
I think one of the biggest things that makes the hermits' videos so amazing is the insane quality of those videos. I meam, just take a look at Bdubs lately.
I'm glad to hear that it'll never end b/c I just started watching it. I started off with watching Grian when he 1st joined (season 6?) and I'm just now getting to season 9. I love the camaraderie, the cooperation and the wholesome pranks. I also just LOVE the builds - so awe-inspiring! I'm also now subscribed to 6(?) of the Hermits now, so I'll have plenty to catch up on!
I realised that when you said that 99% of ppl have a hella short attention span, at that point, my self-awareness kicked in in a form of me realising I haven't checked my phone or other tabs on my opened web browser. And you have a lot of good points about the play styles of the HC (hermitcraft) creators, editing styles of said creators and so on. I have mainly been watching Grians HC episodes because of his humour and silly chaotic nature of being that one guy of the friend group with the ungodly good jokes. There's the occasional Mumbo Jumbo, Kerallis, and Iskall video as well that I watch, but I don't really watch their hermitcraft videos with similar devotion as to me watching Grian's shenanigans
I watched the video where grian made his throne in season 7 and then binged season 6 and got up to pace with season 7, never missed one video from grians side ever again.
Started watching hermitcraft years ago by season 6 due to a video recommended to me, which was a Grian video on season 6, which I believed was his 1st season. Due to him, i got to meet all the hermits, and I even watched all of their videos at times, especially when quarantine came. Crazy to think that, xisumavoid has been in the server since the very beginning, and he has never reset his episode counter since then he has passed over 1000 episodes of hermitcraft a long time ago.
hc is like that wierd sea animal which isn't evolved for ages i mean like millions of years but in a good way its because they are already perfect and doesn't need any more perfection. this is the best i can describe the hc server. i have always dreamt about getting in hc server but now i realise it isn't that easy...
Members of hermitcraft do get burnt out, some for months at a time. The difference of hermitcraft is transparency, the audience is willing to wait for good content instead of forcing bad content to have something to watch. It is genuine.
HermitCraft is technically just a scaled up VanossCrew by technicality, each person has their own personality (duh), but each personality draws their own audience, the collaborative work draws audiences from one another, it’s a society where everyone works and everyone gains from the work even if there’s no direct collaboration between the people, because they say “oh look, Mumbo did this redstone door, I don’t get it, check out his video for explanation, anyways let’s go do this building for the door” and then mumbo goes “look at what Grian built, insane, check out his video for the step by step, anyways back to redstone door”
You forgot one crucial part. Some of these creators are geniuses at content writing, they are competing with Netflix, Prime and Disney for the "sitting down for an hour or so to watch something". I wouldn't be surprised if one of the hermits gets drafted for screenwriting soon.
The rabbit hole of finding new Hermits to watch through other Hermits videos is so real. I bought minecraft right near the start of lockdown and after a few weeks, I looked up some videos online. I watched Wattles for a bit and in a q&a video he mentioned how he wasn't joining hermitcraft and how new Hermits have to be voted in, so then I looked up hermitcraft to see what that was all about. It's a few months into season 7 and youtube recommended me Grain and Mumbo, of course. In their episodes they interacted with iskall a lot, so I started watching him, and he ended up being the campaign manager for stressmonster's mayoral run, so I started watching her, and in season 8 stress based close by to false and gem, so I started watching them. And then server-wide events, like the mayoral run and decked out introduced me to Tango and Joe hills, because decked out was so impressive and Joe hills was hilariously bizarre so I had to go see what they were about. I had started watching Scar from him being neighbors with Grian, and then I started watching bdubs after scar won the mayorship and bdubs was his second in command. The fact that they reset the server regularly, too, is so important. Like, I didn't watch any of rendog's season 7, but his and doc's crazy antics with the octagon had me watching in season 8. I fell out of watching them both in season 9 because doc's episodes got too long for me and I didn't care for the greedy king arc Ren was doing, but when they start season 10 they'll be doing something completely different so I might go back to watching every episode. If Hermitcraft was just continuous, I wouldn't ever be enticed back to their channels because they would still be doing the same thing that made me leave. It also helps that they're all about my age or older, so I never feel silly for interacting with their content.
Also, Xisuma seems like a very capable and very dedicated leader, so I wonder what role he played in keeping the server that organized. I mean, it is a democracy and it has all the positives of a democracy, but still someone needs to organize the server-wide meetings. And someone needed to organize all of the democratic processes to begin with. If I remember correctly, Xisuma stepped up to lead the server in a democratic way after a hard time in the end of Season 1. If he hadn't, who knows where Hermitcraft would be today...
I think Xisuma doesn't do much other than some technical stuff, while the other hermits organise events and big collabs. Xisuma recently did a video series detailing what goes on behind the scenes.
The one thing I always think of when someone says "A youtuber/streamer`s job is to play video games" is that it really isn`t. Their job is entertaining people. Video games is just the medium through which they choose to do so. Just playing a video, even being extremely good at a video game, is simply not enough to keep viewers watching continually and for years. You need to be entertaining as well and that is what is mentally (and probably physically) exhausting.
I enjoy watching Hermitcraft because it genuinely just seems like a bunch of very talented friends having fun. Sure the amazing builds, redstone and other crazy things the hermits can do helps, but ultimately they are able to make entertaining videos without being scripted. There's also never a boring video as they all put in effort to come up with fun and wacky ideas. Plus if one hermit takes a break like Mumbo did a while back then there are still others that people watch and enjoy
I used to only really watch dsmp content and occasionally Grian. But when Alex died i kinda left the dsmp for hermitcraft because it was stable, and a constant I needed.
I also started with one of impulse Iron farms and noticed I have seen the guy with the Moustache before. Today Hermitcraft together are my most viewed videos on youtube.
Hermitcraft really is the only smp I’m willing to watch cause because of the maturity you explained. It’s family friendly yes but you can tell by their interactions with each other they are adults having chill fun with friends.
The thing you said about Zed is absolutely true! When I watched Grian’s video, I was like wtf is this restore stuff?! I was so curious that I watched Zeds entire season, then liked him so much that I watched every other of his Hermitcraft seasons!
Hermit craft is genuinely so much fun to watch. They are so close with one another and always have each other’s back. The builds that they create are stunning and they are always doing something really funny that keeps the viewers engaged. That’s why hermitcraft deserves to be the biggest smp
The fact they are all adults increases the likelihood of them handling any grievances in a mature way. It probably also helps that the server is so large and the hermits so many that if anyone is salty for a time, they can also avoid each other until both parties cool off... a rather healthy way to handle conflict to not escalate it. I can see some people getting annoyed at the pranks of Grian or the playstyle of JoeHills, but the simple solution is to just keep interactions minimal and communicate boundaries. Adults tend to be better at that sort of thing.
Another thing that make people want to watch other hermits is that there is Lore. But not Lore like dream smo were stuff is kinda scripted. No there is just one hermit that Idk,changed the size of the moon. And everyone interprets it differently because nobody knows what it meant.
Imagine showing someone Ethos channel. He doesn't do thumbnails, uploads super irregular and many other things "you should never do on UA-cam", yet he is incredibly successful
One thing I haven’t seen anyone else really talk about is how the hermits don’t need other people but they don’t avoid people either, they can hold my interest if they are on their own or with other people
another thing that keeps the server alive is that most viewers follow 3-5 hermits at the same time, so a hermit can take a break(like mumbo did) and it doesn't hurt the server or the viewers, and when they come back they can just go on as if nothing happen because the viewers will still be interested in watching them.
Yah Iam excited for Mumbo's return 🤧
That is facts, I watch Gem, Grian, Pearl and sometimes Doc
@@meringue5901 I watch grain , scar , gem , bdubs , cubfan and ren sometimes🌝
@@Samuel_Burgess_ many people lmao
Have a lotta free time 🤧
I'd heard of Hermitcraft for awhile, but I never watched it until season 9 when I decided to watch Grian's video, since I'd watched alot of his other videos. In his episode I saw someone had built an Eagle, and I love birds so I had to find out who made that, and it turned out to be False, so I started watching her videos, and now a few months later I'm subscribed to all the hermits and watch like half of the videos.
who do u watch the most? for me its scar :)
@@AK_804 Still probably Grian and False.
I’m a Grian and Impulse guy :)
Mainly Grian here, though I also occasionally watch Mumbo’s stuff and have been watching the other hermits more too!
scar, tango and etho for me, never miss a single video.
What I love about Hermitcraft is how healthy the environment is. Not only in their schedule and self-care, it's genuinely just a server played with friends. It's all so natural, the banter, the games. They don't forget that it's all just a game but at the same time, they acknowledge how much effort the others put into their stuff. There's a near-perfect line they set for each other and it's honestly incredible to watch
They entry system too! From what I heard, if even one hermit doesn't agree on a new candidate, it's instant rejection. They build a fun and healthy environment not only for themselves, but for the viewers too.
Some of the pranks they pull won't even make it in videos and they only reason fans would know about it is because of streams. It shows that even off-camera, they're just a bunch of people enjoying time with each other. And I think that's what drew most people into it and what kept us here. Don't think I'll get tired of them any time soon
True, Just looks at scar's fandom, they don't even care if he takes a 1 year break. as they know his condition, and what issues he faces.
He has been met with nothing but support even when he felt sorry when he did not make a video 1 week in a row.
@@darknessblades true! i'm proud to be a part of it :)
Absolutely! Hell it's been 4 years for me and I don't think there's been even a speck of drama here
@@topiaz sadly not quite true Grian was a real issue early on. Well that's a bit of dig actually Grians fan base prior to Hermit Craft was the real issue. He had to call out a vocal minority a few times during the civil war arc for bombarding a few colleges with really defamatory comments made well out of context. A obvious side effect of what was at the time a unhealthy almost cult of personality with a younger audience. This resulted in a few hermits effectively distancing themselves from him insitu because any growth wasn't worth the possible backlash.
Now that's very much water under the bridge and you can see he is much more contrite and gives preambles warning what he expects of his community if a little manufactured drama is planned on Hermit Craft/Empires or ofcourse any of his spin offs like 2nd/3rd life.
@@DanielVisOneCade Oh, that's really bad. Never knew about that..
Glad it's been long resolved now
Also, the hermits are actually good at communicating with their viewers as well. If the viewers are getting more toxic, during the "lore" some will try to shut it down as soon as possible, unlike some creators most notably Dream.
You can see that in some of Grian's videos, you can see him controlling the younger viewers actions and reduce toxicity overall. Another example is Xisuma, he usually communicates his feelings about some situation with his viewers through his life streams and clips in the Xisuma 2 or says channel. Like the one about the over use of meme comments.
Yeah, I remember a few years back people were kind of making fun of Xisuma, saying he must be an A.I. because he does so much all the time until he started calling it out and saying how he didn't like that. After that, people stopped making those kinds of jokes.
Yeah, I used to be annoyed at Grian constantly going, "Stop, be nice, this isn't about showing hate, we're all in this for fun," But now, I get it, cuz so many viewers go out of their way to cause unnecessary harm over trivial things, and Grian gotta do his best to control it.
The biggest and most important aspect of Hermitcraft is maturity, the hermits are mature and decisive individuals and this quality reflects in their content and playstyle. The hermits have adapted really well, introducing new things to keep their self interests burning. They entertain the audience but also entertain themselves and have kept that as a priority which as a result keeps the content entertaining aswell.
Empires too ❤️
@@JavaRivers well I'm sure they are but we don't have enough sample size. We have years of hermitcraft whereas Empires is a relatively new server. Hermitcraft has made it way thru the ups and downs of social media, Minecraft, SMP culture and controversies while Empires is riding on the peak popularity of the game. But I'm sure that the Empires server will prove itself with time.
@@mr.mastermind3969 Mm I see what you're saying there. I've been watching fWhip Sausage & Gem for years longer, and I can attest to their general maturity
@@JavaRivers yeah same I do believe the same. And I do think empires is pretty much gonna be like hermitcraft. But it's how you handle things as a group and I'm looking forward for empires to show me the coordination which they've got. And most of them are irl friends which only contributes to the likelihood of empires being stable.
Mindcrack had an even older group of people who were even more mature, that SMP ended up dying over greed.
It helps that they reset regularly too. But not too often so each season still has time to develop
that last part is the main reason why s8 wasn't very liked by the community, it ended way too quickly and hermits were rushing to get their bases done in time.
@@Blackilykat S8 was the "first" hermitcraft season I fully watched from start to end. I had previously watched the start of s7 but I didn't watch it after the 1st ep so I don't relaly consider it my first season.
@@Blackilykat it's because the new minecraft update is going to be released not far too long from the release of season 8. Because the new update added more structure and completely new game mechanics, it could mess up the season 8 world. So they had to finish it sooner because of the update. It's really a shame that season 8 is really short. I really wanted to see the completed midnight alley.
Them resettomg was a turn off for me, all my time watching and getting invested was just ruined.
Don't forget to mention the incredible funds they collected through the charity event recently. I mean when a creators' community achieves their charity target even before the actual event starts, you know it is huge.
As someone who wants to get into content creation, I'm taking notes on how they deal with analytics, how they approach creation and their community. I watched a video tracking their growth and let me tell you it was so encouraging to see how many of them where making videos to no one for months even years yet they stuck to it and got where they are now.
Good luck for your future❤
I have been too!! Watching all of the creators and analyzing their methods is so inspiring!
I think another aspect that really shows how perfect of a plan this server has is the seasons themselves. rather then have the server grow through each update, they restart the server when the creators want a fresh start, allowing them to completely change how they play and interact. mumbo can go an entire season with the goal of never killing a mob, and can make creative ways to get the items that become inaccessible as a result of his decision, he can ask friends for help and can barter or trade with them, he can make machines to do it for him, he can even mutate into a potato man because of the number of spuds he ate, but once that gimmick has run its course he waits for the next season and goes back to killing. the new seed and updates allow the hermits to completely change, and then once the season is done they release a copy of the final world so that viewers can explore their bases, find secrets, and have fun. The creators themselves are also just fun. ive seen a lot of tumblr posts just compiling fun facts that the hermits have mentioned in their videos and livestreams. Along with the hermits being really positive overall, they all support each other, encourage each other, and respect each other. when mumbo took a break, grian was very respectful about making sure people understood what was happening and he only wished for mumbo to be back in a "i miss my friend, but im glad hes taking care of himself" way. overall you can really tell that none of the hermits are doing it for money or fame, and pretty much all of them would keep going even if they didnt get any views, because thats not what hermitcraft is. it also helps that a lot of them already did make content for years before blowing up, and most were doing youtube as a hobby or side project while still working a "main" job until recently.
I love the duality of Hermitcraft. While the Hermits are insanely dedicated to the game, they somehow seem to remember that its just a game. This is something that you rarely get to see from people. Their sense of balance carries over to literally anything they do, and it's so perfect. I could've never thought that I'd spend a good part of my life just watching a group of friends play a videogame together for years and years, but here I am. Great video as always, Ani. Absolutely loved it.
While I agree with what you're saying, calling Minecraft just a game (while true) feels like it makes it a little bit more insignificant. I think the game is more of an experience than just a game. Like a creative ground on which you can create whatever you desire.
@@_M_643 but it’s still just a game, at the end of the day. no matter how great the experience is.
@leduck8096 Yeah, I understand that, but it just doesn't feel like it.
@@_M_643 that’s true. our brain can't admit that it’s just a game
@leduck8096 Well, because it's not just a game, it's an experience.
The current hermitcraft x empires crossover is very similar to the base swap in the previous hermitcraft season. It's making fans want to catch up on all members of both seasons to get every angle of what's happening.
Like I mainly watched grian, but now I'm not only watch new empires channels like Jimmy & lizzy but I'm also watching hermits I've never really watches before.
i´ve started with Mumbo and Grian, watched other Hermits too and now many of them are so good to not to watch. Zedaph, Scar and Tango are funny, DocM is top notch in breaking the game and X is a troll, who´s also get trolled by his chat.
I agree, I had heard of Empires due to a couple of the hermits such as Gem and False being on there. Never was interested enough to check them out until this crossover. Now I am starting to follow the Empires gang as well!
Man I forgot about the base swap... Season 7!
(Then there’s the recap of the recap)
Coming from Empires I feel that too. I always wanted to find a Hermit to watch regularly. I couldn't find the time tho, b/c I just wasn't invested in that world or those people. Now that they're unified I can try out a Hermit here and there while still getting an angle on my favorite series ❤️
That mumbo jumbo big base swap video was the one that got me in to hermitcraft from mumbo to scar to grian to zed. I found this rabbit hole with so many absurd Easter eggs like it always got me hooked and excited.
Ha! That was how I found Zed too! I was like, "This dude is FUNNY!" Then shortly after that on a stream Impulse was telling chat if they are looking around for more Hermitcraft content go check out Zed cause he's always doing wacky stuff and is really funny doing it.
So i did ... and did not regret it :)
this is what I've been saying! the fact that the hermits interact with eachother helps them to grow, I started with just watching Grian in s8, I thought the boatem people were all really cool so I watched all of them, through Impulse I discovered Tango, who went to 'the chamber' from Zed, I thought this was a really cool concept and wanted to see more, and now Zed is my favorite hermit! I think it's so good to see them all interacting with people they don't normally interact with, like the base swap, which makes you interested in the others and helps both sides grow! hermitcraft is such an amazing smp with an amazing community and I love every single hermit for that
Zed is so underrated. He's got really good videos and he's hilarious.
One more thing i love about this SMP is they equally respect everyone. TFC was one of my favourite hermits. Gods rest his soul in peace. His videos might be average, his builds might be below average but every hermit gave him the respect he deserved irrespective of the quality of content he posted which is beautiful.
If this was another stupid SMP they would have surely made like giant statues and what not as their tribute for the legend TFC. But NOT HERMITCRAFT. They just kept it simple and they never wanted to monetize on their friend's passing away and they didn't. Each hermit payed their respect in their own way, some talked about him more than other while some just showed a beautiful gesture and moved on. This is how it should be. This shows that this SMP is run by mature real people. Not some desperate kids trying to get views from the internet.
I will be honest, it was a bit of a culture shock for me when I started watching the Hermits after the Dream SMP.
I was a very invested Dream SMP fan. I stopped watching them after a big number of creators just stopped posting anything bcs they got burned out. It got to the point where there were like 2-3 people online on average every time someone streamed bcs literally no one wanted to log on. Even if they create a totally new world, I really don't think they will ever fully make an active server.
I think the reason the Hermits are still active with keeping their smp alive is that they support each other. They get out of the way to create interactive mini-games and shops and always complement each other bases.
Dream smp never had a support system like that. Most creators just sit in their own friend groups. Some bigger creators with more popular lore would even sometimes speak down on the lore of the smaller creators or be dismissive of them and their rp. It may be just little things said without ill intent, but little things like these did create a demotivating atmosphere there.
One of the instances I thought really separates the two were the Mycelium war on Hermicrafy when both parties very patiently waited for their opposing sides to finish the traps in their bases. It gave us the funny ravager trap in the HEP headquarters and Bdubs trying to fight Doc's hog with an item frame. Even though they were "at war", both parties let the other finish what they intended to do. Instead of making a video with them being all smarter and stronger than their enemies, they just messed around and showed how truly impressed they are with their friend's traps.
Edit: it also says a lot how every Hermit has a voice when it comes to new members, but on the Dream smp only Dream (who doesn't even log in) can add new ppl.
i totally get what you mean by 'culture shock' , i started watching s7 in 2021, as i was getting out of dsmp more and remember thinking to myself 'oh they'd have such an advantage if they just broke in before the traps were complete' and thats really missing the point of the server i think despite being exactly what someone on dsmp would do
getting all your shit wrecked tends to make people not want to play
@@Z.O.M.G yeah, there were so much intances of People Just mindlessly destroying each other based and calling it a prank. I never liked that about dsmp.
The hermits always think about compensation when they do stuff like that. Like Grian making a set or Diamond armor and tools before pushing LD in the void to compensate any of her possible lost items. Or Tango destroying Falses copper Shop and then rebuilding it in a more convenient place +giving her extra copper as an apology for the prank
@@taidko376 the first peragraph is literally the simplest possible description of the dsmp
@@Z.O.M.G truth...unless Techno was actively involved...when Techno decided it was time for a lore stream...then everybody logged in...man do I miss that pig...
i've been here since season 6 and man it's only grown. i love the wholesomeness, the way any hermitcraft animatics get creator attention and the comments they leave is so sweet, they genuinely feel like nice people.
Just a couple’a hermits x3
ive also been here sense season 6 and that's when I had disovered grian and mumbo, honestly I think that if it was not for them I would not be the person I am today
On top of that, it isn't scripted. Unlike the Dream SMP, it doesn't feel fake, or like they are pretending. And also, they won't run out of ideas because there are none to run out of.
They definitely script in some cases, but they're good actors and mix it in with improv, so it can be hard to tell. It's most obvious recently when they first came to empires and had to pretend it wasn't extensively planned haha.
@@Lukiyu yeh, but most of it isnt scripted, like the intersctions between hermits, only the lore is scripted
Great video as always! It explains a lot about why I just suddenly started watching Hermitcraft over Dream SMP (even if indirectly). The organization was actually there and I didn't realize how important it was for me in the DSMP. I would just have Lore overload from watching one stream and I missed out on the actual Minecraft. When I watch things on Hermitcraft, there is always a healthy balance of building, shenanigans, and lore.
The whole “every hermit is connected with every video, meaning that everyone gets good views” thing is kinda similar with Empires too, though it’s on a MUCH smaller scale due to empires being newer and having a smaller viewerbase, with Hermitcraft being IN empires currently, it gives empires a good cut from Hermitcraft as well! Hermitcraft fans are also getting into empires, myself included, and vice-versa! Not to mention Hermitopia is one of the few times where ALL of the hermits are all recording together at the same time (other than season starts and events and such)
Hermitcraft is so unique. It HAS to be to of continued this long. And there's a lot of reasons for it, some of which you touched on in this video, but some you didn't.
The biggest is probably how they handle the seasons. They don't just stick to one world indefinitely, they switch to an entirely new world, an entirely fresh start, every year or so. Because if you stick to the same world things will just naturally get boring. There's only so much you can do. But restarting from the bottom means hermits can do new things, they aren't just stuck in one place. Each season different groups arise, some of whom haven't really interacted closely before. It gives you new interactions, new - or just more frequent - interactions between hermits. Which, naturally, allows viewers of one hermit to get attached to another they weren't before and channel hop to watch them as well, thus growing everyone involved. I mean, just look at Grian. He's consistently been grouped with Mumbo, but he also had Iskall with Sahara in Season 6, several other hermits in the Mycelium Resistance in season 7, Boatem in season 8, and now he's with all the hermits who jumped to Empires (which ALSO serves to allow empires viewers to jump to hermits and vice versa, growing the viewership of all involved).
Everything on Hermitcraft shifts with every new season. the Hermits can try out new building styles they didn't last season - like Scar, switching from steampunk style to literally building Disney World - they can interact with new groups, and they can play with new storylines, be they server-wide stories or small scale stuff.
If they'd just stuck to a single world, I doubt they would still be around. Maybe 2 or 3 hermits would still be playing on it, but it wouldn't be as big as it is today, it would of simply faded into obscurity.
Switching seasons also makes it easier for new fans! If they had stuck to the one world, it would be nearly impossible to catch up. But a new fan can jump in whereever, be it the start of Season 9, or rewatching any past season. If you were to just jump in at, say, the start of Etho's season 9, you wouldn't be missing anything. Compare this to something like DreamSMP, where if you jump in anywhere other than the start of L'Manburg you'd be left confused and floundering for information, needing to spend hours upon hours revising just to watch a Minecraft SMP.
Scar is part of what makes hermitcraft so fun. I love watching all of the hermits and the way they interact with each other. But when they interact with scar you never can expect or predict what he is going to say or do. He always adds the wild card that makes everything so much more fun.
One thing I think shows how close the community is, was when one of the member Tinfoilchef, passed away. Seeing them all mourn in their own way was nice. RIP TFC
Every single hermit is also downright amazing at one or two facets of the game as well...and Ethoslab might actually be the best all around minecrafter period. They have amazing builders, redstone geniuses and even some that are amazing at pvp/combat. The thing about a hermit for anyone is true and they're all at the top of the heap for what you're looking for.
He's great at Minecraft but his most impressive acomplishment are his videos. Funny, snappy editing, tons of running gags, efficient, informative commentary, musical montages with noteblock remixes he made himself, masterful blend of the formal and informal- unmatched minecraft entertainment.
this is such a well made video. its interesting to me how communication between the hermits and dsmp ppl work since i never thought of it. maybe it has something about the hermits actually treating it as a job? or their experience outside of content creation that makes them more "professional" with their meetings and such. also 9 seasons to learn what works and what doesnt, made them what they are.
The care they take to select new members is an even bigger deal. They avoid any of the drama/annoyance other servers deal with when they let a new guy on, only for them make like 2 videos and leave. And they are VERY selective, *GRIAN* of all people was vetoed on a few occasions, for reasons ranging from "inexperienced in Survival (wels)" to "too lore heavy (can't remember)". And he's pretty unanimously popular now. But they waited to make sure he'd fit with no issues, which is much better long term
Getting into Hermitcraft is like trying to win a talent show with around 20 judges and everybody has everybody's out buzzers.
But the prize of winning is ~20 chill and sometimes chaotically friends
I'm 43 and although I played console games from a young age, I didn't take it past an xbox. I'd heard of Minecraft and just passed it off as a boring kids game with mastersystem graphics. last year when my son was 5, we were watching UA-cam and he saw a Minecraft based thumbnail from wadzee and asked to watch it (it was a biome swap one I think), then we went to a Grian hermitcraft pranks video. He became obsessed, and so did I, I watched all grian hermitcraft episodes to date. Then went back to watch other hermits that I'd seen interact with grian until now, I've gone back to pre-grian hermitcraft. The series is great! I bought Minecraft for my son to play on this year and have started my own game, now I'm wondering if people would be interested in watching me learn the game as I've not actually got to fighting the dragon or a wither, I've got a mob farm, iron farm and a load of villagers to trade with but that's about it.
It's kinda crazy how there have almost been different generations of Minecraft players. When you mentioned that all the hermitcraft guys are in their 30's and not like the 18-20 year olds blowing up on youtube, I was thinking to myself "THOSE guys were the 18-20 year olds who originally blew up on youtube for minecraft". It's hard to believe they've been going so long, but they've always had good content.
Wow, this was a really great in depth-analysis of what makes this series so popular. Thank you! :D
3:09 wow, in any context, celeste music always hits me with a big dose of nostalgia
This video doesn't even mention the fact that they frequently reset (all the different seasons). When they feel things slowing down because there's nothing left to do, they start a new world/season, which keeps both themselves and viewers engaged.
Hope you get more subs. You deserve more. Your underated
True
With the crossover going on right now. I have definitely been watching more than one hermit, than I usually do. found it really fun and interesting, to see all sides of the story and even some empires. cuz I didn't really watch any of them before the crossover.
This is exactly my experience with Hermitcraft. I started watching through following Mumbo Jumbo's channel. I watched the odd episode but was a bit lost on who everyone was and the scale of what had gone before. Then a new season started and introduced Grian to the crew. Before that I only knew Grian from his aesthetic build tutorials and wasn't very keen on that content. Hermitcraft was a platform that really showed Grian's personality more and his interactions with Mumbo drew me to him. I was now following 2 hermits...
A short way into the season Mumbo needed some interesting landscaping done and felt that wasn't his strong suit so called in a favour from GoodtimeswithScar. I watched Mumbo reveal what Scar had created and decided I wanted to see the design process from Scar's point of view... Scar is absolutely lovely and very amusing... Now I follow 3 hermits.
As the series progressed, Grian's impish nature led to more and more innocent pranking of fellow Hermits. Often I would be interested in seeing the other Hermit's reaction to these pranks. The pranks escalated into a "Civil War" with a lot of cross overs between the Hermits. By the end of the Civil War I found I was following around 15 Hermits.
This season Mumbo has taken time off from Hermitcraft but I continue to follow a large selection of Hermits (and a couple of members of the Empires SMP thanks to crossover events). I find there is a wide variety of content being produced and I get something different from each creator but, as you point out, it's the interaction between them all that creates some of the most engaging content.
great analysis, I especially loved mentioning the hermits maturity and experience compared to many other smps, its definitely their strongest reason for staying so drama free and consistent.
however mumbo is not the youngest nor 26. pearl and gem are both 26 (or 27) but pearl is slightly younger making her the youngest.
I'd love to see more videos about hermit craft because while its certainly gaining popularity, there is a lot to still be said about it and its creators (especially the more under appreciated ones, there's a heavy emphasis of mainly just grian, mumbo and scar which while amazing creators have left many equally talented ones not talked about as much until they're brought to the light like you mentioned with Zedaph)
i had to google this lol but mumbo's bday is december '95, so the man's still a got a couple of weeks of being 26. i get their slip up though, even though i know gem and pearl are around the same age my brain still hasn't fully shed the "mumbos the baby of the group"
Mumbo is definitely not the youngest, that's why he said in the video that "Mumbo is actually AMONGST the youngest," which implies that Mumbo is not the youngest player overall, but belongs in the youngest age group in the server (26 to 28-29). Thanks for listening! (or reading, in this case lol)
Docm! By far one of my favorites the amount of game breaking shenanigans he gets up to is just insane.
I think it’s most notable that Hermitcraft as a whole doesn’t even massively suffer from burnout. Because there are so many creators with overlapping draws to their videos, if one creator like Mumbo stops uploading for a while, there are plenty of other hermits you can watch. I watch The Hermitcraft Recap every week. And when Mumbo stopped uploading I had more time to watch something else. And I filled that space with ImpulseSV. Who does similar technical based stuff and is great fun to watch. Now, even if Mumbo comes back to Hermitcraft. I’m not gonna stop watching Impulse because I’ve grown to really love his stuff. Just watching one video of a hermit you can get entranced. The first hermit I watched was Mumbo. I had been watching his other stuff for a bit. And started watching near the end of season 7. Then when they switched bases. I saw him move with GoodTimesWithScar. And then I went to watch Scar’s videos. Then I went to Grian. Then season 8 started. I saw Gem join who I recognised from Empires as well because I also watch Smajor. And over and over I got attracted to more and more hermits. Now I watch Mumbo, Scar, Grian, Gem, Impulse, BDubs, Zedaph, Doc, Etho, Iskall, Joe, Stress, Beef and Xisuma, every episode they make. I also occasionally watch some of the others if there is a collaboration. I like to watch all perspectives if it’s particularly interesting. I’ve been drowned with stuff to watch with the Empires Crossover.
But I mean to say that the collaboration led me now to go from consistently watching 1 Hermit. To consistently watching 11. That there is growth, even in a Let’s play format. They slowly share their views. Bring it together enough that $429,000 can be made for charity when the communities collide.
I feel like the shop and the economic are also a really big part of the hermits helping each other to make content quicker and more progress!!
Hermitcraft never dies!
Agreed
Glory to hermitcraft
Hermits every now and then make references to an older season making you want to go back and watch an older season
honestly, I love this channle so much! like you are so good at putting scrambled ideas into neat and easy to understand videos, I love the kind of chaotic but also organized nature of them, I love how when you talk it feels naturally even though its probably a script, also you pick the best topics to talk about!!!
Hermitcraft is singlehandedly the most positive and friendly community/series i've ever seen. (it's been 4 years already.. wow)
I’ve been thinking more about this, and found a pattern with Hermitcraft that many people haven’t noticed. Since season 5 (I think) there has been a pattern where 1-2 hermits get added one season, and go without a new member the next. To add more context, Grian was added in season 6, but nobody in 7. Pearl and Gemini was added in season 8, but nobody in season 9. I may be over stating, but I think it’s one of the reasons why Hermitcraft took off in season 6. (It might be just Grian, though). It gives that extra boost of energy for the views when a new season starts. At the end of a season, Hermitcraft gets less popular. I believe that they add a member or two to last them a season and about 2/3, then repeat. It might just be a coincidence, since this system hasn’t run for too long, but if season 10 has a new member, then my point may be proven
Grian is such a chaos amidst of tranquility.
He is been a Hermit for three seasons yet it feels like he has been one for ages.
I was always a building fanatic so Grian was my go-to for any inspiration and knowledge.
Now I follow mumbo, tango, zed, bdubs, scar, and almost all the hermits.
I also found red stone interesting through Impulse and Mumbo.
I don’t normally comment on videos like this, but you said that if I make it to a certain part of the video I have a good attention span. I would like to make it very clear I do not have a good attention span and your video was just that good to keep me involved. Very few videos can do that for me nowadays, and now you have earned my subscription. (Not that it mattered lol)
Funny part is I thought about that too and with empires being so young having hermitcraft people on there to help show them on how to build farms or how they basically run their smp while making it a fun new twist for both smps allowing both worlds to live and yes I do know that there are some permits already on that show but everybody brains a new creativity to the game and I'm pretty sure hermits learning something new
Man, you were the one channel that introduced me to Hermitcraft because of the Grian Lore video.. kinda ironic which is a huge thing because of the HC x Empires crossover.
Thank you truly. I have now watched all of Grian's HC videos and slowly watching other Hermit's perspective of HC. It is so bizarre..
Expanding into the twitch stream section quite alot of hermits who do publish VODs for people who likes long form videos to discover there videos from there 2nd channel
hermitcraft will always hold a special place in my heart
I agree.
The best part about hermitcraft that i feel is the interaction between the hermits, be it pranks, the fun talks, funny fights which is never real and the colab in all the videos, i mean i don't think there is even a single creator who post a single video without anyone else in his/her video
bro i was so hyped about the hcbbs bc zed and grian are my favorite hermits and they've never really collabed before that. zedaph being zedaph during season season 7 was so focused on his lil knick knack cave didn't really venture out that much despite all of the bases being near each other. anyways yeah that was such a genius idea
I've had some of these thoughts swirling around for a while, but you put it into words so well - Hermits approach UA-cam and creation differently from just about every other creator in the game, and it shows in their work. Great video Ani 👏👏
One of my favorite things about hermit craft is the behind the scenes communication. I love watching everyone go to war and prank each other but knowing everyone’s on board and it’s never going to tern into real drama. The knowledge that everyone’s in on it and no one is getting hurt.
Good point about the family-oriented nature of HC. My family of six will watch some separately, some together. We haven't watched any Marvel since a couple episodes of Moon Knight, nor any StarWars since Boba Fett. BUT, we are watching HermitCraft.
i have another example like the HBBS getting people to watch other hermits. the king ren storyline in season 9 is the sole reason i am watching all hermitcraft uploads now. i started watching hermitcraft in june and when ren came out with server quests mid july i was HOOKED. i wanted to see people participate in this quest competition thing. it really made me branch out which is why i hold the whole rentheking storyline close to my heart. also before that, when gem went to get her stats in beef's card game, i subscribed to him immediately. these collabs are just so great for everyone. especially now that unexpected collabs are much easier to come by because they have proximity chat.
The vibes on this server are just immaculate. It’s not even just about Minecraft. It’s about the people.
To add. They also collaborated with Empires SMP and made it easier for some Hermits like Pearl, Gem and False to pump out content. Basically 2 birds in 1 stone.
As well as introducing Hermitcraft viewers to Empires SMP. As of recent I have never missed a single Mythicalsausage episode, he is my favorite Empires member.
finally mythicalsausage love in these comments! :)) he is also my fave empires member which is why i was over the moon when keralis, one of my fave hermits teamed up at first in the crossover.
I also love how in each season the hermits dont always stick with the same group they spread out and hangout with everyone. Though we have the iconic trios and friend groups. They still take the time to chat with everyone. And with lore wise its never as heavy and deep enough for the fan base to start hating on that creator like on the dsmp.
Its a similar situation to the Empires Smp
Something also should be said about the projects the hermits keep doing as well. Decked Out for instance is a level of interactive game play engineered entirely by players that just isn't in Minecraft normally. Many of the builds are taking on whole new levels such as Bdubs massive building of mountains before we even got them or the sheer oddity of community items like the Boat'em Hole.
The game of Demise in season six did also contribute to a lot of people watshing difrent hermits.
I'd say the civil war too. I think the only active hermits at the time who didn't participate were TFC, Zedaph, Biffa and Python
It good you mentioned xisuma videos/streams mentioning the backend working of the smp, which i believe could be very useful to the new creators. I remember watching one of his streams recently where he mentioned how everyone was an underdog when they joined hermitcraft and why they, as a community, would never allow popular/famous/well known new member into the hermitcraft smp and rather add some underdogs who can potentially display much more. I mean that talk he gave in his stream shows a lot about how maturely they take the decisions in running this SMP and are not running to get more views by following trends or other famous creators. And if you don't know there are alot of famous youtube minecraft players who have said it multiple times that they would do anything to be a part of this hermitcraft community.
Amazing! I love hermitcraft because the vibe is so good! Everyone cares for each other! It’s just AMAZING!
I think one of the biggest things that makes the hermits' videos so amazing is the insane quality of those videos. I meam, just take a look at Bdubs lately.
I'm glad to hear that it'll never end b/c I just started watching it. I started off with watching Grian when he 1st joined (season 6?) and I'm just now getting to season 9. I love the camaraderie, the cooperation and the wholesome pranks. I also just LOVE the builds - so awe-inspiring! I'm also now subscribed to 6(?) of the Hermits now, so I'll have plenty to catch up on!
I realised that when you said that 99% of ppl have a hella short attention span, at that point, my self-awareness kicked in in a form of me realising I haven't checked my phone or other tabs on my opened web browser.
And you have a lot of good points about the play styles of the HC (hermitcraft) creators, editing styles of said creators and so on. I have mainly been watching Grians HC episodes because of his humour and silly chaotic nature of being that one guy of the friend group with the ungodly good jokes.
There's the occasional Mumbo Jumbo, Kerallis, and Iskall video as well that I watch, but I don't really watch their hermitcraft videos with similar devotion as to me watching Grian's shenanigans
I just started watching the other hermits other than grian and I have grown to love every single one of them! they're all super entertaining!
I watched the video where grian made his throne in season 7 and then binged season 6 and got up to pace with season 7, never missed one video from grians side ever again.
Love cynthia's theme on the backround on the beginning of the video btw.
My math teacher is literally a hermitcraft superfan
Started watching hermitcraft years ago by season 6 due to a video recommended to me, which was a Grian video on season 6, which I believed was his 1st season. Due to him, i got to meet all the hermits, and I even watched all of their videos at times, especially when quarantine came. Crazy to think that, xisumavoid has been in the server since the very beginning, and he has never reset his episode counter since then he has passed over 1000 episodes of hermitcraft a long time ago.
i am 14 and i have been watching since season 6 and i have loved watching hermitcraft
Absolutely love your videos, so informative and great
i always loved the friendliness between hermits. whenever someone dies another person will help retrieve their gear
hc is like that wierd sea animal which isn't evolved for ages i mean like millions of years but in a good way
its because they are already perfect and doesn't need any more perfection. this is the best i can describe the hc server. i have always dreamt about getting in hc server but now i realise it isn't that easy...
I started watching right at the end of season 5 and start of season 6. It's been great fun watching everything get bigger and bigger from there.
tru the base swap made me rewatch almost all the hermit's perspective last season xD
Members of hermitcraft do get burnt out, some for months at a time. The difference of hermitcraft is transparency, the audience is willing to wait for good content instead of forcing bad content to have something to watch. It is genuine.
HermitCraft is technically just a scaled up VanossCrew by technicality, each person has their own personality (duh), but each personality draws their own audience, the collaborative work draws audiences from one another, it’s a society where everyone works and everyone gains from the work even if there’s no direct collaboration between the people, because they say “oh look, Mumbo did this redstone door, I don’t get it, check out his video for explanation, anyways let’s go do this building for the door” and then mumbo goes “look at what Grian built, insane, check out his video for the step by step, anyways back to redstone door”
You forgot one crucial part.
Some of these creators are geniuses at content writing, they are competing with Netflix, Prime and Disney for the "sitting down for an hour or so to watch something".
I wouldn't be surprised if one of the hermits gets drafted for screenwriting soon.
The rabbit hole of finding new Hermits to watch through other Hermits videos is so real.
I bought minecraft right near the start of lockdown and after a few weeks, I looked up some videos online. I watched Wattles for a bit and in a q&a video he mentioned how he wasn't joining hermitcraft and how new Hermits have to be voted in, so then I looked up hermitcraft to see what that was all about.
It's a few months into season 7 and youtube recommended me Grain and Mumbo, of course. In their episodes they interacted with iskall a lot, so I started watching him, and he ended up being the campaign manager for stressmonster's mayoral run, so I started watching her, and in season 8 stress based close by to false and gem, so I started watching them.
And then server-wide events, like the mayoral run and decked out introduced me to Tango and Joe hills, because decked out was so impressive and Joe hills was hilariously bizarre so I had to go see what they were about.
I had started watching Scar from him being neighbors with Grian, and then I started watching bdubs after scar won the mayorship and bdubs was his second in command.
The fact that they reset the server regularly, too, is so important.
Like, I didn't watch any of rendog's season 7, but his and doc's crazy antics with the octagon had me watching in season 8. I fell out of watching them both in season 9 because doc's episodes got too long for me and I didn't care for the greedy king arc Ren was doing, but when they start season 10 they'll be doing something completely different so I might go back to watching every episode. If Hermitcraft was just continuous, I wouldn't ever be enticed back to their channels because they would still be doing the same thing that made me leave.
It also helps that they're all about my age or older, so I never feel silly for interacting with their content.
Also, Xisuma seems like a very capable and very dedicated leader, so I wonder what role he played in keeping the server that organized. I mean, it is a democracy and it has all the positives of a democracy, but still someone needs to organize the server-wide meetings. And someone needed to organize all of the democratic processes to begin with. If I remember correctly, Xisuma stepped up to lead the server in a democratic way after a hard time in the end of Season 1. If he hadn't, who knows where Hermitcraft would be today...
I think Xisuma doesn't do much other than some technical stuff, while the other hermits organise events and big collabs. Xisuma recently did a video series detailing what goes on behind the scenes.
The one thing I always think of when someone says "A youtuber/streamer`s job is to play video games" is that it really isn`t. Their job is entertaining people. Video games is just the medium through which they choose to do so. Just playing a video, even being extremely good at a video game, is simply not enough to keep viewers watching continually and for years. You need to be entertaining as well and that is what is mentally (and probably physically) exhausting.
Your videos are very informative, and I love your music choices. Keep up the good work
Been watching almost constantly since season 3, and never thought about how that happened, but you told it very well!
I enjoy watching Hermitcraft because it genuinely just seems like a bunch of very talented friends having fun. Sure the amazing builds, redstone and other crazy things the hermits can do helps, but ultimately they are able to make entertaining videos without being scripted. There's also never a boring video as they all put in effort to come up with fun and wacky ideas.
Plus if one hermit takes a break like Mumbo did a while back then there are still others that people watch and enjoy
I used to only really watch dsmp content and occasionally Grian. But when Alex died i kinda left the dsmp for hermitcraft because it was stable, and a constant I needed.
Mumbo isn’t actually the youngest hermit, that’s taken by Gem and Pearl
"Amongst the youngest" does not mean THE youngest
@@bunbunn404 I missed the first part.
Before seeing Grian's and Mumbo's ages I thought Grian was the younger one
@@SierraNight Gem is older than Pearl by less than a month, if I recall
Funny thing is, I’ve been watching hc for 6 of those 10 years. I watched on my mums iPad as a kid.
I also started with one of impulse Iron farms and noticed I have seen the guy with the Moustache before. Today Hermitcraft together are my most viewed videos on youtube.
Hermitcraft has always inspired me! And has inspired the server that I play on!
I like the Volo music at the beginning
Hermitcraft really is the only smp I’m willing to watch cause because of the maturity you explained. It’s family friendly yes but you can tell by their interactions with each other they are adults having chill fun with friends.
The thing you said about Zed is absolutely true! When I watched Grian’s video, I was like wtf is this restore stuff?! I was so curious that I watched Zeds entire season, then liked him so much that I watched every other of his Hermitcraft seasons!
Hermit craft is genuinely so much fun to watch. They are so close with one another and always have each other’s back. The builds that they create are stunning and they are always doing something really funny that keeps the viewers engaged. That’s why hermitcraft deserves to be the biggest smp
The fact they are all adults increases the likelihood of them handling any grievances in a mature way. It probably also helps that the server is so large and the hermits so many that if anyone is salty for a time, they can also avoid each other until both parties cool off... a rather healthy way to handle conflict to not escalate it.
I can see some people getting annoyed at the pranks of Grian or the playstyle of JoeHills, but the simple solution is to just keep interactions minimal and communicate boundaries. Adults tend to be better at that sort of thing.
I now realised that i once started watching mumbo jumbo and slowly started watching almost all of the other hermits
And the pranking
Another thing that make people want to watch other hermits is that there is Lore. But not Lore like dream smo were stuff is kinda scripted.
No there is just one hermit that Idk,changed the size of the moon. And everyone interprets it differently because nobody knows what it meant.
Consistent, genuine, and humble. Respect among and for all make a good community.
hermit craft is 7 years older than the term smp
Imagine showing someone Ethos channel. He doesn't do thumbnails, uploads super irregular and many other things "you should never do on UA-cam", yet he is incredibly successful
One thing I haven’t seen anyone else really talk about is how the hermits don’t need other people but they don’t avoid people either, they can hold my interest if they are on their own or with other people
What I really love about hermitcraft is that these people have been friends for years and the community is so healthy too.
Man I completely forgot about this seires.. i was there since season 6, but now thanks to you ive remembered it and started to watch it again
I feel like hermitcraft is so timeless and now I still enjoy it