A Hundred People Social Experiment in MC.
We've talked a lot about Minecraft players.
Thanks to people's wild imagination and the near-infinite possibilities of the game, MC players build towns, study science, wage wars, choreograph performances, or challenge extreme survival under various resource constraints in this world.
From the release of MC in 2009 to the present, servers containing various types of gameplay have emerged in an endless stream. Some have been gradually eliminated by people in the course of the times, while others have been re-excavated and injected with new vitality, such as simulating civilization in the MC world.
Simulating civilization, or "social experimentation," is what most broadcasters who plan to make these types of MC videos call it. Although there are many details that are different, the gameplay is much the same: a large number of ordinary players gather to build their own civilizations in a server, and each simulation will lead to a different ending.
1
It all started in 2012, when there was a mod in the overseas MC community called Civic that caused quite a stir.
Civcraft's earliest publicity video
The purpose of this mod is to "experiment with community, political ideology, debate, and discussion", which simply means that players who want to join can use trade, territory, etc. settings in the game to simulate the development of real-world civilization, starting from a village and gradually developing into a large country - like the MC version of Civilization.
Country map published by Civcraft in version 2.0
Players upload city-state maps in CivicWiki
The way of trade and diplomacy between countries in the game is quite fun, so it has attracted many people to join. But after several server crashes and massive turmoil of player dissatisfaction with updates, Civcraft officially became a thing of the past in 2016 as staff members retired.
Since then, there have been attempts to revive the gameplay, including various alternative servers and player patches, but the impact has never been as great as before.
Until the end of 2020, a YouTube owner named MagicGum revived a classic question in his video: What if people were trapped in the MC world?
In that video, he proposed two basic conditions that would have a huge impact on simulating civilization in the MC world:
1. Players will not be resurrected as usual, but will have only one life as in Hardmode.
2. Maps are not infinite, and resources and boundaries are not infinite.
Based on these two points, MagicGum, through reasoning and imagination, finally came to the conjecture that survival in MCs is the same as survival in modern human society.
Even if the world changes, people's lives will not change much. Everyday technology can be exchanged for redstone technology, and special maps such as netherworld and hell will be turned into strategic resources. Due to the presence of monsters and hunger, people still have to divide their work and cooperate, huddle together to keep warm, and eventually re-establish the country step by step.
This conjecture was enough to fascinate another group of players, and at their urging, MagicGum began to recruit players to conduct this simulation experiment.
However, the first experiment was not successful, because MagicGum still failed to abandon the resurrection setting, and the scene he simulated was basically no different from that of a normal server, and there was no price for killing and death. Even after he added the red name system to the system, the massacres became more frequent—because people soon discovered that the redder the name, the greater the deterrence and power in the crowd.
In short, no one in this world wants peace.
The player "IknowDeath" is resurrected, murdered, and eventually leaves the game
After reflection, MagicGum finally decided to rely on his own initial conjecture. Finally, nine months after the conjecture video was sent, he uploaded this video of the first successful experiment.
MagicGum assigned the players involved in the experiment to spawn points such as oceans, deserts, and plains, and this time severely limited the resurrection function, whether it was a fall to death or murder, people could not be resurrected again.
In order to manage the unorthodox guys, they also opened a penal colony to exile the guys, and the name of this penal colony was Australia.
Wouldn't that be a bit too historical?
The experiment seemed to go quite well at first.
Due to the differences in resources and enemies between some regions, players in some regions almost immediately began to develop in groups. In order to seek refuge faster, players in the jungle area have built up communities, set up shared resource boxes in settlements, and directly embarked on the path of communism.
For the administrators, the players also showed a considerable degree of cooperation this time, and even built a temple for them to worship.
This may be because MagicGum and others have intervened in this game a little too many times as gods, and players can always talk to the protector of their own area, and if they are sweet, they may also receive blessings from the gods.
"Magic Gum, I surrender to you (so use your divine power to conjure up some diamonds for me)"
Similar frequent meddling is also reflected in the rules of the game, perhaps for fear that players will once again lose control, and the development goals set at different stages of the game, such as the election of leaders and the establishment of cities, are directly issued to the players by the administrators.
To simulate winter, MagicGum gave all players a constantly hungry debuff. In order to promote people's adventures, monster strongholds have been set up around the world for players to attack. The final goal of the game is to grab the beacon on the map and bring it back to your home city.
The consequence of this is that although the game has gone smoothly and players and spectators are quite happy, this is not called a civilization simulation experiment, but more like a quick-pass challenge between players.
2
MagicGum's video has inspired many people, although the entertainment component is more than the spirit of experimentation, but this does not prevent everyone from following his ideas and continuing to go on, so that the gameplay of the civilization simulation experiment is more perfect.
Two months after the video of the MagicGum 100-person experiment was released, the Tubing Master Ish of the second successful experiment appeared. This video selects 200 players to join the same server, ish lets players choose the place they want to be born in four areas: plains, deserts, snow, and jungles.
For more realistic purposes, ish disabled special maps such as Hell and set up border walls early in the game, with servers only open for an hour every day at 7 to 8 p.m. – to avoid the rapid development of the Liver Empire civilization. In addition to occasionally asking about the players' situation and encouraging them to act boldly, ish basically does not interfere with any of the players' behavior, and honestly acts as an observer.
Facts have also proved that his choice is completely correct, and the final effect of this civilization simulation experiment may be beyond everyone's imagination.
Ish released the video on October 27, 2021, according to Google Trends, after the release of his video, the video of civilization experiments on YouTube began to become popular, and the number of Minecraft Civilization searches began to peak.
At the beginning of the game, due to the abundance of wood and food, the jungle and the plains took the lead in developing a production industry. Players have set up farms and pastures on the plains to provide plenty of food for everyone, while others go down to the ground to dig for ore.
And the jungle players, once again, have embarked on the path of communism.
Déjà vu supplies sharing box
Due to the harsh conditions in the snow and desert, players had to huddle together for warmth, so their own leaders were created first.
It is worth mentioning that most of the players who choose the desert are a group of survival bosses who have participated in various challenges before, and when most people are still holding stone manuscripts and iron manuscripts, they have dug out a large number of diamond resources under the desert terrain. This set the stage for their later ending.
Death also began to appear, the first player accidentally fell to his death in the cave, and players in the snowy area erected a tombstone for him.
Due to the server, the protection means that players usually use for "landing water" or "landing ship" will be invalidated due to delay problems. Although this has led to the occasional occurrence of death caused by misoperation, it has also smoothed out the strength level of some players.
A player trying to demonstrate the skills of a landing boat was sacrificed
In addition to the player who was thrown to death, the second unlucky egg who died was executed by the order of the leader.
At the scene of the execution, the crime was: stealing materials to build a monument for singer Cardi B
The first day of the game passes like this, and the next day the jungle and the plains give birth to their own leaders, and the development paths of the two regions are similar but different.
The similarities are that in both regions there are also dictatorial and pro-democracy divisions; the difference is that the jungle democracy leader 9209 successfully drove the dictator out of the colony, and the plains were ruled by the dictator ewaj, and the dissidents had to return to the original village to continue to develop.
So in the first clear world pattern, except for the snow field, which is led by a player named solove, most of the other areas are divided into two or three residences.
The situation and major settlements in the four regions
Although there are differences in the desert, for reasons of development, the two factions in the desert area agree to remain neutral and respectful of each other.
With unified leaders on one side and peaceful coexistence on the other, the pace of development of snowy plains and deserts began to accelerate dramatically. Compared to the increasingly stressful political environment of the plains and jungles, desert players have even begun to play role-play in a friendly atmosphere.
This desert city called Soberon set up a precept board, "Praise our Lord three times a day" and "He who eats pork will not be spared."
Up to this point, the entire simulated civilized world has taken shape. But while it may seem peaceful, events that have accelerated the process of civilization are about to occur one after another.
The people of Soberon soon discovered that they were stealing materials and hunting livestock. Although they expelled the thief, he came back one after another in the following days to wreak havoc, and finally even waited for the opportunity to assassinate the lord of Soberon.
As soon as the news reached the neighboring city of Amazon, they assisted Soberon in killing the fleeing Chaos Evil Assassin. The event brought the two cities of the desert region together, and when soberon's new lord took office, the connection between the two cities gradually became closer through constant talks and trade.
To commemorate this success, Amazon even took a picture with the Assassin's head.
A happy and harmonious scene— if not the head hanging at the end
The same was true in other regions, unlike the Union of Desert Cities, where the first intra-island war broke out between the two camps of the Jungle Region. The previously expelled dictatorial player leads his followers in an attempt to attack the main camp of 9209 at night. The enemy is outnumbered, the dictator leader falls to his death on the way to battle, and the jungle is unified through war.
The jungle then entered an era of great development, and players began to build various buildings and facilities - most of which were more unclear.
For example, put hundreds of boats in the water to reduce the graphics performance of the attacker, or build noisy sounding machines in the city, and the huge "Among Us" statue.
Your Majesty! What a spectacle!
They also built a huge stone tower, and when the managers asked, they didn't say anything but tell him it was called a "wooden fence."
Whoever wanted to get this tower later had great significance
At the same time, the construction of buildings of unknown significance began, as well as the snowy areas that flourished under the leadership of the unified leader, who built a large temple for their protector (the administrator) and worshipped him in it.
This is some kind of sacrificial dance
Although there have been a few small fights, on the whole, the places are still peaceful. It's just that the style of the video begins to change drastically here, and the butterfly effect begins to prove its own correctness.
The cause of the incident was the belief of a player in the Snowy Plains that snow king solaw, although on the surface he seemed to be more democratic, was a tyrant behind his back. So the player secretly plotted to unite with the leaders of all the other regions to form a secret global alliance, in order to pressure Solove to resign voluntarily.
There was nothing wrong with the plan itself, with the two desert states, Soberon and Amazon, agreeing to join the alliance, as did the plains dictator ewaj camp.
The problem is that this player doesn't know that the leader of the jungle 9209 and the leader of the snow field, solov, have already established a secret alliance. So under the wind of the jungle, the player was eventually executed. In the post-shot presentation, snow king solerev sat on a high platform and angrily exclaimed, "They've made their decision, so now it's my turn too." ”
From an operational point of view, Solev did exactly what he said, because the dictator of the plains, Ewaj, was assassinated that same day. An Assassin was the first to show his axe to ewaj, and after the Assassin was besieged, the undead ewaj was killed by another player who suddenly appeared.
Both Assassins, also from the small village of Ewaj, reached a strategic partnership with the Snow King Sorov, who wanted revenge.
So to be well prepared, Ewaj didn't notice that there was another person in the upper right corner aiming at him
This was almost another Sarajevo incident, and the plains were immediately plunged into chaos, and the inhabitants of the small village, knowing that they were about to be retaliated against, immediately fled through tunnels to the snowy territory. The camp of dictators after the loss of ewaj re-elected another leader, but this successor was immediately and inexplicably killed.
Most of the plains began to flee to the other three regions, while the remaining players formed a militia.
Desert players are nervous about the international situation, they are dissatisfied with the Snow King's solaw's practice of sheltering the murderers, plus many heavily armed snowy plains residents land in the desert area at will. Fearing that solaw would soon attack them again, the desert leaders cast a vote to decide whether to attack before the great war came.
After the resolution was voted on, the desert dwellers began to build fortifications while sending a heavily armed army towards the snowfield.
The attack was quite successful, with almost all the inhabitants of the snowfield wiped out, and Solev fled with the rest of the people to the ally jungle area, where the snowy plains completely fell.
On the jungle side, after learning that war was coming, full martial law was introduced. The wooden fence they had been building before also took on its true colors at this time— a huge defensive fortress filled with lava at the center and filled with weapons and food inside.
Thus the end of the experiment, the Battle of the Wooden Fence began.
The desert army gathered manpower to attack the fort, initially trying to climb up the high platform along the perimeter of the wooden fence, but the medieval fortifications gave the jungle army a huge advantage. They poured lava from above and down, firing arrows from peepholes, and relegating the desert army.
In the end, the desperation of the desert players abandoned the bottom-up tactics and built a higher platform on the side, which successfully broke into the wooden fence.
The entire battle was fought from day to night, and in the melee, the jungle leader 9209 was killed and the Snow King solaw fell from a high place and died. The remaining jungle and snow dwellers began to flee the battlefield, the battle was brought to an end, and the desert civilization became the final winner.
3
The reason why this social experiment run by Ish was successful is that there is no script for the whole game, electing leaders and waging wars – all actions and decisions are decided by the players themselves.
Although ish edited most of the places in order to show the video effect, and also let the players re-shoot some shots afterwards, these clips did not cover the players' own voices. The whole video looks like watching a historical group portrait drama starring 200 players.
If you count the entire game time, it only takes 14 hours, but the events and characters that happened are enough for all players to remember.
In addition to the influential Snow King Solov and dictator ewaj, there is also a legendary player named LegacyAN in the video.
Legend to the entire video begins with his appearance
He not only gained a great reputation on YouTube, but also after the video was carried to Station B, he was also revered by netizens as "Mr. Wolong" level existence.
From the beginning he didn't want to take part in any battles, just wanted to live peacefully in the jungle with his parrots. So he left the crowd alone and survived quietly in the hut by the stream. With a keen sense of smell and a big picture, he foresaw the arrival of the jungle civil war in advance and successfully escaped the disaster.
He followed his advice to re-establish a new city on the site of his cottage, and during the construction, he led a team to kill a traitor who was preparing to betray the camp– which increased his reputation. He received the remnants of the snowy plains defeated by the desert, successfully escaped at the end of the Battle of the Wooden Fence, and finally returned to the peaceful life he longed for with his parrots.
Players like him who have participated in history, but who have been gently swiped from the edges, are everywhere, but they are not small.
One of the desert players' biggest wish is to open a flower shop in the desert and sell people petals of various colors so that people can rest after work and war.
A player named Zuffiii in the dictator ewaj's camp has been helping his teammates collect resources from the beginning, and has no understanding or concern about the conflict between the small village and ewaj. Instead, he often runs to what his teammates call the "rebel camp" and the players in the small villages to play, eat cakes together, and dance with them to music.
He even independently built a bridge of friendship to the small village.
After the plains are in chaos and the small village players flee en masse, he becomes unsure of who to believe and decides to go out in search of his friends. After no success, he had to join the Plains Militia and eventually died in the Battle of the Wooden Fence.
After the end of the world war, the world returns to peace, but the snow field has no more players to live in, leaving only a cemetery that I don't know who built it.
R.I.P All the players who have survived on the snow fields
The rest of the people who are still alive have rebuilt new secret settlements in the jungle, and the desert civilization has built a variety of magnificent buildings, which have gradually become more and more prosperous. At this point, the video ushered in the end.
4
Nowadays, people have more and more novel settings and rules to simulate, such as the crown distributed by the administrator to increase the amount of health and power in order to ensure the safety of the leader; or to eliminate regional differences and instead set up racial differences for people; or to add items such as resurrection totems in the game.
ISH also indicated that his next plan is to assemble 1,000 people for prison simulation experiments. On March 15, he tweeted that all the shooting was over and then went into the editing process.
Although a month has passed, there is no news of updates now
Speaking of which, despite the name of social experiments, most of these videos don't really set the background according to the methods of scientific experiments. Players are mostly just thrown into it as a big role-playing game, whether it is dictatorship or democracy, but a choice of course.
Many people argue endlessly about the choices made by players in the game after watching the video, mostly out of a "I can be" mentality - people always seem to be curious about their own civilization and eager to participate in the process. MC inadvertently becomes the carrier of people's aspirations, and the simulation of emerging civilizations may be the best interpretation of creativity in the game world.