Speculating on BTW's story and narrative.

[The Phoenixian]

So I've been thinking about BTW's plot and narrative lately and I'd like to share my thoughts on what the overarching story might be.

Our story begins with Steve waking up to find himself in an unknown land. We do not know how he got here, and we do not know whether he is here out of intent, or accident but we know he is alone, and lacking in everything but the clothes on his back.

Regardless of his lack of material wealth however, in this land he is possessed of boundless strength and nearly endless stamina, needing only the occasional bit of food to replenish himself. He is able to manipulate the elements of the world to a degree no other creature can, save perhaps the Endermen. And as we soon learn he is immortal; Death may find him in many ways but he will always be born anew at a point not too distant from where he first entered the world.

In the beginning of his journey, Steve is humble, seeking only the tools and materials required to survive; He mines and digs from the earth and constructs a dwelling in which to live and a defense against the creatures of the night. As time goes by this home becomes better built, fancier and Steve's tools made of rarer and more potent materials.

Eventually, whether out of some learned knowledge of a way to return to Home or mere curious exploration, Steve turns to industry. He has discovered hemp and begins to construct machines and automated mechanisms with the rope and power sources it creates.

As fuel for this industry, He enters the Nether, and takes the source of it's eternally burning flames so that it may be processed into hellfire to power kilns and crucibles, Along the way he discovers that Netherrack contains an additional element: Souls.

Having had a taste of the power even normal industry brings and likewise having been surrounded by "monsters", he thinks little of the moral implications and immediately begins processing the souls into components for his machinery.

By this point, he has also likely found that the monsters he slays leave their own souls for him to collect. He has likely also had a taste of magic in the vanilla enchanter but it's lack of a means to control the magic he imbues into his tools leaves him wanting.

To this end, he crafts the Infernal Enchanter, and it is entirely possible that no other object will be responsible for so much atrocity. He begins the construction of massive structures which serve no other purpose than to harvest the creatures that live in this world en mass. He breeds hundreds of cows for the leather required to create the massive library the enchanter requires, but that alone is not enough. Each creature that once hunted him is now mere fodder for his research, his intimate knowledge of this world's workings now serving to spawn them into his machines of slaughter by the thousands so that he may obtain the secrets of magic from their remains, even going to far as to sack, pillage, and quite possibly cheat hapless villages for their powerful souls and the power to make his operations more efficient (That is, Looting scrolls and Emerald beacons).

It is possible that he feels some guilt over his actions, we do know that he cannot even sleep for the thoughts which plague his mind but it does not dissuade him from his course.

As to the end of that course? Where Steve's future lies? That is not yet written but we do know that he will leave this world, seeking to return to his true home.

We do not know the nature of his home, and we likewise do not know if where he shall go next is his true home, or just one step on the journey, but we do know it will likely not be better off for having him.

However, as a bit of speculation, It is possible, that even as he encounters his next destination, that the truth of a richer, "realer", world may just open his eyes fully to the horror of what he does.


Regardless of this narrative, I'd like to take a moment to appreciate the elegance of it: At all times, Steve is played entirely by us. His temptation is our temptation and his decisions were made in our own minds.
It is our own unrestrained desire for expediency and efficiency, our submission to temptation and necessity that allows his descent into evil to progress.

It's not often we experience a story that reveals the faults of the audience themselves.

[ThePowerofTower]

I've also heard alot about the Nether; how building a portal made a foul connection to the Overworld. Something about souls leaking out, and the Ender dragon feeding on them. Lore from the archives of BTW Forum past. I'll have to find that again. It was actually really cool.

[Six]

This is one of the best descriptions or advertisements for BTW I have read. There certainly are deeper levels to the lore which you've not touched on, but as a description of how the technological process of the game goes, this is great.

[DNoved1]

This is actually really good. Most of the time I don't even bother thinking about the screams of the dead as I grind their remains to dust, but now...

Actually that reminds me. What place does cake have in BTW lore? Is it a source of entrapped souls, perhaps those of the unborn chickens from the eggs used in it's creation? Or perhaps something far worse...

Also, @PowerofTower: the search "soul anus" ought to bring up a few relevant threads you may be thinking of.

[dawnraider]

The search "soul anus" ought to bring up a few relevant threads you may be thinking of.

Hehe, this is one of the weirder things you will be told by a fellow gamer: "Search for the Soul Anus, and you will find the truth!"

In all seriousness, this is a rather good summary of BTW. The only lore outside of it that I can think of is that redstone is made by cracks in the fabric of the world that leak souls from the nether, tainting the gold into redstone. These cracks are also what allows a nether portal to be built anywhere. The end, however, has strong bonds holding it together, so only the three nexi, no doubt placed in the triangle formation by the builders of the strongholds in order to focus the power of the portals, fueled by a combination of the ender pearls and blaze powder. The ender pearls are obviously something which retains a bit of the enderman's essence, as it still retains the ability to teleport. However, this essence is not fully formed, causing Steve to take damage every time he harnesses the power of the endermen. The blaze powder is a concentrated form of the source of the blazes flames, seen by the fact that the fire from the blazes starts out inside the swirling vortex of blaze rods which make up its body, then moves up to its head to be fired at high speeds. These two powerful materials combine into the eyes of ender, which are drawn to the nexi when elevated high in the air, as they want to join and become even more powerful. When they are placed in a ring on the end portal frames (which seem to be made from endstone infused with the essence of the end) and act as a lens for the power that exists everywhere in the world, focusing it to be strong enough to open a portal to the end. The end contains a large chunk of endstone with giant obsidian pillars rising out of the ground, with ender crystals on top, which heal the dragon. The endstone is created by the endermen, which convert blocks from the overworld into endstone, which is then brought to the end to construct the island. The pillars of obsidian were forged by the endermen in order to serve their dragon overlord. The endermen sacrificed themselves, turning their bodies into solid rock, infusing their power into the massive obelisks, which focus the power coming into the end in the form of souls into energy usable by the dragon. The ender crystals seem to be pure energy, held together by the dual cubes. They rest on bedrock, as that is the only material that can withstand the massive amounts of power the crystals contain, but even the bedrock is strained, ignited by the energy of the crystal. If the cubes bounding the energy are broken, the energy within violently releases, causing a massive explosion. Once the dragon is killed, it releases all the souls it has absorbed, and the powerful energy of the dragon's being is strong enough to open another rift back to the overworld.

That got a bit long, but I got excited.

[The Phoenixian]

This is one of the best descriptions or advertisements for BTW I have read. There certainly are deeper levels to the lore which you've not touched on, but as a description of how the technological process of the game goes, this is great.

Yeah, I figured I'd leave out a lot of the background lore for that post and focus on the corruption of Steve as that's what most of the gameplay's narrative arc is based around.

I don't have it in me right now to go further on about things like the origins of villagers and pigmen or the mechanics of dimensions but I feel I should note just how malleable this all is. Back when mining ores returned soul orbs I'd had an idea that perhaps Emeralds were actually the compressed souls driven out of the rock by the weight of the mountains. (And that similarly, villagers were doing something very sinister indeed to acquire all those precious stones they paid you with.)

Nowadays, that would not hold up half as well. Amusing as it is to imagine some dark bargain between villagers and Endermen.

Also It's cool to see people (Dawnraider) adding their own thoughts to this. That obsidian not only had dimensional properties but also a direct relationship to Endermen seems quite likely. Though I might speculate that perhaps it is not that obsidian may be formed from dead Endermen but also that Endermen are born as beings of living obsidian. (Would an Obsidian statue, granted a pearl and souls, come to life? Is that why the Dragon seeks souls?)

[FlowerChild]

Hehe...I will admit to having gotten a good chuckle out of various parts of the OP. Nice :)

[ThePowerofTower]

So now, I've got to wonder, what would the overarching purpose of the endermen be? Are they just a byproduct of so much obsidian (in the End) and so much dimensional fabric manipulation that they can come to life and traverse various planes? It seems to make sense. There's a direct connection between everything, but because of so much massive traffic, what would have been mere obsidian statues have become animated.

On the dimensions. Things die in the overworld, then are stored in the Netherrack of the underworld, but some souls are too wicked and powerful to leave peacefully, so they must first be killed as zombies, skeletons, etc. Then, as the Nether world got flooded with souls, it turned it hot, caused lava to fall from the very cracks of it's dimension, and the immense heat and pressure caused some souls in the Netherrack, otherwise at peace, to turn into living beings, in an uncomfortable world, angry that their peaceful sleep has been disturbed.

But what about the End? Was the Enderdragon an extremely powerful soul who became greedy and sought to enslave all the souls in the nether? If so, is Steve any different from the Enderdragon? Was the pressure so great that it leaked into, not just the overworld, as redstone, but another dimension, and the Enderdragon is the power's bastard child?

And what's the story with the Silverfish? Do they exist just to make humble miners afeared, or are they spies for the Enderdragon? So many questions. How do the cows feel about all this?

[Simurgh]

Also got to wonder how the beacons fit in, we don't know (or at least I don't) all of the side effects of causing them, but with what someone posted about obs beacons it sounds like they're destabilising this dimension or reality or whatever. Or possibly anchoring it to another?

[dawnraider]

I do like the idea that the endermen are beings of obsidian, animated with the pearls, as it makes more sense in my way of where the pearls come from, and why they contain the ability to teleport, and my explanation of the towers didn't make a lot of sense considering obsidian is made from water and lava. But that gets into the whole thing as to why obsidian has interdimensional properties, and why endermen are hurt by water. (Here we go again :P) The water contains the essence of life, allowing it to infinitely produce itself from a single spot, and also form water beings (squids) when there is enough water around. This life, though is very raw, and Steve can only take so much of it, which is why he drowns so quickly. The respiration enchant, however, holds back some of this raw power, and SFS does that much better because of the inherent magical properties of the material. This power though is in direct opposition with the endermen's dark souls, which react violently when they come into contact with each other, instantly damaging the endermen, and forcing them to teleport involuntarily by exciting the energy inside them. The water, when it comes into contact with the lava, cools the lava, but also imbues it with the power in the water, allowing it to conduct portals (and channel the souls to the dragon).

[ThePowerofTower]

I like your explanation for the water damaging Endermen, as well as their formation. It makes sense.

After some searching, and looking up the 'Soul Anus' and stuff, which led to several lore forums, I think I have some of the information to compile what is, or is closest relative to, the Better than Wolves lore. Since this thread is more about the story arc, I'll perhaps make another post to discuss that, but I will say that by analyzing the villagers, the pre-made structures (fortresses, mineshafts, old desert/jungle temples), the alchemical and physical implications of materials in the world (netherrack, soul sand, end-stone, redstone, SFS, etc.), and pondering the canvases that were added a long time back, you can piece together a large background lore about, not just Better than Wolves, but the game in general, as it perhaps was meant to be.

About the story arc, based on the lore, the canvases, and the direction of BTW, I think that the climax of the story in RTH will be that Steve realizes that he's doing exactly what the Enderdragon was, except instead of fueling himself with them, he fueled his tools and apparatus with it, to create industry, and he will, perhaps, create another dimension in an attempt to rid himself of the souls that trouble him, and escape into it. But that doesn't account for what is apparently Steve's innate curiousity, which led him on this journey. So, perhaps he solves this problem by cutting off the link of souls to the Nether, and keeping them all in the overworld, choking out the End and shattering it's hold on the Overworld, which might calm the souls and heal the dimensional fabric. Or something like that.

[Mud]

Reviving this topic in response to FC's post here regarding the recent addition of Abandoned Villages to BTW: No crops are found, and the farmland is dry. The well is still active, and aside from missing doors, the structures are intact, save for the church which has all of it's windows knocked out.

These subtle details of the village were designed, and FC has already dismissed the theory that the villages fell victim to the relentless zombie sieges in the end.

:edit: aaaand I totally left out my theory, which builds on the already suggested theory that the Villagers are involved in something sinister. Given that all the windows in the church are gone, I'm going to go out on a limb and say they weren't knocked in, but rather blown out when whatever ritual the villagers were performing went array and killed them. The lack of crops and properly irrigated farmland is just a natural result of neglect as there are no villagers to maintain them.

[FlowerChild]

Errr...no, I dismissed the theory that the zombies originated from the villages. Not the same thing :)

[Mud]

Errr...no, I dismissed the theory that the zombies originated from the villages. Not the same thing :)

Damn! So much for the theory I just edited into my previous post...

:edit: I guess the simpler theory is that the relentlessness of the zombie sieges overwhelmed the villagers in the end when they ran out of doors to hide behind.

[jecowa]

Errr...no, I dismissed the theory that the zombies originated from the villages. Not the same thing :)

Damn! So much for the theory I just edited into my previous post...

:edit: I guess the simpler theory is that the relentlessness of the zombie sieges overwhelmed the villagers in the end when they ran out of doors to hide behind.

Spoilers:

Spoiler

Show

Steve is a werewolf. He killed the villagers.

[sargunv]

The mobs spawn near Steve, so the villages near Steve were overwhelmed with zombies?

EDIT: Or the mobs come from dead Steves, so the villages near spawn were killed off by previous Steves?

[Mud]

Spoilers:

Spoiler

Show

Steve is a werewolf. He killed the villagers.

That would explain the proximity of the Abandoned Villages to your spawn. But not why it doesn't happen again later.

[ThePuzzleMasher]

Maybe it could be energy leaking from the ender portals that might spawn zombies or in other ways infect the villagers as those portals are somewhat near the spawn.

[Mud]

Maybe it could be energy leaking from the ender portals that might spawn zombies or in other ways infect the villagers as those portals are somewhat near the spawn.

I like this one a lot... however do all three Strongholds in any given world spawn within range of the initial spawn point?

[The Phoenixian]

I don't think zombies sieges depopulating villages was what FC was dismissing so much as the idea that the the abandoned villagers themselves became zombies.

Regardless of that announcement, I personally still like and hold to the idea that dead villagers have parts of their souls harvested and then spawn elsewhere as zombies (and then skeletons and possibly creepers as their souls further decay until they finally become useless and are shunted out in the nether) but while I think it still fits with the majority of villages, I doubt it's true of the spawn villages in particular. Reason being: It doesn't make sense for the "Minecraft is the Enderman's mob farm" theory, where you'd expect the builders to ensure a stable population in order to repopulate the world with new souls to replace the ones that decay. This depends of course on the precise power the Endermen hold but given the nether is used as a depleted soul depository I'm inclined to think it's "A lot".

So that leaves the possibilities of what did happen.

I'm not sure just how far out from spawn abandoned villages form but this does put them in proximity of the four points where the Minecraft world connects to other worlds. This in mind I think that narrows down things to "Something came in and affected them", "They left", I!or "They did messed with forces beyond villager ken and brought their own extinction".

For a few of many possible examples: In the first possibility, this could well mean that Steve is not the first of his kind to find his way into Minecraft, that he is perhaps one of a number of travelers/abductees from his homeworld, some of whom interacted with and by some means depopulated the villages. (Which could be an alternative/additional source for the zombies and skeletons we see around for those who are as attached to my little "gradual soul decay" idea as I am.)

In the second possibility: They could have left, venturing through the Spawn rift to evolve into the (theoretical) inhabitants of Home.

In the third possibility, the Strongholds and Nether fortresses were obviously built by someone. If this someone was the abandoned villagers then they may well have found their descendants forced into the nether and eventually warped into becoming the zombie pigmen.

[Simurgh]

Crackpot theory time..

Steve doesn't *belong* in the overworld. His coming there caused something to happen which resulted in the villages being depopulated. The monsters are the world antibodies, seeking him out and trying to stop him. You are the bad guy in this story and the worlds reaction to your presence sucked the life out of those villagers in order to create beings to destroy you. Or some such.

[Mud]

Crackpot theory time..

Steve doesn't *belong* in the overworld. His coming there caused something to happen which resulted in the villages being depopulated. The monsters are the world antibodies, seeking him out and trying to stop him. You are the bad guy in this story and the worlds reaction to your presence sucked the life out of those villagers in order to create beings to destroy you. Or some such.

One issue with that, why do the "antibodies" attack the villagers?

[ThePuzzleMasher]

Maybe the endermen are soul-less villagers.

[Mud]

Maybe the endermen are soul-less villagers.

I'd always theorized that Enderman in general (not just in BTW) are a form of ascended humans, namely the ones that built the temples and strongholds.

[Simurgh]

Crackpot theory time..

Steve doesn't *belong* in the overworld. His coming there caused something to happen which resulted in the villages being depopulated. The monsters are the world antibodies, seeking him out and trying to stop him. You are the bad guy in this story and the worlds reaction to your presence sucked the life out of those villagers in order to create beings to destroy you. Or some such.

One issue with that, why do the "antibodies" attack the villagers?

Just zombies attack them dont they? And make more monsters to kill you. Plus monsters spawning is really centralised on the player - villages too far away dont ever get attacked, its steves presence that causes it. Like I said crackpot theory, and its really baseless speculation on my part :)