@@retroflame3104 The scavs seem as intelligent as humans. Their culture is more advanced than the social interactions of a group of chimps, and they can hold items and throw things.
15:00 Its very important to note that Moon says this after collapsing and losing most of her memory. Its not that iterators in general do not recognize it, its just that one with severe brain damage cannot.
@@SchnortBrain Damage has become a term similar to "stupid" in slang on the internet these days. Casually saying you or someone else has missing brain cells or brain damage is used in humor to denote something about your behavior is off or you're "not working right".
Holy shit the prequel to "The Affairs of Passing Gods" just dropped y'all Seriously though this video was so good, I'm gonna have to rewatch it just to find all my favorite parts again but as a recent member of the fandom, this video did a phenomenal job of consolidating both lore and game files into an easy-to-follow timeline that neither pearls nor wiki pages could quite convey. Bravo my good sir!
The thing about Elite Scavengers' masks is that they have practically the same description as other Vulture masks, with only a remark on how they were altered (probably by scavengers) from their original form. Though I do think Vultures' masks themselves were designed by the Ancients to mimic their own, since Vultures without masks will get harassed to death by other Vultures.
@@galaxxy_foxx2583I don't think they would reduce themselves to a form unenlightened and one that wants to survive in this world. The ancients just wanted to fucking kill themselves lol
I believe that the mixed number of digits on the ancients could have been cultural, where they take off digits and could even cut of the hands to be ‘prettier’ as all the iterators have 1 digit hands and you’d make your robot as pretty as you could
I thought something similar I thought it more as a religious thing mixed with a status symbol. The richest ones that had the void fluid more available to them (at least at the start) wouldnt need to work as much as the one with less resources so, why would they want to have extra of something they dont use? And with greed or ego being one of the taboos wouldn't it be logical to chop the parts of the body that they find useless? After all, the mural that is representing ego/greed/self preservation (the one with the ancient with 2 shields 00:03:15) doesn't have any bandage on and just keeping a physical feature could still count as a way of showing ego. Maybe the clawed/tentacle feet are the original ones and maybe they still had a tail and as they were growing up or as they started preparing for the void fluid bath they started cutting off limbs and when the void fluid was more accesible to all, most kept doing it because they were already use to that kind of rituals
Another possibility is that the art depicting the ancients is simply taking creative liberties on how many digits they had. Think about how often human art depicts humans or fictional humanoids with only four or three digits.
@@archdruidbookwalter951could even be like the Ancient equivalent of stick figures (conceptually, not quite literally) in that they might consider these murals the minimum to be identifiable as "ah yeah that's an ancient"
21:20 I believe the purpose slug cats were meant to serve was originally cleaning pipes. The magenta Shoreline pearl reads: "It is the genome for a purposed organism. A small slug to clean the insides of pipes." At the end, Moon states: "So it's highly likely that you are the descendant of a purposed organism yourself!" I think the end note is to contextually clue the reader that your species started as a slug and later became a slug cat. (Due to them being very close in name, and you crawling through pipes throughout the game.) (P.S. I especially enjoyed the section about their anatomy and possible body modifications. The foot binding theory is a cool take.)
Pretty sure if you bring that very same pearl to Five Pebbles he comments on the fact that the slug has unneccessary features(such as eyes and I think limbs) that indicate to him it was a blueprint for a domesticated variant of the pipe cleaners, meant for use as pets/companion animals rather than cleaners. And I'm 99% certain one of the adds/images you can see being broadcasted in the iterator city features a slugcat implying they were kinda popular?
They get called "rodent", but I feel pretty confident that it's just because they might be superficially similar. There's no indication that slugcats have the defining teeth of rodents; they don't chew on anything they aren't eating (or in the rare case, attacking), for instance.
@mastermarkus5307 they are not slugs or cats so you're wrong . The name slugcat came from a fan of the game and has never been officially what they were
My theory on the Ancient's naming convention is that it is merely a translation quirk. Kind of like how I would be translated as _The Nobleman_ with _Grey Hair._ Also notice how the Ancient's names as from the pearls and their echoes have two pairs of phrases whilst the iterators have only one phrase. Their names sounded directly could be something as simple as Alexa.
I heard somewhere they have Buddhist connotations. Like the beads in "A Bell, Eighteen Amber Beads" (Echo) have some specific meaning in that context - meaning I can't currently recall. I know I heard it sometime before the DLC, because I haven't messed around with Rain World in a couple years.
I believe you might also be able to differentiate cultures (differing times or place or wealth) based on names, as some followed the "number noun, number noun," while others had "number noun relation to number noun," while others still had a description of scenery. Because we know so little this means almost nothing, but I still think it's neat
I think there's definitely some sort of system of family/clan recognition with things like the House of Braids in the metropolis. I imagine that ancients belonging to it might have "Braids" as part of their name.
One thing that I came to notice after watching lore videos is how different Pebbles is from Moon to how he interacts with the Ancients. Putting aside their opinions or how pleasing or unpleasing the whole thing was, Pebbles seems to look at his creators like they were his parents, just as they do look at him as their "golden child", spoiling him to no end; Moon, on the other hand, as one of the earliest iterators built to "pamper" a flourishing civilization as they enter an era on incredible discoveries, looked at her creators as troublesome children, if often also interesting and even adorable.
hm, i don't think Moon looked at ancients as adorable. she did call them skin parasites, after all. she appears very polite otherwise, so i don't think she would use that metaphor if she truly respected them, even if in the next line she backtracked. but i still think it was out of politeness, like "oopsie maybe i shouldn't be saying that", as if someone could still hold her accountable. she implied she doesn't miss the times of when they would inhabit her city. she could appreciate some things her creators would do, like the beautiful festivals, but overall, i feel like Moon was more tired of them.
The iterators: They all ascended. Lore videos: The ancients ascended. AUs: They all ascended. Any other fan: All ancients ascended. Me: *T h e y w e n t t o s p a c e*
19:54 A simple explanation. Placing void fluid into a vacuum (held there by magnetics? So it seem) purifies it. Pure void fluid works like the edge of a blackhole. You drop matter into it and that matter is violently ripped into its base elements and spit out with velocity. This process creates a lot of heat. Thus they created fission reactors that run on dirt.
I don't quite enjoy the use of the term "like a black hole" in this example. I think it's more reasonable to describe it as the ancient did, as a universal antimatter, that anahilates everything leaving behind only pure energy in the form of (thermal) radiation.
@@dr.cheeze5382 The reason I used "like a black hole" is because what I'm describing is essentially the same process that makes accretion disks. Its not like antimatter, because antimatter would have the same violent heat reaction to air, which void fluid pointedly does not seem to do (in fact it appears to have no reaction to the air at all). The way its described is that solid matter must be processed, so it has more in common with heavy elements being ripped apart and generating heat through the process of atomic spaghettification caused by black holes. It's not gravity performing the task so its not a perfect 1 to 1, but the output is so similar that it is the closest parallel process in our world. Spaghettification would also explain why air doesn't really generate heat while in contact with void fluid, thus explaining why everything is getting colder over time. The air is already largely composed of lighter, smaller elements, or component elements. The air simply moves on or skips off the void fluid, or the void fluid doesn't interact because there's simply not enough mass there to interact with. Antimatter wouldn't care about a requisite mass, it would just interact. Though this is all from a person who took far too much time to think of how a mechanism works that is not explained in detail in the world that it applies to. So take it with a grain of salt.
Incredible video! Your efforts are appreciated - the ancients can be quite confusing, but your video does an amazing job of putting everything that is known about them in a cohesive package that is really well presented!
This is wonderful, great job. Learned lots of things from it I previously hadn't been aware of. The story of the Ancients has so much to unpack. Their influence is felt in every corner of the game. Videocult did a fantastic job crafting it.
One of my headcannons that i had before downpour was this: the ancients, either through recent discoveries or just boredom, indulged in interstellar travel and settled in other planets, likely building other iterators there (hence why the astral bodies visisble in game are green, resembling the lightning beneath the superstructure).
It could be possible since they do have a strange obsession with space like naming the iterators looks to the moon or seven Red suns... And in moons chamber during spearmaster the pearls orbit like a moon around a planet it would make sense if they went to other planets thinking they would escape the cycle by leaving theirs
Awesome video, right up there with "Affairs of Passing Gods". This is my favorite game and its great to see the Ancients and their culture and flaws presented so accurately. I'm super happy that someone finally explained why what they did to their planet and the fate of the iterators was so awful. But I think I've got a kinda different take on Rain World's 'Great Cycle' than most of the community, which is that its not actually a time loop and dying doesn't mean you just wake back up again in the same body to do the day over. I know that's how the respawn system works in game, but I think that's more to highlight the frustration and futility of what it means to be 'trapped in the cycle of rebirth'. It's a metaphor. I think the actual cycle the iterators refer to (based on how closely the Ancient's religion is to actual Buddhism) is the cycle of getting reborn as an entirely different organism every time you die, with what you're reborn as being based on your karma. (There are a bunch of different types of 'beings' you can be reborn as in more traditional Buddhist beliefs and they're all based on karma and some of them are seriously fucked; this shit gets so wild.) Hence why to progress to different areas in game and get closer to ascension, you need certain 'levels' of karma to make the gates work. The Ancients were obviously still fanatically obsessed with ascension and destroyed themselves and almost everything else because of it, but I don't think they entirely lacked the ability to die. My opinion is that they just hated the idea of being reborn and having to live another life, because they made their own world such a crappy place to exist. That's just my opinion though. I don't think how the cycle works, whether via respawn/functional immortality or actual rebirth, is ever confirmed in canon, so take it with a grain of salt. And I'm a Buddhist so I'm probably just nitpicking based on what I want to see. Doesn't change how great the whole video was.
The cycle in rainworld is really confusing. Reincarnation although requires deeming whole gameplay respawn mechanic non canon is definitely really good interpretation. Especially considering DLC events.
One thing I keep thinking about is if it is reincarnation then how do the ancients know about it? How would they know that the person they saw die reincarnated to be something else? Unless they keep their memories after reincarnation which could be a possibility I guess.
@@TheCubifyer I think Moon says something about how the Ancients used to eat karma flowers to see their past lives. Or maybe after the Void Fluid Revolution they figured out how to track spirits across different bodies, since they also figured out how to make techno-spiritual stuff like the karma gates. I'm not sure.
There's a lot of Buddhism/Hindu themes so l'm guessing their attire and appearance due to the symbolism of birds in the religion along with beings like Garuda and the mythical creatures kinnara. Birds are often seen as an omen for rain, they often welcomed by those of agriculture for bringing water to crops. I visit my family members in Thailand and frequently see similar creatures at the temples and as the crest of the Thai royal family. Birds also utilize in teachings codes and concepts. Some also seem to have similar features as nagas with the tail and head fringes. Nagas often live in rivers, lakes and other bodies of water often with the purpose of protection these sources. Some also seem to have similar features as nagas with the tail and head fringes. Nagas often live in rivers, lakes and other bodies of water often with the purpose of protection these sources. also think is what inspired the major predators in rain world, including the centipedes which in Buddhism are used to represent anger. Though regardless they are life and generally during monsoon seasons many monks stay inside to avoid stepping on them since even they are treated and sentient beings to value their lives. The architecture of the Rain World is also based on his visit in Seoul a city which holds 90 percent of South Korea's population. Another thing I noticed growing up in the Asian community, other than inheriting a name there's a lore behind it. The outstanding events during the life of the Buddha happen during the full moon. For five pebbles we noticed depictions of the five outliers when going towards his domain, there are also five key steps in pebble meditation too. Pebble can also be used as a representation of what's significant in your life that you can live without. I do find there atre some irony in their names too especially in aspects to their physical locations.
EDIT: While a bit less in-depth, a newer & more accurate video is now available th-cam.com/video/On-gEZ-mwcE/w-d-xo.html Thumbnail: www.tumblr.com/kociamieta
Powerful stuff, and very insightful! I had never considered that ascension might have veeb mandatory, or even forced upon others. It really was a wild thing to consider.
Even if it wasn't forced, it would be so hard to avoid. All of your friends, your family, your coworkers and employer, businesses you frequent or services you enjoy all ceasing to be. Everyone you know, or at least most of them, gone to kill themselves leaving behind a husk of empty infrastructure. It wouldn't be something you'd want to stay around in. Everything would become so much more difficult, that giving up and just going with them would be the easier choice by far. Especially when under the pressure of doing it with those friends as opposed to alone when you can't stand the loneliness any longer. And every individual who gives up is another body gone for the more persistent to lose, wearing them all down one by one. Societal and religious pressure on top would be almost impossible to endure.
I mean, there's probably not even a million users of RW itself, and only sporadic interest outside that, for topics as niche as this. That said, videos (and games) like this might be a master class on how to write vague, mysterious, yet incredibly deep worldbuilding, and I wonder if (or hope that?) such authors look to content like this..!
you blew my mind, I hadn't even thought to consider that the ancients to the ancients might've constructed the depths. or that there were ancients who predate our ancients. i love the worldbuilding in this game so much. its genuinely a masterful work of art. thank you for such a top notch video. i hope you that when you move on to the next topic, whatever it may be, you keep this level of dedication to your craft. its beautiful dude.
12:55 there's been theorized that there is a sixth sin which is *ADVANCED VIOLENCE* (the urge to help others ascend or ascend others) Downpour thingy Saint would most likely being guilty of that sin thus not ascending
This honestly my favorite Rain World lore video I've watched so far, it's criminal how underrated it is. I've had a good idea of the ancient's lore for quite some time, but this video placed the timeline neatly and helped me view things from a different angle. Thanks for making this video, I look forward to more!
This was so incredibly amazing and useful!!! There are two things I love the most about Rain world, the gorgeous pixel environment and the lore. This was so helpful to really get to know everything about the ancients and when and how everything happened. Thank you so much for releasing an amazing video!!
>Ancients destroy the world, failing to destroy themselves >Ancients create life (Iterators), and damn it to their fate, but fail to destroy themselves. >Ancients destroy themselves, but leave behind magnitudes more destruction. >Ancients destroy those who do not want destruction I'm getting the idea that the true lesson is that ascension is to...lift the spirits. To find purpose and happiness in the long life you're given. Your life, after all, will not be suddenly ripped from you. There is no frail mortality. And think too: Every Scug (barring Saint) has an ending that isn't Ascending. Hunter...definitely should, Arti is happier that way (maybe?) and Saint But those who have community, brotherhood, and labour yet to wrought - those are where the happy endings are found.
I don't remember where I heard it or how reputable the source is, but I remember hearing online someone say that the purpose of the Slugcat was to clean pipes. This would explain how they seem to move through pipes with great ease. It would also explain why, despite the player ultimately being in control, the slugcat seems to immediately know what to do when confronted with the Void Fluid. One of their tasks (if this theory holds) was to clean the pipes used to transport Void Fluid. This would have them be in the same spot when the ancients jumped in. The presence of the fluid would also explain why Slugcats seem to be so rare. Personal side theory: The Scavengers were either inte intended for construction or as there name suggests, scavenging supplies. We do see them doing things that feel like construction with the tolls. The scavenging part would explain why they seem to hoard spears more beyond them being wepons. They would probably have less contact with Void Fluid, explaining why they're so much more common than Slugcats.
I was trying to add this to the comment in the Scav part, but TH-cam is being a pain in the butt. The Scavengers being intended for scavenging lends credence to why they can hold more spears than Spear Master and Hunter.
As far as I remember, one of the pearls says that “slugs” were used to clean pipes, the analogy is not difficult to draw. Btw, I like your scavenger theory.
on the topic of ancient naming conventions, i feel as though it might be similar to how real world names have meanings and translations - we’re just given the translation of ancient names though, rather than the original name
I’ve always had this headcannon that the reason that the cycle exists is because a civilization far, far more ancient than the ancients created a way to completely cheat death, a technological representation of their arrogance. Eventually realizing that endless life was futile and pointless, they ascended and broke the cycles leaving every other civilization after to deal with the remains of their brazen vendetta against the inevitable.
OH MY GOD THE THUMBNAIL IS INCREDIBLE, IS THAT THE CRITIC? as the guy who put that in, it's amazing to see the artwork, it feels amazing to know my graffiti was used in this video too. Great vid as well. Also, it's called critic because the pose is from a discord emote of the nostalgia critic. I've seen people calling it pepehands, but the truth is much worse.
Its file name "sonix - critic" makes SO much more sense now lol No but it's definitely one of the best graffiti in the game especially when it comes to the ancients so I had to have it as the thumbnail The fact that it's based off of nostalgia critic is actually so funny LOL
I realy love how the community can find so much in a game that leaves everything up to interpretation I've been thinking about this kind of stuff for months and this is amazing Personally, I imagined the Ancients being a little bigger with the slug cats being chihuahua sized bc my chihuahua has the size to get into tubes and narrow places when im not looking just like slugcat slides everywhere
Fantastic video. There were only a very few minute details that i think were inexact, but for the overwhelming majority, this is a fantastic interpretation of what happened in the world of rain world. Beautiful editing. Good job
48:45 I think this could be something about moon's gravity disruptiors failing or something. Because when we go see moon. When the cycle ends her gravity disruptiors dont turn back on.
OMG I just made the connection between the 5 virtues of the ancients that they have to embody in order to transcend and the 5 different slugcats in downpour! They each embody one of those as well as what they do in the story.
The theory about the ancients appearance being due to some kind of body modification rituals or genetic modification is cool. I sort of assumed that their art was religious and depicted them with some creative liberties taken to symbolize stuff from their religion. Sorta like Egyptian artwork showing people with animal parts even though we are pretty sure none of the ancient Egyptians looked like that haha
IVE BEEN BLESSED BY THE GODS. A 1 HOUR VIDEO ABOUT RAIN WORLD ANCIENTS?! I AM TRULY THE LUCKIEST PERSON ON THIS PLANET, THANK YOU!! dawg, im going to watch the fuck out of this video.
I really would like to see what's out there? More iterators? Maybe living ancients? A massive desert? A gigant tundra? A enormous jungle?? Maybe all of them or none of them Like the región concepts of dazombes
I haven’t looked at any rainworld ancient lore, this is the first video I saw on it, I must say you did a good job! Though I would like to share my thoughts on how they looked. I feel like the answer would be the most simplest, as are most things when it comes to debates. They were mostly human, maybe some slight genetic modification as they most definitely had the potential for it. Humans, makes robots in their own self image, why would the ancients not do the same? The iterators are extremely humanoid with no bird like parts to be seen on them, if they were bird like why would they not include these parts? The murals that depict them as more abstract are just that, art of that nature commonly does such to excentuate specific messages. Especially the graffiti. We see that some of their masks can be quite big, perhaps they could have contained technology to keep them warm in the cold temperatures or filter the air from the constant technological advances going on. Bird masks could have been made for coincidental reasons, much like plague doctor masks who used the “beaks” to stuff them full of good smelling flowers when spending time around all those corpses Idk, just my two cents though :p
Great video. The slugcats yes, they are purposed organisms served to clean pipes! You can confirm this by taking the colored pearls from shoreline to Moon (I think it was the Pink one, the one that is above a tower) and she will say that the slugcat served to clean pipes
You got all very neatly covered, an hour long video, I really enjoyed every minute of it, great job man!!. But oh my god, every time i read the echoes dialogue I get very sentimental, Rain World truly is a very precious experience.
This video is a gift to the rain world community. Seriously, this is very, very good. I consider myself well versed in the world of this game, but I still learnt a lot of small details I hadn't realized before this video. Great work! Looking forward to your next works.
excuse me for the second comment but ive just finished the whole video and ENJOYED EVERY SECOND OF IT. I am personally very obsessed with ancients and, MAN, you did as much research as I did, huh? haha! I had no problems with this video at all and i cannot think of anything you could fix, as it is perfect (say for some very specific details that were left out such as the possibility of very few ancients probably still being alive post-global ascension and the fact some ancients possesed pen names that went outside their naming convention. but I'm not disappointed as im already satisfied by the fucking fact youve mentioned the foot binding, naming convention, and other such small details when no other youtuber would!) this is seriously now one of my favorite yt videos of all time and i just cant help but appreciate every single detail in this video from the SPECTACULAR editing, overall structure, and THE FACT THAT ITS AN HOUR LONG TH-cam VIDEO ABOUT ANCIENTS HOLY SHIT I MUST BE DREAMING!! Youve worked so well on this, you deserve a long rest after this splendidly (but likely exhaustingly) long video. cheers, man! (btw ive subbed and secretly wish for more despite the pain it might cause for you to create another one of these)
Its a federal crime that this video isnt among the ranks of TH-camrs like dazombes or the like. This video is amazing. A whole hour of documentation on the ancients? I couldn't have asked for anything better
after having actually watched some of the video im here to leave an actual comment you did a great job making this video. You didnt just read the lore pearls to us or tell us the events/campaigns or whatever but went deeper, telling us about their biology and culture which i dont remember other videos really doing
This is one of if not the best rain world lore video I’ve ever seen! You tell all of the information in such an easy to understand way! Awesome video :)
I have a small theory: the game videocult is developing, the one with the hover bikes where you play in the city, i think that's an ancient city, you play as an ancient, i am one karma symbol away from proving it.
This is THE BEST and most exhaustive video on the matter. It really shines light on the thoughts put in the creation of the game's universe, which now makes the game's input ideas make MUCH more sense, compared to otherwise Aaand it makes it much easier to compare that universe to reality. Theory: The fact that ancients didnt purely use the thinking process for development but made biomachinery to decide instead of the ancients themselves really pushed them back and made them realize their collosal mistake, meaning void fluid doesnt actually ascend them, but really just puts them away for the next generation (and not doing what efforts would grant) to try better to ascend for a second time.
Early in the video but I wonder if the Ancients remembered the previous life in the cycle & that’s what caused so much frustration! And the phrase of you waking up from sleep. You have to be aware of yourself as a self even minimally to intellectually recognize that you’ve slept. But if dying is viewed as sleeping and birth as waking, how can you be frustrated if you don’t remember that you fell asleep? Do you recall it? Is it a dream, it dreams? Now I know that it could be purely philosophical and religious belief-after all there is the belief of reincarnation that exists in our world-but what if wasn’t, and they had proof? How long could or would an individual view as their lifetime as a single entity? Or is there even a concept of birth traditionally for the Ancients, and instead they fall into a sleep and wake in the same body? Is it revived anew or still aged? Even the masks, the need for safety in obscurity but identity in individuality through masks and body modification? To break ties with an old life within the ‘same’ body? All of these things could have began as practical but evolved as a spiritual importance over the long years of their civilization-they could work for either theory.
20:00 Moon explains it poorly. I don't understand physics well. But i get the idea well enough to provide a somewhat decent explanation. E=mc² The void fluid, when in a vacuum and with a bit of input energy can perfectly transform every ounce of matter into pure, harvestable energy. With what im assuming is 100% efficiency, or some other absurd number. And then, multiplied, by the speed of light, squared. Basically, throw a rock into magic piss, and get back a sizeable portion of the total energy the sun provides the planet. That might be hyperbole, or maybe I'm underestimating it. Anyways, the closest thing in comparison, currently known to science. Is 40% energy efficiency, and that's from crazy black hole physics
This video was well explained. Rain world's lore is too deep and complicated but you and your team made it like a good detailed story that everyone can understand. I really appreciate the effort into the video, the editing, the information gathering and etc.
53:53 My interpretation of Rhinestones Beneath Shattered Glass wasn't that they didn't want to ascend, rather they never shed their want for Survival. To ascend you need to rid yourself of wordly needs and all that. A couple other echoes mention being drawn to certain places, perhaps having a strong connection to the land is enough to get them stuck
30:21 that was a siren? I always thought that was like creaking metal or something like that idk in hindsight it doesn't really sound like creaking metal, but it was my best guess at the time
I'm blown away! You've hit on pretty much every lore beat I can think of, plus a couple I hadn't yet put together! There's really only one point I can think of that I disagree with; and not outright, but more by omission. And to be clear, such a minor critique is hardly an embarrassment, indeed, that it's the only point, should be taken as high praise indeed! Anyway, the pearl projection in Metropolis -- which I hadn't noticed before either, or at least its background (and thus geographic context) -- I suspect it might've been more as either an attraction to _visit_ (a somewhat treacherous but worthwhile pilgrimage, given the surface conditions at the time), or indeed to experience, as in to take or exchange pearls to view and experience their contents -- it was something of a hallowed library, after all. A _reminder_ to place ones' pearls or other offerings there, certainly works too -- it just seems less likely to me. On a related note, it's interesting to think what Ancient life might've been like in the later days. The loneliness in public must've been palpable, even as populations dropped say from millions to 100k's; let alone to thousands or less. This would be only mildly offset by exploring that library -- why else to record ones' experience, collected thoughts and words, memories, and possessions, than for others to also experience them? (An egotistical conceit perfectly suited to the Ancients, especially those rich enough to have ascended earlier!) It seems to me, the dynamics of ascension might've been something like -- at least in some cities or subcultures, not necessarily Pebbles' -- take your time, experience the cycles (whatever that means, whether literal as in-game respawning, or any other time-traveling or metaphysically-interwoven loop; procreation might even be included ("progeny") -- though we don't of course know when Nineteen Spaces lived/ascended, aside from after Pebbles' construction), and when you are good and ready, having experienced everything your civilization had ever experienced -- to give up your attachments, whether by sheer force of will, or abject boredom, and finally ascend yourself. At least, that that would be one possible implementation of it, but it would seem in our particular case, the cultural mandate was _much_ stronger, that _everyone_ shall ascend, whether they privately wished to or not; and so we have echoes like Rhinestones. Perhaps shutting down the freight system was done not for efficiency (who was left to care?), but for coercion: without perishables at least, but perhaps without even more critical consumables like any food and drink (not just their preferred brands of Nectar (...or "Pebsi" :) )), the final stragglers had no choice but to ⦻ themselves out, whether they were (psychologically, spiritually) ready to do so or not. Thanks again for an excellent production!
I still remember how I first stumbled upon Rainworld. Ive watched videos of its content for about 10 hours. The next day I told my sister about it. She told me in return that it sounds like a great story but she didnt like how much of it eluded to suicide and a dieing world. Looking at this I couldnt agree more, as its in there a lot.
this was an amazing in depth look at the ancients! thank you so much! i thought i knew all i could about rain world lore, and this type of video is the type i wish i could make myself. thanks for your effort!!
Been meaning to watch this since release day and finally remembered. This is a great video! Well edited and written. Here's my comment for engagement :)
i just want to drive it home how much we dont actually know about the cycle. while the classic explanation that "its a time loop" make sense on the surface, no actual explanation satisfies the conditions needed for the cycle to make sense in the way that it does. for example, if its a bhudist type deal where you reincarnate as a random creature, you run into the problem of how the heck do the ancients know that the cycle even exists. if its a thing where you die for everyone around you but wake up in an alternate timeline, theres the problem of how did they figure out void fluid ascends you and doesnt just regular kill you. it doesnt help that a lot of texts straight up conflict with eachother. ive personally come to the conclusion that the cycle is so extremely badly defined that its easier to just make up your own headcannon for it to make sense, even if that means retconning a lot of previosly said stuff / adding in completely new parts of the lore.
Amazing video My theory about appearance of ancients that they weren't one biological species. They could be different biological species connected by the same ideology and so the culture. That can explain their differences in appearance (+ There is a chance that some of them could use body modifications like they did to wild life)
*five pebbsi*
Looks for the water
*proceeds to drink up every drop of moon's water supply*@@Zer0cip
@@shreyaspamaraju262 *Moon Screaming Sounds*
Imagine an iteratore running with fivepebsi
Seven red guns
“touch some grass“
Instructions unclear,
the grass has consumed me
aw hell nah, not the grass near farm arrays
"Touch some grass" excuse me, but that's is threat in Rain World
I think you touched the wrong grass
Touch the regular grass not the worm grass XD
You got it touch the right grass the ones that are actually plans and not some weird animal
Ironically chances are the Slugcats and the Scavs are the next advanced civilisation. They already figured out art, crafting and cooking.
I think that scavs are to ancients as chimps are to us.
@@retroflame3104 And slugcats are like elephants, in intelligence scale at least
@@consueno753or Dolphins too, but not so creepys as tjem
@robertomejia2075 Nah... the slugcat has two voids for eyes. They're built for sucking your soul out of your body.
@@retroflame3104 The scavs seem as intelligent as humans. Their culture is more advanced than the social interactions of a group of chimps, and they can hold items and throw things.
I gotta mention that moon's rain siren sounds terrifying, like imagine its night time and your trying to sleep and then you hear THAT
That tells you when it's bedtime lol
@@starcraftgemyeah close your eyes before the demons come😅
15:00
Its very important to note that Moon says this after collapsing and losing most of her memory. Its not that iterators in general do not recognize it, its just that one with severe brain damage cannot.
Although you are correct in saying moon has brain damage it is both very funny and extremely mean lol
@finnduggan4422 why is it mean?
Agreed
@@SchnortBrain Damage has become a term similar to "stupid" in slang on the internet these days. Casually saying you or someone else has missing brain cells or brain damage is used in humor to denote something about your behavior is off or you're "not working right".
@@blackwell4701but she literally has missing brain cells
Holy shit the prequel to "The Affairs of Passing Gods" just dropped y'all
Seriously though this video was so good, I'm gonna have to rewatch it just to find all my favorite parts again but as a recent member of the fandom, this video did a phenomenal job of consolidating both lore and game files into an easy-to-follow timeline that neither pearls nor wiki pages could quite convey. Bravo my good sir!
We should make a playlist of all these great lore essays entitled The Pearls of Sullied Stories
@@HelloWorldMyNameIsLyra why did so little people see this comment. oh my god. that's brilliant.
The thing about Elite Scavengers' masks is that they have practically the same description as other Vulture masks, with only a remark on how they were altered (probably by scavengers) from their original form.
Though I do think Vultures' masks themselves were designed by the Ancients to mimic their own, since Vultures without masks will get harassed to death by other Vultures.
Or inversely the Vultures were the organisms that the Ancients took after when modifying their genomes, if that happened.
@@galaxxy_foxx2583I don't think they would reduce themselves to a form unenlightened and one that wants to survive in this world. The ancients just wanted to fucking kill themselves lol
Touching Rain World’s grass would be a very good way to make our lives quite finite.
I believe that the mixed number of digits on the ancients could have been cultural, where they take off digits and could even cut of the hands to be ‘prettier’ as all the iterators have 1 digit hands and you’d make your robot as pretty as you could
I thought something similar
I thought it more as a religious thing mixed with a status symbol. The richest ones that had the void fluid more available to them (at least at the start) wouldnt need to work as much as the one with less resources so, why would they want to have extra of something they dont use? And with greed or ego being one of the taboos wouldn't it be logical to chop the parts of the body that they find useless? After all, the mural that is representing ego/greed/self preservation (the one with the ancient with 2 shields 00:03:15) doesn't have any bandage on and just keeping a physical feature could still count as a way of showing ego.
Maybe the clawed/tentacle feet are the original ones and maybe they still had a tail and as they were growing up or as they started preparing for the void fluid bath they started cutting off limbs and when the void fluid was more accesible to all, most kept doing it because they were already use to that kind of rituals
@@matoyuwu3748 Very cool! 👍
Another possibility is that the art depicting the ancients is simply taking creative liberties on how many digits they had. Think about how often human art depicts humans or fictional humanoids with only four or three digits.
@@archdruidbookwalter951 yes thats very true, think about like gravity falls for instance they only have four fingers so like yeah sorry I’m on two %
@@archdruidbookwalter951could even be like the Ancient equivalent of stick figures (conceptually, not quite literally) in that they might consider these murals the minimum to be identifiable as "ah yeah that's an ancient"
21:20
I believe the purpose slug cats were meant to serve was originally cleaning pipes.
The magenta Shoreline pearl reads:
"It is the genome for a purposed organism. A small slug to clean the insides of pipes."
At the end, Moon states:
"So it's highly likely that you are the descendant of a purposed organism yourself!"
I think the end note is to contextually clue the reader that your species started as a slug and later became a slug cat. (Due to them being very close in name, and you crawling through pipes throughout the game.)
(P.S. I especially enjoyed the section about their anatomy and possible body modifications. The foot binding theory is a cool take.)
Pretty sure if you bring that very same pearl to Five Pebbles he comments on the fact that the slug has unneccessary features(such as eyes and I think limbs) that indicate to him it was a blueprint for a domesticated variant of the pipe cleaners, meant for use as pets/companion animals rather than cleaners. And I'm 99% certain one of the adds/images you can see being broadcasted in the iterator city features a slugcat implying they were kinda popular?
Sentient pipe cleaner my beloved
The "slugcats" are rodentia. They're rats, Harold.
They get called "rodent", but I feel pretty confident that it's just because they might be superficially similar. There's no indication that slugcats have the defining teeth of rodents; they don't chew on anything they aren't eating (or in the rare case, attacking), for instance.
@mastermarkus5307 they are not slugs or cats so you're wrong . The name slugcat came from a fan of the game and has never been officially what they were
My theory on the Ancient's naming convention is that it is merely a translation quirk. Kind of like how I would be translated as _The Nobleman_ with _Grey Hair._ Also notice how the Ancient's names as from the pearls and their echoes have two pairs of phrases whilst the iterators have only one phrase. Their names sounded directly could be something as simple as Alexa.
I heard somewhere they have Buddhist connotations. Like the beads in "A Bell, Eighteen Amber Beads" (Echo) have some specific meaning in that context - meaning I can't currently recall. I know I heard it sometime before the DLC, because I haven't messed around with Rain World in a couple years.
Sitting Bull is the _chief_ example of this for Americans.
I believe you might also be able to differentiate cultures (differing times or place or wealth) based on names, as some followed the "number noun, number noun," while others had "number noun relation to number noun," while others still had a description of scenery. Because we know so little this means almost nothing, but I still think it's neat
I think there's definitely some sort of system of family/clan recognition with things like the House of Braids in the metropolis. I imagine that ancients belonging to it might have "Braids" as part of their name.
One thing that I came to notice after watching lore videos is how different Pebbles is from Moon to how he interacts with the Ancients.
Putting aside their opinions or how pleasing or unpleasing the whole thing was, Pebbles seems to look at his creators like they were his parents, just as they do look at him as their "golden child", spoiling him to no end; Moon, on the other hand, as one of the earliest iterators built to "pamper" a flourishing civilization as they enter an era on incredible discoveries, looked at her creators as troublesome children, if often also interesting and even adorable.
hm, i don't think Moon looked at ancients as adorable. she did call them skin parasites, after all. she appears very polite otherwise, so i don't think she would use that metaphor if she truly respected them, even if in the next line she backtracked. but i still think it was out of politeness, like "oopsie maybe i shouldn't be saying that", as if someone could still hold her accountable. she implied she doesn't miss the times of when they would inhabit her city. she could appreciate some things her creators would do, like the beautiful festivals, but overall, i feel like Moon was more tired of them.
The iterators: They all ascended.
Lore videos: The ancients ascended.
AUs: They all ascended.
Any other fan: All ancients ascended.
Me: *T h e y w e n t t o s p a c e*
lol
technically still ascending, just to space not the void
"One Nissan Ultima, Fourteen Outstanding Tickets"
LMAO
Turns out the ancients sucked at driving…
19:54
A simple explanation.
Placing void fluid into a vacuum (held there by magnetics? So it seem) purifies it. Pure void fluid works like the edge of a blackhole. You drop matter into it and that matter is violently ripped into its base elements and spit out with velocity. This process creates a lot of heat. Thus they created fission reactors that run on dirt.
Hm, so the void fluid revolution is sort of like if the Industrial Revolution was us going from steam engines to nuclear power plants
I don't quite enjoy the use of the term "like a black hole" in this example. I think it's more reasonable to describe it as the ancient did, as a universal antimatter, that anahilates everything leaving behind only pure energy in the form of (thermal) radiation.
@@dr.cheeze5382 The reason I used "like a black hole" is because what I'm describing is essentially the same process that makes accretion disks.
Its not like antimatter, because antimatter would have the same violent heat reaction to air, which void fluid pointedly does not seem to do (in fact it appears to have no reaction to the air at all).
The way its described is that solid matter must be processed, so it has more in common with heavy elements being ripped apart and generating heat through the process of atomic spaghettification caused by black holes. It's not gravity performing the task so its not a perfect 1 to 1, but the output is so similar that it is the closest parallel process in our world. Spaghettification would also explain why air doesn't really generate heat while in contact with void fluid, thus explaining why everything is getting colder over time. The air is already largely composed of lighter, smaller elements, or component elements. The air simply moves on or skips off the void fluid, or the void fluid doesn't interact because there's simply not enough mass there to interact with. Antimatter wouldn't care about a requisite mass, it would just interact.
Though this is all from a person who took far too much time to think of how a mechanism works that is not explained in detail in the world that it applies to. So take it with a grain of salt.
One last comment before bed
The comment:@@Exile_Sky
I have no knowledge to join the discussion, but doesn't antimatter create a white hole instead of black hole?
Incredible video!
Your efforts are appreciated - the ancients can be quite confusing, but your video does an amazing job of putting everything that is known about them in a cohesive package that is really well presented!
SIGMA PLS ADD ME TO THE COOL CLUB
This is wonderful, great job. Learned lots of things from it I previously hadn't been aware of. The story of the Ancients has so much to unpack. Their influence is felt in every corner of the game. Videocult did a fantastic job crafting it.
if a name is always a "Amount" followed by a "Noun"... an Ancient with a name as "Two Girls, One cup" could fucking exist. and i'm terrified.
LMFAO
>"we must become effortless, like the jellyfish"
>Proceeds to drill into the center of the earth
> "Shit we cant do anything right can we"
21:07 it looks like the lizard is trying to eat that scav
One of my headcannons that i had before downpour was this: the ancients, either through recent discoveries or just boredom, indulged in interstellar travel and settled in other planets, likely building other iterators there (hence why the astral bodies visisble in game are green, resembling the lightning beneath the superstructure).
I have that headcanon too!
It could be possible since they do have a strange obsession with space like naming the iterators looks to the moon or seven Red suns... And in moons chamber during spearmaster the pearls orbit like a moon around a planet
it would make sense if they went to other planets thinking they would escape the cycle by leaving theirs
Note also that stars can't ever be green; a typical scifi trope is that green stars are a sign of artificial stellar objects.
I loved every moment of this: the visuals and editing were astounding along with the incredible writing. This is an underated masterpiece. 10/10
Awesome video, right up there with "Affairs of Passing Gods". This is my favorite game and its great to see the Ancients and their culture and flaws presented so accurately. I'm super happy that someone finally explained why what they did to their planet and the fate of the iterators was so awful.
But I think I've got a kinda different take on Rain World's 'Great Cycle' than most of the community, which is that its not actually a time loop and dying doesn't mean you just wake back up again in the same body to do the day over. I know that's how the respawn system works in game, but I think that's more to highlight the frustration and futility of what it means to be 'trapped in the cycle of rebirth'. It's a metaphor. I think the actual cycle the iterators refer to (based on how closely the Ancient's religion is to actual Buddhism) is the cycle of getting reborn as an entirely different organism every time you die, with what you're reborn as being based on your karma. (There are a bunch of different types of 'beings' you can be reborn as in more traditional Buddhist beliefs and they're all based on karma and some of them are seriously fucked; this shit gets so wild.) Hence why to progress to different areas in game and get closer to ascension, you need certain 'levels' of karma to make the gates work. The Ancients were obviously still fanatically obsessed with ascension and destroyed themselves and almost everything else because of it, but I don't think they entirely lacked the ability to die. My opinion is that they just hated the idea of being reborn and having to live another life, because they made their own world such a crappy place to exist.
That's just my opinion though. I don't think how the cycle works, whether via respawn/functional immortality or actual rebirth, is ever confirmed in canon, so take it with a grain of salt. And I'm a Buddhist so I'm probably just nitpicking based on what I want to see. Doesn't change how great the whole video was.
The cycle in rainworld is really confusing. Reincarnation although requires deeming whole gameplay respawn mechanic non canon is definitely really good interpretation.
Especially considering DLC events.
One thing I keep thinking about is if it is reincarnation then how do the ancients know about it? How would they know that the person they saw die reincarnated to be something else? Unless they keep their memories after reincarnation which could be a possibility I guess.
@@TheCubifyer I think Moon says something about how the Ancients used to eat karma flowers to see their past lives. Or maybe after the Void Fluid Revolution they figured out how to track spirits across different bodies, since they also figured out how to make techno-spiritual stuff like the karma gates. I'm not sure.
@@justplainninja That could be a possibility, but I guess we'll never truly know unless a new dlc comes out.
My interpretation was sorta a mix of the two that they were reborn the next cycle but as the same thing as before
I think all the people who cover the rain world lore should get together and make one MASSIVE video covering all of it
this video is great! a fantastic elaboration that really needed to be made
thank you tardigrade man
There's a lot of Buddhism/Hindu themes so l'm guessing their attire and appearance due to the symbolism of birds in the religion along with beings like Garuda and the mythical creatures kinnara. Birds are often seen as an omen for rain, they often welcomed by those of agriculture for bringing water to crops. I visit my family members in Thailand and frequently see similar creatures at the temples and as the crest of the Thai royal family. Birds also utilize in teachings codes and concepts.
Some also seem to have similar features as nagas with the tail and head fringes. Nagas often live in rivers, lakes and other bodies of water often with the purpose of protection these sources.
Some also seem to have similar features as nagas with the tail and head fringes. Nagas often live in rivers, lakes and other bodies of water often with the purpose of protection these sources. also think is what inspired the major predators in rain world, including the centipedes which in Buddhism are used to represent anger. Though regardless they are life and generally during monsoon seasons many monks stay inside to avoid stepping on them since even they are treated and sentient beings to value their lives.
The architecture of the Rain World is also based on his visit in Seoul a city which holds 90 percent of South Korea's population.
Another thing I noticed growing up in the Asian community, other than inheriting a name there's a lore behind it. The outstanding events during the life of the Buddha happen during the full moon. For five pebbles we noticed depictions of the five outliers when going towards his domain, there are also five key steps in pebble meditation too. Pebble can also be used as a representation of what's significant in your life that you can live without. I do find there atre some irony in their names too especially in aspects to their physical locations.
EDIT: While a bit less in-depth, a newer & more accurate video is now available
th-cam.com/video/On-gEZ-mwcE/w-d-xo.html
Thumbnail:
www.tumblr.com/kociamieta
"rhinestones above shattered glass" is actually named Rhinestones beneath Shattered Glass!
Wait,… your comment is 2 days old and the video is 1 day old
Powerful stuff, and very insightful!
I had never considered that ascension might have veeb mandatory, or even forced upon others. It really was a wild thing to consider.
Even if it wasn't forced, it would be so hard to avoid. All of your friends, your family, your coworkers and employer, businesses you frequent or services you enjoy all ceasing to be. Everyone you know, or at least most of them, gone to kill themselves leaving behind a husk of empty infrastructure. It wouldn't be something you'd want to stay around in. Everything would become so much more difficult, that giving up and just going with them would be the easier choice by far.
Especially when under the pressure of doing it with those friends as opposed to alone when you can't stand the loneliness any longer. And every individual who gives up is another body gone for the more persistent to lose, wearing them all down one by one. Societal and religious pressure on top would be almost impossible to endure.
the fact that this video has less than a million views is beyond me, this video deserves all the recognition it gets and MORE, great video mate.
Less than a thousand at the time of writing this
My friend, the video just have appeared. Of course nobody have viewed it yet
I mean, there's probably not even a million users of RW itself, and only sporadic interest outside that, for topics as niche as this. That said, videos (and games) like this might be a master class on how to write vague, mysterious, yet incredibly deep worldbuilding, and I wonder if (or hope that?) such authors look to content like this..!
As a rain world music enjoyer, I must say noticing that the music for chapter 1 was ancient made me laugh a little more then it should have
you blew my mind, I hadn't even thought to consider that the ancients to the ancients might've constructed the depths. or that there were ancients who predate our ancients. i love the worldbuilding in this game so much. its genuinely a masterful work of art. thank you for such a top notch video. i hope you that when you move on to the next topic, whatever it may be, you keep this level of dedication to your craft. its beautiful dude.
“Touch some grass”
-UraniumEater, guy who made multiple hour long videos about a video game about slugs that can do backflips /j
long, detailed documentary on my favourite niche subject of an already niche game?? you're too kind
I didn’t realize how unknown this video went until I looked at the comments. You deserve a lot more for this level of skill
12:55 there's been theorized that there is a sixth sin which is *ADVANCED VIOLENCE* (the urge to help others ascend or ascend others)
Downpour thingy
Saint would most likely being guilty of that sin thus not ascending
me when I commit advanced violence
Saint spreading them good ol' christian values
This honestly my favorite Rain World lore video I've watched so far, it's criminal how underrated it is. I've had a good idea of the ancient's lore for quite some time, but this video placed the timeline neatly and helped me view things from a different angle. Thanks for making this video, I look forward to more!
This was so incredibly amazing and useful!!! There are two things I love the most about Rain world, the gorgeous pixel environment and the lore. This was so helpful to really get to know everything about the ancients and when and how everything happened. Thank you so much for releasing an amazing video!!
>Ancients destroy the world, failing to destroy themselves
>Ancients create life (Iterators), and damn it to their fate, but fail to destroy themselves.
>Ancients destroy themselves, but leave behind magnitudes more destruction.
>Ancients destroy those who do not want destruction
I'm getting the idea that the true lesson is that ascension is to...lift the spirits. To find purpose and happiness in the long life you're given. Your life, after all, will not be suddenly ripped from you. There is no frail mortality.
And think too: Every Scug (barring Saint) has an ending that isn't Ascending. Hunter...definitely should, Arti is happier that way (maybe?) and Saint
But those who have community, brotherhood, and labour yet to wrought - those are where the happy endings are found.
I don't remember where I heard it or how reputable the source is, but I remember hearing online someone say that the purpose of the Slugcat was to clean pipes. This would explain how they seem to move through pipes with great ease. It would also explain why, despite the player ultimately being in control, the slugcat seems to immediately know what to do when confronted with the Void Fluid. One of their tasks (if this theory holds) was to clean the pipes used to transport Void Fluid. This would have them be in the same spot when the ancients jumped in. The presence of the fluid would also explain why Slugcats seem to be so rare.
Personal side theory:
The Scavengers were either inte intended for construction or as there name suggests, scavenging supplies. We do see them doing things that feel like construction with the tolls. The scavenging part would explain why they seem to hoard spears more beyond them being wepons. They would probably have less contact with Void Fluid, explaining why they're so much more common than Slugcats.
I was trying to add this to the comment in the Scav part, but TH-cam is being a pain in the butt.
The Scavengers being intended for scavenging lends credence to why they can hold more spears than Spear Master and Hunter.
As far as I remember, one of the pearls says that “slugs” were used to clean pipes, the analogy is not difficult to draw. Btw, I like your scavenger theory.
@@verygoodjobsofar5179 But hay, that's just a theory.
A G A M E T H E O R Y.
21:19 If I'm not wrong, slugcats were made by the ancients to clean pipes and tunnels, which explains why they are so slimy and oozy.
on the topic of ancient naming conventions, i feel as though it might be similar to how real world names have meanings and translations - we’re just given the translation of ancient names though, rather than the original name
love this !!! its so well produced!!
also to my friend jaga that thumbnail is amazing omgg
EAKI
JAGA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HELLO!!!!!@@kocia-mieta
I’ve always had this headcannon that the reason that the cycle exists is because a civilization far, far more ancient than the ancients created a way to completely cheat death, a technological representation of their arrogance. Eventually realizing that endless life was futile and pointless, they ascended and broke the cycles leaving every other civilization after to deal with the remains of their brazen vendetta against the inevitable.
I like that headcanon! Feels very in line with how the ancients themselves left their problems for a future civilization to solve
This video is so insanely good I wish it was longer.
Welp
Guess my "Ancient" name would be two dwarves one door....
OH MY GOD THE THUMBNAIL IS INCREDIBLE, IS THAT THE CRITIC?
as the guy who put that in, it's amazing to see the artwork, it feels amazing to know my graffiti was used in this video too. Great vid as well.
Also, it's called critic because the pose is from a discord emote of the nostalgia critic. I've seen people calling it pepehands, but the truth is much worse.
I probably should have used my main acct for this comment but oh well
Its file name "sonix - critic" makes SO much more sense now lol
No but it's definitely one of the best graffiti in the game especially when it comes to the ancients so I had to have it as the thumbnail
The fact that it's based off of nostalgia critic is actually so funny LOL
Three kings, Eleven peaks.
One hundred and eighty blenders, thirteen apples.
Great video! The attention to detail, love it! Only spottet one mistake: The slugcats where purpose beings to cleane the insides of pipes.
I hope the passing god that is the youtube algorithm picks this up soon, it is quite sad to see such a good work be left at only 15k views.
By far one of the best story retrospective videos I’ve ever watched
This is the 3rd time I’m rewatching this and it’s just as incredible
I realy love how the community can find so much in a game that leaves everything up to interpretation
I've been thinking about this kind of stuff for months and this is amazing
Personally, I imagined the Ancients being a little bigger with the slug cats being chihuahua sized bc my chihuahua has the size to get into tubes and narrow places when im not looking just like slugcat slides everywhere
Fantastic video. There were only a very few minute details that i think were inexact, but for the overwhelming majority, this is a fantastic interpretation of what happened in the world of rain world. Beautiful editing. Good job
48:45 I think this could be something about moon's gravity disruptiors failing or something. Because when we go see moon. When the cycle ends her gravity disruptiors dont turn back on.
OMG I just made the connection between the 5 virtues of the ancients that they have to embody in order to transcend and the 5 different slugcats in downpour! They each embody one of those as well as what they do in the story.
The theory about the ancients appearance being due to some kind of body modification rituals or genetic modification is cool. I sort of assumed that their art was religious and depicted them with some creative liberties taken to symbolize stuff from their religion. Sorta like Egyptian artwork showing people with animal parts even though we are pretty sure none of the ancient Egyptians looked like that haha
IVE BEEN BLESSED BY THE GODS. A 1 HOUR VIDEO ABOUT RAIN WORLD ANCIENTS?! I AM TRULY THE LUCKIEST PERSON ON THIS PLANET, THANK YOU!!
dawg, im going to watch the fuck out of this video.
I really would like to see what's out there?
More iterators? Maybe living ancients? A massive desert? A gigant tundra? A enormous jungle?? Maybe all of them or none of them
Like the región concepts of dazombes
I haven’t looked at any rainworld ancient lore, this is the first video I saw on it, I must say you did a good job!
Though I would like to share my thoughts on how they looked. I feel like the answer would be the most simplest, as are most things when it comes to debates. They were mostly human, maybe some slight genetic modification as they most definitely had the potential for it. Humans, makes robots in their own self image, why would the ancients not do the same? The iterators are extremely humanoid with no bird like parts to be seen on them, if they were bird like why would they not include these parts? The murals that depict them as more abstract are just that, art of that nature commonly does such to excentuate specific messages. Especially the graffiti. We see that some of their masks can be quite big, perhaps they could have contained technology to keep them warm in the cold temperatures or filter the air from the constant technological advances going on. Bird masks could have been made for coincidental reasons, much like plague doctor masks who used the “beaks” to stuff them full of good smelling flowers when spending time around all those corpses
Idk, just my two cents though :p
The world dies, and then reincarnates.
Great video. The slugcats yes, they are purposed organisms served to clean pipes! You can confirm this by taking the colored pearls from shoreline to Moon (I think it was the Pink one, the one that is above a tower) and she will say that the slugcat served to clean pipes
You got all very neatly covered, an hour long video, I really enjoyed every minute of it, great job man!!. But oh my god, every time i read the echoes dialogue I get very sentimental, Rain World truly is a very precious experience.
This video is a gift to the rain world community. Seriously, this is very, very good. I consider myself well versed in the world of this game, but I still learnt a lot of small details I hadn't realized before this video. Great work! Looking forward to your next works.
excuse me for the second comment but ive just finished the whole video and ENJOYED EVERY SECOND OF IT. I am personally very obsessed with ancients and, MAN, you did as much research as I did, huh? haha! I had no problems with this video at all and i cannot think of anything you could fix, as it is perfect (say for some very specific details that were left out such as the possibility of very few ancients probably still being alive post-global ascension and the fact some ancients possesed pen names that went outside their naming convention. but I'm not disappointed as im already satisfied by the fucking fact youve mentioned the foot binding, naming convention, and other such small details when no other youtuber would!) this is seriously now one of my favorite yt videos of all time and i just cant help but appreciate every single detail in this video from the SPECTACULAR editing, overall structure, and THE FACT THAT ITS AN HOUR LONG TH-cam VIDEO ABOUT ANCIENTS HOLY SHIT I MUST BE DREAMING!!
Youve worked so well on this, you deserve a long rest after this splendidly (but likely exhaustingly) long video. cheers, man!
(btw ive subbed and secretly wish for more despite the pain it might cause for you to create another one of these)
this is an actual masterpiece good job dude
Its a federal crime that this video isnt among the ranks of TH-camrs like dazombes or the like. This video is amazing. A whole hour of documentation on the ancients? I couldn't have asked for anything better
after having actually watched some of the video im here to leave an actual comment
you did a great job making this video. You didnt just read the lore pearls to us or tell us the events/campaigns or whatever but went deeper, telling us about their biology and culture which i dont remember other videos really doing
This is one of if not the best rain world lore video I’ve ever seen! You tell all of the information in such an easy to understand way! Awesome video :)
I have time to watch this
I have a small theory: the game videocult is developing, the one with the hover bikes where you play in the city, i think that's an ancient city, you play as an ancient, i am one karma symbol away from proving it.
Twist: it's the violence karma symbol and they've got a gun~
@@T3sl4 pretty sure it is
GREAT video. surprised to see your number of subscribers and that it's your third ever!!
touch some grass? nah bro farm arrays teached me to never touch grass
This is THE BEST and most exhaustive video on the matter. It really shines light on the thoughts put in the creation of the game's universe, which now makes the game's input ideas make MUCH more sense, compared to otherwise Aaand it makes it much easier to compare that universe to reality. Theory: The fact that ancients didnt purely use the thinking process for development but made biomachinery to decide instead of the ancients themselves really pushed them back and made them realize their collosal mistake, meaning void fluid doesnt actually ascend them, but really just puts them away for the next generation (and not doing what efforts would grant) to try better to ascend for a second time.
Early in the video but I wonder if the Ancients remembered the previous life in the cycle & that’s what caused so much frustration! And the phrase of you waking up from sleep. You have to be aware of yourself as a self even minimally to intellectually recognize that you’ve slept. But if dying is viewed as sleeping and birth as waking, how can you be frustrated if you don’t remember that you fell asleep? Do you recall it? Is it a dream, it dreams?
Now I know that it could be purely philosophical and religious belief-after all there is the belief of reincarnation that exists in our world-but what if wasn’t, and they had proof? How long could or would an individual view as their lifetime as a single entity? Or is there even a concept of birth traditionally for the Ancients, and instead they fall into a sleep and wake in the same body? Is it revived anew or still aged?
Even the masks, the need for safety in obscurity but identity in individuality through masks and body modification? To break ties with an old life within the ‘same’ body? All of these things could have began as practical but evolved as a spiritual importance over the long years of their civilization-they could work for either theory.
Have not watched this video yet, but for being the third video ever on this channel I'm very impressed by the ambition
20:00 Moon explains it poorly. I don't understand physics well. But i get the idea well enough to provide a somewhat decent explanation.
E=mc²
The void fluid, when in a vacuum and with a bit of input energy can perfectly transform every ounce of matter into pure, harvestable energy.
With what im assuming is 100% efficiency, or some other absurd number. And then, multiplied, by the speed of light, squared.
Basically, throw a rock into magic piss, and get back a sizeable portion of the total energy the sun provides the planet.
That might be hyperbole, or maybe I'm underestimating it.
Anyways, the closest thing in comparison, currently known to science.
Is 40% energy efficiency, and that's from crazy black hole physics
holy shit holy shit holy shit im so obsessed with ancients im so glad im seeing this now
"Got touch some grass or something"
I tried, but it just pulled me into the ground and ate me 😔
This video was well explained. Rain world's lore is too deep and complicated but you and your team made it like a good detailed story that everyone can understand. I really appreciate the effort into the video, the editing, the information gathering and etc.
ABSOLUTE MASTERPIECE I WAS SUPPOSED TO BE ASLEEP BUT IT LURED ME IN THE LORE AND MADE ME DECIDE ON GETTING A RAIN WORLD TATTOO
Honestly, the lesson of the ancients is one that a lot more people should learn.
Never thought it is possible to make such a long video on this! Absolutely majestic
I believe it was said somewhere that slugcats were used to clean pipes. 21:19
53:53 My interpretation of Rhinestones Beneath Shattered Glass wasn't that they didn't want to ascend, rather they never shed their want for Survival. To ascend you need to rid yourself of wordly needs and all that.
A couple other echoes mention being drawn to certain places, perhaps having a strong connection to the land is enough to get them stuck
rewatching this for the 3rd time... ive never played rainworld before. the lore is fascinating and the information is presented nicely!
I didn't even get through half of this video before going "alright fine I'll fucking play the game"
Well… good luck, you will need this (at least)
Came back to the video after a day, so glad you’re getting the love you deserve
30:21 that was a siren? I always thought that was like creaking metal or something like that idk
in hindsight it doesn't really sound like creaking metal, but it was my best guess at the time
the way my eyes expanded when i looked at the title and then the video length. I'm so excited
I'm becoming obsessed with rain world lore, thank you for this video
I'm blown away! You've hit on pretty much every lore beat I can think of, plus a couple I hadn't yet put together!
There's really only one point I can think of that I disagree with; and not outright, but more by omission. And to be clear, such a minor critique is hardly an embarrassment, indeed, that it's the only point, should be taken as high praise indeed!
Anyway, the pearl projection in Metropolis -- which I hadn't noticed before either, or at least its background (and thus geographic context) -- I suspect it might've been more as either an attraction to _visit_ (a somewhat treacherous but worthwhile pilgrimage, given the surface conditions at the time), or indeed to experience, as in to take or exchange pearls to view and experience their contents -- it was something of a hallowed library, after all. A _reminder_ to place ones' pearls or other offerings there, certainly works too -- it just seems less likely to me.
On a related note, it's interesting to think what Ancient life might've been like in the later days. The loneliness in public must've been palpable, even as populations dropped say from millions to 100k's; let alone to thousands or less. This would be only mildly offset by exploring that library -- why else to record ones' experience, collected thoughts and words, memories, and possessions, than for others to also experience them? (An egotistical conceit perfectly suited to the Ancients, especially those rich enough to have ascended earlier!) It seems to me, the dynamics of ascension might've been something like -- at least in some cities or subcultures, not necessarily Pebbles' -- take your time, experience the cycles (whatever that means, whether literal as in-game respawning, or any other time-traveling or metaphysically-interwoven loop; procreation might even be included ("progeny") -- though we don't of course know when Nineteen Spaces lived/ascended, aside from after Pebbles' construction), and when you are good and ready, having experienced everything your civilization had ever experienced -- to give up your attachments, whether by sheer force of will, or abject boredom, and finally ascend yourself. At least, that that would be one possible implementation of it, but it would seem in our particular case, the cultural mandate was _much_ stronger, that _everyone_ shall ascend, whether they privately wished to or not; and so we have echoes like Rhinestones. Perhaps shutting down the freight system was done not for efficiency (who was left to care?), but for coercion: without perishables at least, but perhaps without even more critical consumables like any food and drink (not just their preferred brands of Nectar (...or "Pebsi" :) )), the final stragglers had no choice but to ⦻ themselves out, whether they were (psychologically, spiritually) ready to do so or not.
Thanks again for an excellent production!
I still remember how I first stumbled upon Rainworld. Ive watched videos of its content for about 10 hours. The next day I told my sister about it. She told me in return that it sounds like a great story but she didnt like how much of it eluded to suicide and a dieing world. Looking at this I couldnt agree more, as its in there a lot.
3:03 the scratched out faces seem like vandalism, and not part of the original art
I agree!!
this was an amazing in depth look at the ancients! thank you so much! i thought i knew all i could about rain world lore, and this type of video is the type i wish i could make myself. thanks for your effort!!
HOT DAM THIS IS LIKE ONE OF THE GREATEST ESSAYS ON RAINWORLD LORE EXISTING?? Dude good job!!!!
The message in the end was a good touch whaysuqhwa
holy shit i have waited ages for this i am fucking obsessed with these fictional people that wear golden engines on their heads
Been meaning to watch this since release day and finally remembered. This is a great video! Well edited and written. Here's my comment for engagement :)
This video is incredibly well crafted
i just want to drive it home how much we dont actually know about the cycle. while the classic explanation that "its a time loop" make sense on the surface, no actual explanation satisfies the conditions needed for the cycle to make sense in the way that it does. for example, if its a bhudist type deal where you reincarnate as a random creature, you run into the problem of how the heck do the ancients know that the cycle even exists. if its a thing where you die for everyone around you but wake up in an alternate timeline, theres the problem of how did they figure out void fluid ascends you and doesnt just regular kill you. it doesnt help that a lot of texts straight up conflict with eachother. ive personally come to the conclusion that the cycle is so extremely badly defined that its easier to just make up your own headcannon for it to make sense, even if that means retconning a lot of previosly said stuff / adding in completely new parts of the lore.
And then saint came
Amazing video
My theory about appearance of ancients that they weren't one biological species. They could be different biological species connected by the same ideology and so the culture. That can explain their differences in appearance (+ There is a chance that some of them could use body modifications like they did to wild life)