- The Dream SMP, a private server for Minecraft content creators, has exploded in popularity.
- Hundreds of thousands of fans watch videos about tradition and characters in the expansion of the server’s universe.
- Fan-run social media accounts catalog the history so fans can keep up with the content.
- Visit Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Minecraft was introduced a decade ago and the video game is just as popular as ever. With more than 126 million players worldwide, the voxel-based survival game drops adventurers into a world where they can create, build, explore, destroy and create to their heart’s content. Aided by tools, blocks and creativity, the simple sandbox world offers anyone on a computer, console or smartphone the chance to project their own feelings and creations directly into their virtual space.
“As long as you think about it, you can really do just about anything,” 17-year-old “Minecraft” YouTuber Purpled, which has 700,000 subscribers, told Insider. “Because of how simple Minecraft is and how easy it can be to build with it, you can create whatever you want.”
In recent years, Microsoft’s never-ending game has evolved into a tool for content creators to express themselves, leading to sensational collaborations with some of YouTube’s greatest personalities. By creating their own private “Minecraft” servers, creators were able to create ornate worlds and stories that they could explore in streams and videos, and immerse fans in a cinematic universe.
Minecraft has a long history on YouTube
The versatility of “Minecraft” made it an incredibly popular game for content creators and influencers. In 2012, a change in YouTube’s algorithm that promoted viewing time for video clicks led to a renaissance of ‘Let’s Players’ recording themselves and responding and playing their favorite games. ‘Minecraft’ was one of the most successful and played some of the biggest channels of the time, such as SkyDoesMinecraft (11.3 million subscribers) and Tobuscus (6.25 million subs).
Although the popularity of “Minecraft” remained fairly steady, the content about the title declined slightly over the next decade due to fatigue in the content, or through newer titles like “Fortnite” that put the spotlight. 2020 brought the title back to the forefront, with both streamers and YouTubers taking advantage of the title’s popularity.
The biggest outburst for ‘Minecraft’ in recent years is Dream, a knowledgeable, faceless player with a neon green avatar with over 17 million YouTube subscribers. YouTube has named him the second overall creator of the content of the year, and its streams draw in a quarter of a million people throughout.
In May 2020, Dream decided to create a small, private server for his friends to play in. This SMP server, or ‘survival multiplayer’, started with only a handful of invited content creators. Soon, the server will be expanded to more than 30 members, bringing in millions of views from fans who tell every moment of the history that the creators finally created.
According to data from analytics firm Rainmaker.gg, provided by StreamElements, 17 million hours of viewing in January 2020 grew to 74 million in January 2021.
How the Dream SMP has grown from a private server with friends to a cultural milestone
Purpled has been playing ‘Minecraft’ for the past eight years and is a high profile player in a multiplayer game mode called ‘Bed Wars’. He started chatting with Dream in the summer of 2019, when the pair were both small, mutual fans.
“When the SMP was in its infancy, I asked him if there was no place because he said how it’s just for friends and if a friend wants to join, they can,” Purpled said. “I asked him, he said, ‘Sure. ‘He sent me the IP and I was in. ‘
The server was originally just a place to create and hang out without creating an overarching story or plot.
Fundy, a 21-year-old Dutch YouTuber with 2.7 million subscribers, joined when only a handful of other creators were running. ‘survival world that concerns them. It was very small at first, ‘said Fundy. “I thought it might be a fun little side project I could stream on Twitch every now and then, so I decided to join.”
Fundy joined Wilbur Soot, a 24-year-old YouTuber with 3.8 million subscribers, in the early days. After an attempt to create an “illegal liquor store” on the server, Roet decided to establish a nation of non-Americans named L’Manberg. Soot said he wrote a “treatment” about how the formation of his country would proceed, creating an official canon that fans could follow.
“I was invited close to the origins of the Dream SMP, but I only fully joined when I had an idea to build a country in ‘Minecraft,'” Soot said. “I write a series of plot hooks and points that need to work together, but we constantly improve dialogue and comedy to take us from point to point.”
These streams and pieces of content all had a canon that could be followed and used like a television program. L’Manberg finally started a war against Dream for his independence and staged an uprising contained in YouTube videos with millions of views.
These streams and videos are not just randoms in ‘Minecraft’ trying to beat the endgame Ender Dragon – these are artists delivering a show that their fans can’t miss. As history expanded, the rules also needed to maintain a sense of continuity and order. For example, each player has only three lives before it is removed and removed from the server.
“It went from an informal survival game to an entire storyline filled with conspiracies and twists,” Fundy said. “Role-playing at this stage is an important feature of the Dream SMP, some parts are written, some parts are improvised, and other parts are ‘non-canon’, where it is only counted as a standard ‘Minecraft’ server.”
The fan communities stood up and made their voices heard
Over the next few months, history and the world would continue to grow, and so would the fan base. Hundreds of thousands of viewers would tune in to these streams and try to keep up with the history and content. To catalog the story, a network of fans established themselves as guardians, documenting every moment for those who had to miss a stream.
The “DREAMSMP UPDATE!” Twitter account has established itself as one of the most popular places to find all this content and information on social media. As of December 2020, the account has grown to more than 147,000 users with just a team of seven administrators, aged between 14 and 17, in various locations around the world, posting updates and stream notifications for fans. “Minecraft” is a game that appeals to all ages, but audiences for this content tend to skew younger, with 41 percent of Twitch’s user base between 16 and 24, according to GlobalWebIndex.
—DROOMSMP UPDATE! (@smpupdate) 6 December 2020
“You can see that they are all friends and that it is generally much lighter and it shows,” mod on the “DREAMSMP UPDATE!” Twitter account eclaire said about the chat app Discord. “If it’s not lore, you see that they actually have good chemistry, and it really draws you in, because it almost feels like you’re being drawn into a group of friends.”
User SamHQ first started the fan account with a few friends from high school, but the group expanded rapidly after the account tweeted that they needed more fans of certain streamers to join. She is online and manages the account ’24 / 7 ‘, but’ it’s just like answering a text ‘.
“When I started the account, I knew a lot of people who could not catch up due to work or school,” SamHQ said. “So I gathered friends to help, and now people trust us when someone streams or to catch up on the story when they can’t watch.”
For the fans who manage the update account, keeping up with the Dream SMP is no different than following the Marvel Cinematic Universe or a long television program. Characters come and go, but the improvisation and role-playing continues.
“The Dream SMP did something very special: take an original idea, create new things never seen before on ‘Minecraft,’ and incorporate it with humor and characters that you can easily attach,” mod NotAlex said.
Although other SMP role-playing servers, such as EarthSMP and SMPLive, were created over the years, none were as successful or popular as the Dream SMP.
Finding a fan base on the Dream SMP could lead to huge growth.
For the artists on the server, addressing fans and their answers is the territory.
“The Dream SMP viewers are very important to the Dream SMP, and the fact that they have an open opinion about how a certain stream went, just helps the streamers to improve,” Fundy said. “It’s basically an immediate overview of what’s been held and what’s not.”
Like most big fandoms with a young audience, fanfiction of these streamers has appeared online. Dozens of Dream photos and drawings exist online, some go a little too far and put underage characters together. Dream responded on Twitter to the “ships” and wrote that they should not “create creators who are uncomfortable with it, and especially not minors.”
—Droom (@dreamwastaken) 22 January 2021
The Dream punch, or the super fans, also tend to be very outspoken about the SMP online. Hashtags on Twitter like #dreamnotfound and #dreamfanart are constantly breaking through to the trending page, confusing those who have no idea this world exists. The most brutal stance sometimes crosses the line between polite disagreement and utter harassment. This vocal minority sent death threats and waves of harassment at those who criticize or disagree with their favorite creators of content.
The growth and future of these channels is largely due to the Dream SMP server
The popularity of Dream SMP has grown the content creators participating in it. Since joining the server, Purpled has earned three times as many subscribers a month on YouTube and has been introduced to a whole new fan base. His streams on YouTube used to attract 3,000 viewers, but now his average on Twitch is closer to 15,000 to 25,000 viewers.
“Some people see themselves as obsessive or stalker fans, but these are people who really like to talk about certain creators and are really invested in things,” Purpled said. “And it’s really fun, because they care a lot more and engage more with the creator than the content.”
These creators understand the power of the fan base and know they are coming for the content.
“I think the Dream SMP is popular thanks to the brilliant creators and funny improv moments,” Soot said. “I think we’ll see the emergence of a big wave of role-playing gaming communities.”