Minecraft Death Edits

About

Minecraft Death Edits refer to video edits which incorporate death screen and/or pre-release damage sound from 2011 video game Minecraft. With the earliest edits dating back to 2017, the format rose in popularity on Instagram and YouTube through 2018, commonly used as a punchline for fail videos.

Origin

Before the release of the 1.0.0 version of Minecraft on November 18th, 2011, in the beta version of the game the player would emit "Ooh!" sound upon taking damage (soundbite available below). As the original soundbite suggested that the player was male, it was removed in the release version in order to keep the game gender-neutral.^[1]

Upon taking fatal damage in the game, the player would see a death screen showing their score and offering to either respawn or return to the title screen (examples shown below).

Spread

Starting 2017, remixes utilizing the old death sound from the Minecraft, game UI, death screen and "Calm 1"^[2] composition gained popularity on Instagram and YouTube. On July 10th, 2017, YouTuber^[3] nihonium posted the earliest known edit using the pre-release Minecraft damage soundbite. The video gained over 1,000 views in 18 months. On July 11th, nihonium posted another video based on the format, which gained over 6,000 views in the same period.

On May 20th, 2018, Instagram^[4] user bltw.mp4 posted the earliest known edit featuring Minecraft UI and death screen in addition to the soundbite. The post gained over 250,000 views in nine months.

Starting December 2nd, 2018, multiple versions of the meme were posted by YouTube channel The House of the Dank (examples shown below).^[5]

On January 29th, 2019, YouTube channel IsDARC_975YTb posted a compilation of Minecraft memes, featuring numerous versions of "Minecraft Death" edits made by Instagram and YouTube creators.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References