Xaryu Reacts to NEW YORK CITY Rebuild in Minecraft

[00:00] We spent five years building New York

[00:02] City in Minecraft, guys. As a new

[00:05] Minecraft player, this is like like five

[00:08] years.

[00:10] What? For the past 1,000 days, my team

[00:13] and I have been recreating New York City

[00:15] into Minecraft at a 1:1 scale. Now,

[00:17] after 5 years, we built more than 50,000

[00:20] buildings and already [music] fully

[00:21] finished the huge amount of districts in

[00:23] Manhattan. Every single building is

[00:25] being recreated from real life with

[00:26] insane amount of precision, details, and

[00:28] secrets for you to explore with your

[00:30] friends. All in a massive world spanning

[00:32] across 700 km. Today, we are exploring

[00:35] what's been built by the team over the

[00:37] past 5 years. Many sleepless nights and

[00:40] hundreds of hours went into this video

[00:42] alone. Get ready for the most extreme

[00:44] progress update on this channel so far.

[00:47] So, lean back. Okay, so is this like

[00:49] Google Earth and they're like zooming in

[00:51] on each building? Um, like quickly, just

[00:54] cuz I don't know this, I've only played

[00:55] hardcore Minecraft so far. They didn't

[00:58] farm all these mats, right? They're

[00:59] playing in some mode where they have

[01:00] infinite blocks. I hope probably, right?

[01:06] And creative mode. Okay. So, they can

[01:09] build whatever they want. They have

[01:10] infinite blocks. And then they're like

[01:12] onetoone mapping it through Google Maps

[01:15] or Earth or whatever.

[01:16] >> Take a coffee and enjoy a tour through

[01:18] the history of building New York City in

[01:20] Minecraft. [music]

[01:23] Okay,

[01:26] dude. The amount I mean just the time 5

[01:29] years.

[01:32] Okay, so how do you get started? 5

[01:36] years. That's quite a lot of time.

[01:38] >> Yeah,

[01:38] >> basically it all started in 2020 when

[01:41] the entire world shut down.

[01:44] >> Oh,

[01:46] co

[01:48] suddenly

[01:48] >> CO hits. They have in like it's like all

[01:50] right, we're trapped inside. Let's

[01:51] rebuild New York City within Minecraft

[01:53] then. I mean, that makes sense. That

[01:54] makes sense.

[01:55] >> From one day to another, all of us were

[01:57] stuck at home with nothing to do. As bad

[02:00] as this pandemic was, Build the Earth

[02:02] probably wouldn't exist without it.

[02:04] That's when a YouTuber named Pitman FTS

[02:06] dropped a video that changed everything.

[02:08] >> One day, a one:1 scale model of the

[02:10] Earth with all our humanmade structures

[02:13] will be completed. But I don't want to

[02:16] stand alone in this project. That's why

[02:18] I'm calling for all mcrafter around the

[02:21] world, skilled builders and

[02:23] organizations to join in on this effort.

[02:26] Start their own planet Earth map, pick a

[02:28] large city or territory of their own,

[02:30] and work on creating it onetoone scale

[02:34] just as it stands today. Bro, wait.

[02:36] They're going to So, they did New York,

[02:38] but they're going to do the whole world

[02:40] and then put it all together. Bro, that

[02:42] would be Bro, imagine you download an

[02:45] Earth Minecraft map and you have the

[02:47] entire Earth to ex No. No way. And yeah,

[02:51] so we did. Our team chose New York City.

[02:55] Afterwards, we prepared everything

[02:56] needed to start something as insane as

[02:58] this. How we pulled it off and all the

[03:01] technical challenges along the way would

[03:03] take a full video on its own. For now,

[03:05] let's just say somehow we managed to get

[03:08] started. [music] The first area that

[03:10] everyone wanted to work on was the World

[03:12] Trade Center District for obvious

[03:14] reasons. We all were hyped, but there

[03:16] was one issue. None of us had much

[03:18] building experience, especially not for

[03:20] this kind of building. Recreating an

[03:22] entire city at a one:1 scale was never

[03:25] really attempted before, and [music]

[03:27] there were no tutorials or guidelines

[03:29] online that you could just watch and

[03:30] learn from. So, we just started and had

[03:33] huge building sessions every day with 50

[03:36] to 80 builders working on

[03:37] >> I was literally just going to ask how

[03:40] many of them was it? And then he read my

[03:41] mind and answered it in real time on a

[03:44] YouTube video that was recorded years

[03:45] ago.

[03:47] >> One area at the same time.

[03:48] >> It was complete chaos, but also super

[03:51] fun to make that much progress in just a

[03:53] few hours. The learning curve was brutal

[03:56] and we made so many mistakes. [music]

[03:58] Honestly, most of that early work

[04:00] doesn't even exist anymore. We've

[04:02] already rebuilt most of it multiple

[04:04] times. For example, here's what it looks

[04:06] like in 2020. And here's the version

[04:09] from 2024. See [music] the difference?

[04:11] Over the years, we realized how much

[04:13] details matter. Like when a random guy

[04:16] from New York City logs in and finds his

[04:19] flower pot on his balcony exactly where

[04:21] it is in real life, that's when you know

[04:23] it's worth it. Their reactions are

[04:25] always priceless.

[04:26] >> Yeah.

[04:27] >> Okay. So, here's an overview of

[04:29] Manhattan Island with all of its

[04:30] districts. Each one of them has its own

[04:33] story. And in this video, I want to show

[04:35] you how all these districts came

[04:36] together over the years. As mentioned

[04:38] before, we started with the World Trade

[04:40] Center District, but it's tiny compared

[04:42] to Tribeca, which is right next to it.

[04:44] It literally took years to finish

[04:46] Tribeca completely. So, let me show you

[04:48] a time-lapse of its creation process to

[04:50] give you an idea of how much work went

[04:52] into this.

[04:53] >> Times 5,000 speed. by the way,

[04:55] >> one district. [music] Same as the

[04:57] Memorial area. This wasn't built in one

[04:59] go. For nearly 2 years, it was 99%

[05:02] complete simply because we kept finding

[05:04] new things to improve and more details

[05:06] to fix. Many parts of the district were

[05:08] rebuilt over and over again just because

[05:11] they became outdated over time and

[05:13] didn't meet our standards. Now,

[05:15] >> another huge challenge we faced,

[05:17] especially during the creation of

[05:18] Tribeca, was our ongoing elevation

[05:21] problem. See, after Pippen's first build

[05:23] the earth video went viral with over 60

[05:25] million views, all this code was just

[05:27] flooded with thousands of people who all

[05:29] wanted to help build New York City. This

[05:31] meant we had to start fast. And once we

[05:34] helped to solve the projection problem,

[05:35] we began building within a week. But

[05:38] >> projection build the earth.

[05:41] >> Since we had to set up everything so

[05:43] fast, our first version of the New York

[05:45] City map didn't include any elevation

[05:47] data at all. Everything was just flat.

[05:50] In my first video from 2020, you can see

[05:52] that these headlight image was just

[05:54] printed in a flat world with staked

[05:56] building shells on top. At first, this

[05:58] wasn't a huge problem at all since

[06:00] Manhattan is mostly flat anyway. But we

[06:03] knew that eventually we'd need to

[06:05] migrate all our buildings to a new map,

[06:07] and the more we built, the harder this

[06:09] house would obviously become. And

[06:11] getting high quality elevation data was

[06:13] another headache.

[06:14] >> That's annoying.

[06:14] >> Because Manhattan is so densely packed

[06:16] with buildings, it's nearly impossible

[06:18] to capture. I mean, this would be a lot

[06:19] easier if the earth was flat. Like,

[06:23] unless it is like, you know what I'm

[06:24] like, if if the earth was flat, this it

[06:26] would be easier to build Minecraft that

[06:28] way. [sighs]

[06:31] Accurate ground elevation data for the

[06:34] entire island. In the end, the best

[06:36] approach was to manually apply elevation

[06:38] in lower Manhattan using World Edit

[06:40] while using high precision lighter data

[06:42] for the rest. [music] Special thanks to

[06:44] Leax for spending hundreds of hours to

[06:47] manually adjust the elevation on

[06:48] Manhattan Island. This was a crazy task

[06:51] and in my eyes, he did a perfect job.

[06:53] [music] Finally, in June 2022, we

[06:55] released version two of New York City.

[06:57] Now, imagine one day they finished this

[07:00] and these guys this guy has like a like

[07:02] a a great grandchild and he's asking him

[07:05] like, "What did you do in your lifetime,

[07:07] great granddad?" And then he's like, I

[07:09] rebuilt Earth

[07:12] in Minecraft.

[07:15] Like just just imagine that for a sec.

[07:17] >> Featuring proper elevation across the

[07:19] entire map.

[07:20] >> But enough about elevation. Let's get

[07:22] back to Tribeca. As you can see in the

[07:24] time lapse, this district is massive. It

[07:27] spans 81 city blocks and contains over

[07:29] 850 [music] buildings. We tried to build

[07:31] all of them as detailed as possible. And

[07:34] eventually after countless revisions,

[07:36] Tribeca came together beautifully. It's

[07:38] now one of the most complex and detailed

[07:40] zones in the entire map and one we

[07:42] incredibly proud of. But Tribeca isn't

[07:44] the only district, of course. Just in

[07:46] lower Manhattan, we already fully

[07:48] completed 14 more districts. [music]

[07:50] Unfortunately, I can't show you every

[07:52] district today in that much detail.

[07:54] Otherwise, this video would probably be

[07:55] hours long.

[07:56] >> Maybe in future videos, we'll take a

[07:58] deeper dive into the history behind some

[08:00] of them.

[08:00] >> [music]

[08:00] >> For now, let's just take a quick look at

[08:02] each district one by one so you can see

[08:05] how the city evolved over the years.

[08:07] After finishing Tribeca, we moved on to

[08:09] the Two Bridges District, home to the

[08:11] Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridge. We put so

[08:13] much effort into the bridges because

[08:15] they are so famous and iconic. First, we

[08:17] studied its architectural drawings to

[08:19] get everything right, obsessing over

[08:21] every detail, from textures to the angle

[08:24] of every single beam. We just wanted to

[08:26] make it perfect. If you ever spot a

[08:28] mistake, please don't tell the builders,

[08:30] otherwise they'll instantly want to

[08:31] rebuild the whole thing. The rest of the

[08:34] district was finished in 2021, [music]

[08:36] and it's been evolving ever since. A

[08:38] year into the project, we are making

[08:40] tons of progress all over the city, but

[08:42] the grant never stopped. For months, we

[08:44] made one big session after another,

[08:46] building landmarks all over the city,

[08:48] like Times Square with its massive

[08:50] amount of billboards, or the Flat Iron

[08:52] District in Midtown Manhattan with its

[08:54] beautiful Medicine Square Park. At the

[08:56] same time, we also continued to build in

[08:58] lower Manhattan. The first area we

[09:00] concentrated on was Little Italy, a

[09:02] compact neighborhood defined by narrow

[09:04] streets, cozy restaurants, and a

[09:06] character that immediately stood out to

[09:08] me. It's a small district, but it feels

[09:11] completely different from the rest of

[09:12] lower Manhattan. Almost like stepping

[09:14] into another city within the city. Right

[09:17] next door is Chinatown, over three times

[09:19] the size, but completed in the same

[09:21] amount of time thanks to more routined

[09:22] and efficient teamwork.

[09:24] >> That's crazy. This early district still

[09:26] holds some personal touches from the

[09:27] builders, like a Chinese New Year parade

[09:29] that was placed right in the middle of

[09:31] Chinatown. To bring all the areas

[09:33] together, we hosted a 48 hour build

[09:36] event to complete the civic center this

[09:37] morning and combine all districts into

[09:40] one massive completed area. It was a

[09:43] huge success and I still remember I was

[09:46] quite exhausted after this because I

[09:48] live streamed a big portion of it. But

[09:50] we made so much progress in this event

[09:52] alone, it was crazy.

[09:54] after grinding through man.

[09:56] >> I don't know about you guys, but what I

[09:57] want to see is the building process.

[09:59] Like what are they looking at to then

[10:02] replicate and like how does it look to

[10:03] actually like how quick can you actually

[10:05] just like see something and then rebuild

[10:07] it? I like I want to see how that works,

[10:09] right?

[10:10] >> Skyscrapers for months. We needed a

[10:12] break and we wanted to try out something

[10:14] different because actually most of New

[10:16] York City isn't just skyscrapers. It's

[10:18] neighborhoods and a huge part of the

[10:20] city's soul lives in Brooklyn and

[10:22] Queens. While we were busy polishing

[10:25] lower Manhattan, tens of thousands of

[10:27] buildings were popping up in the outer

[10:28] burrows, made possible by our building

[10:30] system that lets the entire community

[10:32] work on the city in parallel. The core

[10:35] idea has always been that anyone can

[10:37] join a project and start building

[10:39] immediately. What stops griefers from

[10:41] just griefing?

[10:43] >> Like, you know what I mean? If it's open

[10:45] to the community and anyone can start

[10:47] helping, what if someone just went in

[10:48] and just started burning everything to

[10:50] the ground? Are you kidding me?

[10:52] admins. But like what if someone just

[10:55] deletes like half of it before the admin

[10:57] got to them? Maybe there's something

[10:58] where like you can only delete one block

[11:00] every

[11:02] 10 seconds or I don't I don't know. And

[11:05] there's like backups, too. Oh, you can

[11:08] make certain things unbreakable. So once

[11:09] a part's finished, you just like safe

[11:11] zone it. Uh so there's Okay, there's

[11:14] probably ways, bro. I'm just thinking

[11:16] like dude, what if someone gets in there

[11:17] and they they burn the thing to the

[11:19] ground? much prior knowledge. Just

[11:21] launch Minecraft, go to

[11:22] nyc.buildoff.net,

[11:25] join the building server, and boom,

[11:26] you're put in front of a real New York

[11:28] building that you can now work on. New

[11:30] players usually start with residential

[11:32] homes in Brooklyn.

[11:34] >> Oh, this is how so they just build it

[11:36] and then they copy paste it to the

[11:38] actual world. But if you're building it,

[11:40] you're like isolated.

[11:43] They thought this through Queens.

[11:46] simple, iconic, and great for learning,

[11:48] especially if you don't have much

[11:49] building experience or never recreated a

[11:51] structure at a 1:1 scale in Minecraft

[11:53] before. As you level up, you unlock more

[11:55] complex structures like multi-story

[11:57] apartments, town houses, and eventually

[12:00] even skyscrapers. Once all buildings in

[12:02] the neighborhood are done, our advanced

[12:04] team steps in to finish the area, adding

[12:07] roads trees sidewalks lights and

[12:10] more. Only when everything is fully

[12:12] completed and perfectly detailed

[12:14] district is marked complete on our

[12:16] >> someone in the chat says go on their

[12:17] Zar. Bro, have you seen me try to build

[12:19] a house? I put like four doors in and

[12:21] they're like hitting each other and like

[12:22] it's like the wrong dimensions. It's

[12:24] it's bad, man. I need some more

[12:26] experience. Okay, progress website. On

[12:29] Manhattan's west side is Battery Park

[12:31] City, a modern mix of luxury to peaceful

[12:34] green spaces. Our builders took their

[12:36] time capturing its clean, modern wipe.

[12:38] We hosted another 48 hour build event to

[12:41] complete Battery Park, the one at the

[12:43] south of Manhattan Island. From there,

[12:45] you can see the Statue of Liberty, which

[12:47] we built during a Mr. Beast challenge,

[12:49] competing for an $8,000 trip to New York

[12:51] City. By the way, congrats to John Andre

[12:54] for winning the trip. You really

[12:56] deserved it, man. Battery Park is the

[12:58] largest park we finished so far, soon to

[13:00] be dominated by Central Park, which uh

[13:02] we haven't started yet.

[13:04] >> Oh my goodness. This financial district

[13:06] is the last one in this area that is

[13:07] still under construction. Most

[13:09] skyscrapers of lower Manhattan are

[13:11] located here. So, we are taking extra

[13:13] care to get every one of them just

[13:15] right. But nearby, the tiny seapot

[13:18] district was finished back in 2022. With

[13:20] that, we've now completed almost all of

[13:22] South Manhattan. Just north is the Soho

[13:25] district, finished in 2021. Known for

[13:28] its artistic wipe and cast iron

[13:30] buildings, Soho really changed how we

[13:32] worked. Instead of group builds, each

[13:35] builder now took full responsibility for

[13:36] an entire block, which somehow brought

[13:39] some sort of consistency and style

[13:41] across the entire district. The result

[13:43] is a detailed, stylish district, and

[13:45] it's just cool to rock through it and do

[13:47] some exploration.

[13:49] With Soho done, we moved on to its

[13:51] neighbors, Bowery, Nolita, and Nohoo.

[13:54] These areas might not have skyscrapers,

[13:56] but they are full of personality. old

[13:59] tenementss, boutique shops, narrow

[14:00] streets, and yeah, we recreated each

[14:03] district carefully to preserve its

[14:05] unique blend of history and culture.

[14:08] >> Together, they stitched the final pieces

[14:10] of Lower Manhattan into one seamless,

[14:12] fully connected, finished world. After

[14:15] all these years, this world has turned

[14:16] into one of the largest 1:1 recreations

[14:19] ever created in Minecraft, and you can

[14:21] literally explore it for hours and

[14:23] hours. We also wanted to make this

[14:25] >> when he says one one to one and someone

[14:27] in the chat asked this question too a

[14:29] second ago is like how many feet one

[14:32] block is or yards or whatever like is it

[14:37] based off the height of the Minecraft

[14:38] character and they like translated it

[14:40] perfectly so it's actually a true one to

[14:41] one in terms of like the height of a

[14:43] person. I mean there's some people that

[14:45] are taller than others like I I'm I'm

[14:48] tall for a Mexican. I'm like 58 almost

[14:51] 5'9. the average height's more like like

[14:53] in the 5'7 for a Mexican-American male.

[14:56] Um, but that's not the point. The point

[14:58] is I wonder what the scaling is.

[15:00] >> World available to you guys. You can

[15:02] download and explore it together with

[15:04] your friends or do other creator stuff

[15:06] with it. That's why we just released a

[15:08] new map on our ability of Patreon called

[15:10] BTE New York City version 3, which is

[15:13] available both for Java and Bedrock

[15:15] Edition on the latest Minecraft version

[15:16] for you to download. The map lets you

[15:19] teleport to all the lower Manhattan

[15:20] districts that were covered in this

[15:22] video and contains many Easter eggs

[15:24] which are waiting for you to find.

[15:26] >> We tried our best to optimize the world

[15:28] to perform as smooth as possible even on

[15:30] low-end PCs and other devices like

[15:32] smartphones or conscious.

[15:35] >> If you are impressed by all the work

[15:36] we've put into the map for the past 5

[15:38] years and want to support the project

[15:40] moving forward, make sure to check out

[15:42] the download link in the description and

[15:44] visit our Patreon. Of course, there's so

[15:47] much more ongoing progress across the

[15:49] city, but that's a story for another

[15:51] video. Hopefully, this gave you a solid

[15:53] look at how Low Manhattan came together

[15:55] over the years and just how much effort

[15:57] it's taken to get this far.

[15:59] >> Oh, yeah.

[15:59] >> In future videos, we'll dive into other

[16:02] parts of the city and show you what the

[16:04] builders are working on right now. We've

[16:06] already spent so much time on.

[16:08] >> I wonder if they have this statistic for

[16:11] manh hours.

[16:14] Like, there's like Okay. Yeah, 50,000

[16:16] hours fast forwarded, whatever. But like

[16:19] each person is working on one building

[16:22] at a time and there's hundreds maybe

[16:24] thousands of people working on it as a

[16:26] community. I wonder if they if they have

[16:28] it logged like how many hours each

[16:30] person spent and aggregate it. That

[16:32] would be really interesting.

[16:33] >> This project and I'm definitely not

[16:34] stopping now. So we'll have to continue

[16:36] for a few more years until one day it's

[16:39] all finished. But we need your help. If

[16:42] you want to be part of it, jump on the

[16:44] server or support our work on the

[16:46] Patreon at patreon.com/buthe

[16:49] is just one city. But in build the

[16:51] earth, we are not just building New York

[16:52] City. We are building the entire world.

[16:55] And there's over 40 other teams out

[16:56] there helping to build every single

[16:58] country on Earth. Hability of Patreon.

[17:01] >> Do you guys think this project ever

[17:03] concludes

[17:06] that build the earth.net net. Like

[17:08] there's a bunch of different people

[17:09] trying to build like I I don't know. No,

[17:13] no, no, no. Does anyone believe? Yes.

[17:15] Yes. No. No. Like maybe Oh, yeah. Maybe

[17:19] with AI. If you get a AI on it. Bro,

[17:22] this is this project is just so massive.

[17:25] Um, a lot of people in the chat, uh,

[17:27] we're not talking

[17:28] >> every single country on Earth. Rhdy of

[17:30] Patreon also does not only include this

[17:32] map, of course. It also contains

[17:34] hundreds of other buildings and maps

[17:36] from across the globe as well. So, if

[17:38] you're curious, go check it out. But

[17:40] that's it [music] for now. If you like

[17:42] the video, make sure to give it a like

[17:44] and let me know which other parts of the

[17:46] city you want to see next. Thanks for

[17:48] watching and I'll see you in the next

[17:50] one. Cheers.

[17:54] Okay, that I mean that's as mind-blowing

[17:56] as the title of the video makes it seem.

[17:58] A lot of people in the chat were asking

[18:00] for the video link. Let me link it for

[18:02] you guys. And if you guys Yeah. want to

[18:05] check out the video link has like the to

[18:07] download and the Patreon and everything

[18:08] like that. That's crazy, guys. That that

[18:10] is I mean absolutely wild.