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Minecraft IRL: bridging the gap between worlds

Minecraft_IRL_ArchaeopteryxAlex

The term “Minecraft IRL” has been used in all sorts of contexts over the years, including for elaborate in-public cosplaying or examples of real-life behaviour that mirrors the game, but lately it’s become more and more associated with a particular kind of image manipulation. Lately, and particularly on reddit, Minecraft IRL has come to stand for photoshops that suggest the world of Minecraft sometimes exists just beyond our own. Here’s a few of the most popular posted on r/Minecraft/ in just the last 24 hours, representing only a few of the many, many images out there.


Many of the images are subtle, such as this one by NemisisX31, and they often depict Minecraft as something that’s just behind the next wall, through the next doorway or, very often…

…found beneath our feet, as suggested here by sanime, or even hidden inside many of the things we’ve come to take for granted…

…as seems to be the case with yellowram’s laptop. But it doesn’t just have to be about doorways into another world, it can also be about Minecraft subtly changing the world we already know…

…which seems to have already happened with jt663’s goldfish bowl. Credit must also go to st112570, who imagined things the other way around…

…so it turns out that this connection works both ways. Final credit has to go to enchilado for a very special image, with the suggestion that this is “what Minecraft IRL would really look like.” This one is fantastic and much more subtle than you might first think.

All too true.