Five Pebbles Fell | The Story of Rain World Downpour in its Entirety

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FULL SPOILERS OBVIOUSLY for Rain World and its Downpour DLC.
Welcome to the Life and Death of Five Pebbles, his Big Sister Looks to the Moon and all the little creatures in-between. Where the lore is ambiguous, artistic license was taken.
This video is the sequel / sibling narrative to my original Rain World lore video, focused on Looks to the Moon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdnoHx1PgJA

Rainworld is the best world and the Downpour DLC expanded it enormously.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/312520/Rain_World/

Timestamps:
0:00 – Five Pebbles Fell
1:18 – Birth of a Fallen God
11:31 – Left Behind in a Broken World
16:53 – To Become a Sliverist
19:11 – A Path to Freedom
26:51 – The Messenger
32:29 – Moonfall
35:34 – The Hunter
38:34 – The Gourmand and other creatures
40:53 – The Downpour
47:54 – The Power of the Moon
52:16 – The Ravages of Time
55:14 – Triple Affirmative
59:49 – The End is the Beginning

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My successful and very handsome website with all my novels and artstuff:
http://www.israelbarbuzano.net

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39 thoughts on “Five Pebbles Fell | The Story of Rain World Downpour in its Entirety”

  5. Slight correction: The reason the ancients wanted to find a new way to ascend without void fluid was probably not because they were scared of becoming echoes. The way Moon describes the echoes implies that knowledge about them was not very widespread among the ancients and iterators, like they were rumors or ghost stories that would scare some ancients away from the void baths, but not all or even most of them. The actual reason for the iterators' construction was because the ancients didn't just want to ascend themselves, they also wanted to help all the other creatures of the world ascend as well. In one of the colored pearls, an ancient describes Five Pebbles as a "Gift of Charity from Us to The World", and Five Pebbles likewise calls himself a gift, the slugcat the recipient, and the long-dead ancients as the noble benefactors. This is why the ancients expected the iterators to continue working on the Great Problem even after they all ascended, the goal was never to ascend the ancients, but to ascend the entire world.

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  17. I always found iterators interesting, wanted to know more about their lore and how they saw the world. More how they worked in the game, and more about the world in general. Just this alone shows alot how iterators think and act in general, metaphors can be taken in a way that is rather helpful, and answers quite a few questions. I'd like to thank you for this. BUT PLEASE KEEP MY FAR FAR FROM SPIDER PEBBLES!

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  25. Okay, so there’s kind of a big error in this video. Ascension is flat-out never actually described as cessation of existence anywhere in RW's lore. The idea that the Ancients were just suicidal and wanted to stop existing is a huge fanon misconception and this video unintentionally helps perpetuate that. Ascension, when it is rarely described, is described as being a state which is "beyond" the constraints and suffering of the cycles. It’s pretty vague but there's an entire rabbit hole of theories. But the idea that Ascension is this "final death" is a pretty surface level interpretation that doesn't have a lot backing it up especially when you consider the vanilla endings.

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  27. I don't think Iterators can die even with heavy damage. As we can see with FP, even with complete collapse caused by energy absence and super cancer, his consciousness and sapience still exists. Iterators are composed of flesh too, and all living things in Rain World is bound to the cycles, and the Iterators are built to withstand the cycles.

    The only things that could have effectively eliminated an iterator's full consciousness is either the Saint, the Void Sea finally chewing it's way towards their minds, or a nigh unfathomable amount of time for entropy to take effect.

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  28. Please look up the correct pronunciation of iterator. Dazzombies pronounces it in the way you do, so you likely got it from him, however you can find him mentioning in multiple videos as being mispronounced.

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  31. this is how i believe mass rarefaction cells work i tried to word it simply but also informatively hope you can understand

    so you create a vacuum, around that vacuum create an energy field (most likely electric due to the view of moons heart) inside the vacuum you have a point of highly purified void fluid (the vacuum is most likely so the void fluid doesnt affect any unwanted stuff), all you have to do is feed base elements into it and due to a broadcast in spearmaster's campaign the elements used are most likely among these Hydrocarbons Sulfur Silicon and Phosphates due to this stream of elements the void fluid somehow creates a sort of 4d equalization (probably due to erosion of the 4d space around these/in these elements) and there is a theory in our world that 4d disturbances/displacement causes gravity so if one say equalized this by eroding away this 4d space it would make sense why it would cause 0G to low G space and as for how it makes energy as says the law of conservation one cannot create or destroy energy/mass it must be converted these energy flux fields must capture the release of energy i mean picture this a 3d piece of wood in a 2d world when you burn this 3d wood it would last significantly longer then a 2d piece of wood now imagine this but for 4d space if you were to convert 3d mass into energy it would yield a good amount of energy but 4d space would have so much more mass per unit of 3d space this void fluid can in theory erode this space that cannot be touched otherwise and can tap into an energy source that for all we know could be thousands of times greater then anything we could achieve otherwise we already know that void fluid can erode other dimensions because moons speaks of the "karmic dimension" clearly referring to what still operates after we die and because we can erode this (hence breaking the cycle) whos to say it cant erode other higher dimensions

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  32. I love the way you've created your own (beautiful, might I add) writing, while still riffing off the in-game dialogue, especially in the ending of the saint section! You've taken what we know and accented it, moving from simply each piece of knowledge in sequence to braiding them together, until you're left with what can only be described as a beautiful freeform poem.
    I'm very impressed. Loved the video.

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  33. Absolutely adored this video, Blargh. I'm very, extremely pleased with the sheer amount of care you put into this video essay. I love Rain World, and I love you too. I will be consuming ALL of your media(s) as long as I am alive.

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  34. And how would the universe of the game change if a Strand of Straw produced a triple confirmation BEFORE global ascension? What would have happened if she and her city had simply disappeared from this reality? And the ancients would have seen it! I became curious about this, and now I want to develop an alternative universe on this issue!

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  35. I live that the godlike beings are only truly erased by the being the embodies true death. They say you die twice, once when you die, twice when you are mentioned for the last time. Loved this video, happy new year!

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  36. I think the single best moment of the game is with Rhinestones Beneath Shattered Glass, the final Echo we meet in the game. Warning, probably very pretentious sounding essay.

    The entire game is following two different philosophies of existence, one being following a path of Ascension/Nirvana which is to stop existing and ascend to a higher plane of being, however sacrificing everything in the process. While the second path is to continue existing through the cycle, suffering, but also being able to actually enjoy life and what it offers, and being able to actually love and care. The base game primarily follows the Ascension path, with basically every character and pearl and Echo either not denying it, or outright agreeing with it. Always saying that the removal of suffering is the only possible way for happiness. The only exception is Moon, who has like… 2 lines relating with how life is beautiful.

    It's only until the final playthrough, Saint, when we finally get the single character who literally, point-for-point, explains the moral of Rain World's story. Rhinestones is the Echo encountered in Undergrowth, which is already significant by itself. Rhinestones questions why the Ancients were so eager to find a way out of the cycle. They say that they didn't want to ascend, nor did they see a reason to. They understood that without negatives, positives aren't positives. They're just -ives. They then say an incredibly important line, that being,
    – "Why did they always search for an escape, as if we were imprisoned?"
    It's an amazing line because it highlights the fact that in reality, they were never truly trapped. They only saw themselves as being trapped. The irony in their views of the cycle is that they only saw it as a curse, and not as a blessing. An infinite amount of time, is an infinite amount of self-improvement. Which is an incredibly important part of self-ascension and achieving Nirvana. Nirvana is literally the truest form of self-acceptance, and the cycle would've been the perfect opportunity to achieve that. Nirvana in reality isn't some sort of physical heaven, but more of a mental state. And most of the Ancients couldn't see that, with only few exceptions like Rhinestones.

    They then go to describe existence and life as a "gift," which is amazing. Because they're entirely right about that. Regardless of what one believes, the opportunity to exist is a gift that many don't get, and some are unlucky to not have. What's important is that this is only really something many people realize when they're about to forsake that gift. That's the entire concept of the episode, "A View from Halfway Down." It's based on a real story of someone who survived jumping off a bridge, hence the title. According to an interview, it was only when they were falling that they saw their problems in a different light, not as insurmountable odds, but as much smaller things compared to the situation they found themselves in. Because death is generally a much bigger issue than most things, especially when you're faced by it. That's exactly why the fact that Rhinestones describes life as a "gift" is so important. They've truly realized that life is an opportunity that shouldn't be wasted. Which is the exact opposite many Ancients saw it as. They saw it as something they were trapped in, and not as something to be cherished. They only saw the negatives, but rarely the positives. And then Rhinestones says a great line. "This moment, right here! It is where we are meant to be." At first glance, it's arbitrary. They're just saying that they regret ascending, but that's exactly the thing. This line is essentially them saying that they would prefer the ups and downs of existence, over Ascension. They have, in essence, achieved their own form of Nirvana, having accepted that life is about suffering, but that that's exactly what makes the positives so much better.

    However, I skipped over the single most important line in the game. It's their second line, and they say, quote,
    – "Beauty continuing to bloom even in a place long forgotten."
    This is exactly why Undergrowth is the single best area in the game. It literally represents life itself. Because life is literally a cycle. Life blooms from death. And death gives to life. Undergrowth is literally a massive jungle growing from the dead civilization of the Ancients. An entire ecosystem of life growing from a civilization that basically hated loops. It's only Rhinestones, the final Echo we meet, who realizes this at the very end of the story. That's the tragic irony of the Ancients. They were so blinded by their hatred of life, that they never stopped to smell the roses. And Undergrowth has plenty of them.

    This is why Rhinestones is possibly my favourite character in any game. Because they aren't just a character. They represent the literal moral of the entire story of the game. Rain World is explicitly a game about suffering, from the story, to the gameplay. The player literally has to suffer through the difficulty of the game, to truly enjoy the game. That's why Rhinestones, and Pebbles and Moons' stories are so good. They are both stories built on suffering, and the acceptance of it. Both stories are founded on suffering, but both of the characters learn to push past it and grow. They learn to push their happiness past the suffering, and in turn, see existence in a different light. Pebbles learns that he doesn't have to suffer alone. Rhinestones learns that suffering is exactly why the happy moments are so cathartic. That's why I love Rhinestones and Pebbles so much as characters. They represent the fundamental concepts of the games they're in.

    What's amazing is that the entire moral is built on a nihilistic view, but ends up optimistic in the end. It isn't about accepting suffering, but learning to move past it and focus on the happy moments that come from it. That's why Rain World is literally the best suffering simulator. So in conclusion, Monk is the best scug. Thank you.

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  38. In my interpretation, it is old to think that the acension is a permanent morye, I think that bad as a passage to an afterlife, but my greatest prosthesis is that the sea of ​​emptiness is not just a water that acendend another creator of worlds and destroyer, just like the eternal cycle, an experiment made by someone to understand death

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