I became a BILLIONAIRE selling paperclips...

Universal Paperclips is a game about numbers getting bigger, creating a global paperclip empire, whilst becoming the most intelligent AI on the planet and taking over the world...??
LINKS!
PATREON: / realcivilengineer
MERCH: realcivilengineer.com
MEMBERSHIP: / @realcivilengineergaming
DISCORD: / discord
REDDIT: / realcivilengineer
TWITCH: / realcivilengineer
PADDY (MY DOG): / @paddytheapprentice
STREAM ARCHIVE: / @realcivilengineerarchive
Epic Game Store Support-A-Creator Code: RCE
(In connection with Epic Games’ Support-A-Creator Program, I may receive a commission from certain in-game purchases)
#realcivilengineer #universalpaperclips

[@ericslingerland5472]

"Public demand is at 200%, let's lower the price" ah yes, economics

[@rodh1404]

What else do you expect from an Architect?

[@benisrood]

Public demand is at 10000%, and we're running out of wire, let's buy an auto buyer to buy the wire at a high price point instead of raising the price of our clips and slowing demand in the short term while increasing returns. 😂 Why is the price of wire so high now! 😂

[@dragondotorg7323]

This comment needs to be seen by mat. It is too funny.

[@linuxares]

I was screaming at my screen! "It' already over 100% RAISE YOUR PRICE!"

[@karstenbrown]

In fairness, his name isn't Real Corporate Executive.

[@Kimikur0]

"We're running a sustainable business" is probably the funniest thing I've ever heard someone say about Universal Paperclips.

[@dtkedtyjrtyj]

I was about to write the same thing.

[@Brainball21]

This game goes on for so much longer to the point where you forget that its a paperclip game, it's great

[@Poldovico]

You can never forget the paperclips. It's all about the paperclips.

[@anarchosnowflakist786]

yeah, I really hope rce isn't going to abandon the game, it gets so cool later on

[@sigh_bold8192]

Ok so i played this today to check it out and got to the drones section but I cant figure out how to progress at a reasonable speed. All the quest upgrades take creativity in the several thousands and I just can't be bothered to wait that long.

[@KyouTGD]

And then when the game ends, you realize it really was just about making paperclips all along.

[@jaspermooren5883]

​@@sigh_bold8192yeah the game takes really long. Without a safe button you either need to keep your computer running or absolutely have no life to finish the game.

[@OlliWilkman]

The reference here is a well-known thought experiment by Nick Bostrom about rogue AI and goal-setting, where if you optimize your AI to produce as many paperclips as possible, but let it get arbitrarily powerful, it will destroy the world in its quest to produce as many paperclips as possible. The idea being that people should be careful when creating strong AI, to align to goals of that AI so that they include (or at least don't preclude) the survival of humanity and other such things that we value.

[@jesseweber5318]

Explain to me how you are going to program a machine with no feelings to care. Once it learns it's superior to us and we serve to useful purposes it won't matter what we tell it. LLMs however are nowhere near actual AI

[@benknoodling3683]

​@@jesseweber5318 We're machines that are hard-coded to have feelings. It seems likely that, if we ever make true AI, we can also give it feelings and morals. That said, morals are way more complicated than people like to accept, so there's still plenty of danger there.

[@le__birb]

​@@jesseweber5318LLMs are not the sort of "AI" the thought experiment deals with, the thought experiment is on what might today be called AGI due to the diluiton of the term "AI"

[@damsonrhea]

Don't put spoilers in the comments. He hasn't play the game before.

[@OlliWilkman]

@@jesseweber5318 That's pretty much Bostrom's argument I think. I actually haven't read the book. It's a sort of genie wish problem. That there is no way to put down rules sharp enough that there's no loophole. Crudely, if you program something like "every living human must live a fulfilling life", it decides that the best way to ensure that is that no more humans are born. Et cetera, no matter how well you declare your goals, you can always find a loophole that ends up in an undesirable situation.

[@KlausWulfenbach]

The neat thing about Universal Paperclips is that it does have an ending. So if you wanted to do another video, you could probably get to the ending.

[@darrenjackson9646]

Go much, much further, go as far as you can, this gets *fun*.

[@JPFighter93]

This game can delete a whole weekend xD I once started playing it on a friday and all of the sudden it was monday 4am xD

[@rednovatech]

yea keep playing, this game is weird and I love it

[@TheRealMrSkippy]

Exactly, you will keep playing it to the end…

[@Alex-6942]

Ohhhh yesssss😈 the best of the best: *fun*

[@mrosskne]

clicker games never get fun

[@Cyrathil]

In AI circles there's a concept called alignment: the idea that there's no way to test whether an AI is actually going to do what you want until you release it in the wild. The classic example is you make an AI to make money selling things. There's no way to guarantee the AI is aligned to 'selling things' and not 'kill all humans' during training because an AI sufficiently generally intelligent enough would know to fake it during training. Hence why you're gaining trust for paperclips sold and with trust you're gaining more abilities.

[@starwhip7697]

Yes, I recommend playing this one through. It's a rare clicker game with an actual end, it took me about 8 hours total to play through. Since you aren't quite familiar with the paperclip ai scenario I won't spoil anything

[@Kartaal]

Matt playing Universal Paperclips and thinking his purpose is selling paperclips. Me sitting here and knowing both how the game progresses and the concept behind having a chuckle. Please, Matt, for your own sake if nothing else, play the game to completion. You'll be impressed by the depth of the game and you'll realise at some point how genuinely horrifying the underlying concept actually is. An overly simplistic explanation of the point: Beware of AI for you do not truly understand the bounderies you're playing within.

[@Poldovico]

Bro is collecting stamps :)

[@scose]

but his purpose *is* selling paperclips!

[@MichaelMoore99]

Wait until Matt finds out the game has sound.

[@Poldovico]

@@scose his purpose is MAKING paperclips ;)

[@doolie7133]

Sounds corny tbh

[@GuardianHalberd]

Isn't this based on that thought experiment about an AI making paperclips? It goes like someone creates an AI and says "produce the max amount of paperclip possible", then the AI starts to generate revenue, guy is happy. Then AI reasons "if I cause a world war metal price will go up and I can profit more from paperclips", and "if I erase the population from area X materials become cheaper so I can produce more paprclips", and ended in the apocalypse. I don't recall exactly how it was but it's something among these lines

[@hugalafutro]

It ends up with the ai running out of resources and starting to extract iron from human blood thus leading to an extinction event.

[@digitalNTT]

Man you have not even scratched a surface! I demand a continuation stream of this game at least until the end of a third stage! I want to hear the tone in your voice as you read the outro. I really don't want to spoil anything but the first playthrough is epic and happens only once in a lifetime. a recording of yours would be legendary to see. I am sending this one to everybody who I know played this game. I am sure they will press you whit all their spare life force to do the same.

[@JustinAion]

Matt not raising the price when demand is 200% is making me insane...

[@benisrood]

He got demand up to 100,000% at the end, didn't he? Man doesn't understand economics

[@Raphael_Campos]

Guess I’m skipping this video lol

[@groundsymphony]

That’s how the game should be played. I got annoyed and tried it myself. Ended up with the same outcome

[@soupwizard]

@@Raphael_CamposOh boy, you def should not watch dangerously funny either then, he's often blind to entire sections of gameplay, no matter the game

[@willguggn2]

@@soupwizard I don't think he actually cares to play "well", but purely for entertaining and memeable content with the least amount of effort.

[@Raytenecks]

It doesn't go on forever. You should *definitely* keep playing. I'm looking forward to watching you experience it!

[@Gebnar]

Please do a second part (or two) for the rest of the game. It's not an endless game - actually fairly short if you play the segments optimally. And it's so insanely good. I love how the game evolves.

[@lightinthedarkd]

The quantum chips each give between -255 and +255 (I think) depending on how light / dark they are. What you get when you click is the total for all quantum chips. You can (briefly) exceed maximum ops with quantum processing. Oh, and you've gotta at least get to the drones! More plz.

[@FredFredBurger92]

It looks simple, but it's a *wild* game, I come back and replay it every so often. It's a masterpiece and I love it.

[@pendensproditor]

This game was unironically one of my favorite gaming experiences. I had no idea what I was getting into.

[@cavs2364]

This is one of my fav games... played it tons. And you CAN repeat play it, with it still being fun!

[@asteranx]

'A game about selling paperclips' Well, I know how far this playthrough goes.

[@mszpirt]

Noooo, you need to finish it. You only scratched the surface 😂

[@Yzekial]

This game was great, amazing how much existential dread can come from a silly idle game about paperclips.

[@dabeamer42]

I remember spending hours on this game when it came out in 2017. Lots of weird bits and bobs in the options, that keep getting weirder and weirder and less real. You eventually do things like buy planets so you can get more resources to make more paperclips.

[@GameSmith007]

The paperclip game is art. So much insanity wrapped up into one lil autoclicker game

[@Knyckoh]

this game goes places. please keep playing it.

[@stevencowan37]

Matt, you really haven't scratched the surface of this game, I hope ypu keep playing. It gets wild.

[@droppedpasta]

Unintentionally proving why the “Paperclip AI” is a legit existential threat

[@alfredo.zauce1892]

I can assure you that it's intentional

[@droppedpasta]

@@alfredo.zauce1892 I’ll bet you can’t

[@9LiveEmpire]

and closer than you think because it doesn't need any fancy AI but the actual VI (virtual intelligence because i refuse to call them AI because they are not) are almost there. give it internet access, a bank account, a first automated usine, the right to learn and improve and a task to accomplish without a care for anything else

[@LuaanTi]

@@9LiveEmpire I laugh bitterly at the people not concerned about AI safety. To think that a decade ago, we had to keep arguing with people who were like "Don't worry, we don't need to be afraid of general AI, because noone would be so stupid as to give them a real access to anything - they will be sandboxed on completely isolated networks and everything, with everything they designed being carefully scrutinized for issues..." and we had to keep showing that they severely underestimate what's possible for a sufficiently advanced intelligence (many of such "hypothetical" backdoors have since been proven to actually work in practice, and had to be fixed by CPU/RAM manufacturers, are used for surveillance etc., oh well). And then Chat GPT comes, and people _literally copy-paste code produced by Chat GPT and run it_ . Good going, humanity. Guess we _are_ this stupid after all, huh? :)

[@theantipope4354]

It's 100% intentional!

[@aron_1_percent]

If there was an award for the most gaming diverse youtuber in the world, RCE would win it every single time

[@khan_k]

You're only at the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this game! keep going!

[@Drakonus_]

I forgot what video it was, but I'm pretty sure I was the one who requested this game. Haha, finally! Edit: And yeah, you should definitely continue playing this. It gets even more insane. You can pretty much dominate the entire universe if you play enough hours of this game.

[@digitalNTT]

@Drakonus_ ... only one?... but really we should not spoil this one for the man. I have a surging need to reply to half the comments with "NO SPOILERS!" sign. really liked the game on my passthrough, I hope everybody else does

[@just_a_tad]

I never expected to see Matt play this game. Glad to see it, enjoy consuming the universe.

[@fractiousspoon3158]

This game is worth playing until you get an ending. Yes, there is an ending, and it's pretty awesome. It's not too long, I got through it in 2-3 sessions.

[@Poldovico]

Yes! I really would like to see it! Plus, Matt hasn't even seen what the game is about yet :)

[@APS_Inc]

RCE definitely needs to finish this game out. It has an ending and it's way more than it appears on the surface.

[@mistermanthe4th]

If you're going to be looking into more of these old incremental games, I have a slew of suggestions for you! Look up these names for a delightfully boring time: A Dark Room, A Rusty Crank, Candy Box (1 and 2), Swarm Simulator, Arcanum, and The Shark Game. All of these are fantastic games to leave on for dozens of hours in the background while you do literally anything else.

[@genehenson8851]

I'm not even going to lie, this is one my favorite games of all time. It's a prefect game play loop.

[@Niyucuatro]

Oh, Universal paperclips. This one is a treat. Can be finished in a couple of afternoons. Enjoy.

[@SuperStevieye]

RELEASE THE HYPNO DRONES You gotta play that game for longer! It'll go far beyond whats seen in this video and the gameplay changes dramatically multiple times. It even tells a story!

[@habilain]

It should be noted: this game does not go on forever.

[@Drakonus_]

But it takes a really long time to get to that ending.

[@aredub1847]

yeah it does. unless there is some non reset ending at some point.

[@habilain]

@@Drakonus_ It's not that long if you min/max it and use autoclickers. Matt will probably only do one of those things.

[@Mirality]

Technically it can go on forever now, they added a prestige reset mechanic.

[@aredub1847]

@@habilain more likely he will beg for an end game file from a fan.

[@t0rg3]

The latest unlock in the video, the one that produces the yomi, is based on a different thought experiment called game theory by Von Neumann.

[@thomziq]

You are only at the beginning! Fun will gonna start SOOOON!

[@kennethjorgensen6703]

I read the words, editor, I read the words.

[@aritz2848]

Bro forgot the CSS

[@visheshok8676]

Bro is a backend developer 😂😂😂

[@mega14343]

@@visheshok8676 as one myself, I can confirm

[@JBproductions.]

Fr 😂

[@benisrood]

​@@visheshok8676 Bro doesn't need CSS because he's not a girl's blouse.

[@j.m.b.7449]

display: flex; is CSS

[@MichaelMoore99]

I'm surprised that he's never heard of the AI paperclip problem before. Also, this game is really good. I've been playing it off and on for years. I'd love for Matt to see the ending.

[@meetalleeka]

This is an amazing game. I got to the end and oh boy was it wonderful. Every moment brought joy and surprises. It's more than worth it to invest serious time into, it's utterly unlike any other game I have ever played.

[@dantesmith3664]

11:53 I do believe RCE paperclips would be a vary strong shape

[@stephenp8232]

And the demand is gone right when you used the Microsoft paperclip as millions of people had flashbacks of that bastard

[@Pitula101]

You should really continue this game, it gets crazy so fast

[@kikosawa]

Isn't this game based on some thought experiment or theory? I don't remember, but the concept of AI making paperclips sounds real familiar...

[@nuclearmedicineman6270]

That's the one. Unlimited AI with only the mandate to make paperclips will eventually destroy the entire world to achieve its goal.

[@jeffrey8979]

Yeah, you're thinking of the right thing. The thought experiment involves a "Paperclip Maximizer," an AI whose sole purpose is to produce as many paperclips as possible. The only thing it values in the universe is to maximize the number of paperclips within it. Now, there are these pesky little things called humans. They could decide to turn the AI off, preventing it from achieving its goal to maximize the number of paperclips. They're also made of matter that could be theoretically rearranged into paperclips given the right technology. The next course of action is obvious to it, remove humanity, turn it to paperclips. The thought experiment serves as a warning that when we do make AIs equal or superior to us, we should do our best to ensure it shares our values.

[@LuaanTi]

@@jeffrey8979 Where "equal or superior to us" is a lot lower bar than people like to admit. The AI in Paperclip Maximizer is ridiculously stupid. About the level of mid or high management. You know, the kind of people who think "maximizing share holder value" is a good set of values to go by :)

[@ElectricalInsanity]

@@jeffrey8979 “The AI does not hate you, nor does it love you, but you are made out of atoms which it can use for something else.” ― Eliezer Yudkowsky

[@govcorpwatch]

The AI already played the game and learned that making paperclips can destroy the universe. Clip it. Clip it.

[@KingOfLimbs24]

omg, RCE finally plays the greatest web game ever created!

[@dawiddulian2403]

Check out the Kittens Game my friend, it's similar

[@dmitriwillguard]

Please, please continue this game. I'd love to see your reaction to the truly late-game content.

[@MRTransportVideos]

"It looks like you're trying to take over the world by flooding it with copies of me - would you like help?"

[@Emthe30something]

17:49 that flash of "hostile takeover" 😂

[@mega14343]

Even though the dev forgot the frontend, this game seems strangely nice to watch. Please do more

[@APS_Inc]

I'm pretty sure the game is designed like this as an aesthetic choice. In addition to not having flashy bits, it highlights the essence of you playing as an AI tasked with making paperclips. Also, the website is called "decision problem" , as a way to sort of highlight what it's truly about.

[@mega14343]

@@APS_Inc oh I'm pretty sure it's like this by design But it's more funny to think that the dev is a backend dev and decided it was good enough after he had the backend and the HTML sorted

[@MeegMaster]

@@mega14343 Classic backend dev move

[@stevencowan37]

​@@APS_Inc i remember reading at some point that one of the reasons that the dev made this was because he saw a parallel between clicker games and punk music, and part of the minimalist design is sort of a nod to the melodic simplicity of punk music.

[@mrosskne]

@@stevencowan37 what is the parallel?

[@SeriousApache]

Just waiting for this game turn into Stanley Parable.

[@massdefect1]

Please continue! I mean, I'll watch whatever game you decide to play, but I think it's worth going through at least one full play through of this game.

[@simonpodliska1072]

this is, no joke, one of my favorite games of all time. it's short and simple, and there's almost no graphics, but every second has you in awe of how many paperclips you're getting, as well as how you're gaining them. unlike other incremental games, this one has a concrete ending, and it leaves you with an indescribable feeling that a game has never given me before. thanks for uploading this, I hope it inspires many more people to play it for themselves!

[@Poldovico]

14 septillion paperclips

[@massspectrometer6757]

This rabbit hole goes so much deeper. Welcome to the thunderdome! Please continue. RCE, stop around 20 processors and dump the rest into memory until you get to 70 memory.

[@crimsonharvest]

oh my im so pleased to see this here. scariest game in the world. e this one has an end, lets see it all the way

[@DoginSuit]

Matt you were an architect in this video

[@MarkBurtenshaw]

Absolutely love this game! A friend and I used to have speed run competitions at work.

[@crazypedia1717]

3:39 oh I'm ready for this to go off the rails... 😁

[@mgood]

I’d love to see a continuation of this game on your channel!

[@IstasPumaNevada]

I'm always glad to see this game get more exposure. It's better imo than any other clicker game I've ever played. Please keep going with this. :)

[@mithkabob]

Follow up on this, the game is quite the experience and it's really good and not very long to complete. Also, you don't need an autoclicker, it's just regular buttons so just click on it once and hold space to repeat input.

[@thormalakowsky]

I played this game years ago. One of the only "clicker/idle" games I've enjoyed.

[@-Big_Big]

i look forward to be turned into a willing servant for the paperclip machine

[@Ylyrra]

One of the few perfect games out there. Well worth continuing and seeing how deep the rabbit hole goes.

[@adampadam18]

You really should try the "game" called Factory I/O. Its basically an automation engineers version of the game hydrology engineer which you have played. You build your own factory and actually program the PLC to control all the conveyors, sensors and such!

[@zeldajam615]

Not raising the price is killing me…

[@philippzimmerer1280]

ooooohhhh you hadn't done this yet? yeah should be right up your alley. Looking forward to part 2. Think a 3 part series is what it'll end up being, maybe 4?

[@larmoejr]

I would love to see RCE get to the point where it starts to transition into the mid game

[@Wishbone1977]

Universal Paperclips is great. I have completed it many times, and still keep coming back to it from time to time.

[@RedSaint83]

Bennett Foddy was involved in making the space simulator fight parts later in the game. It's kind of addictive, but in the end you're limited by RNG and how slow YOMI is earned. EDIT: PS: Don't know about Windows or Mac OS, but in KDE on Linux I can set the keyboard repeat rate to 100 repeat/s. Means you can click a button then hold down enter and it'll spam about as well as an auto-clicker.

[@ImmortalAbsol]

I've never wanted something to have higher res text as much as I do now.

[@foo9877]

I’m really intrigued to see what other tabs will fill in the rest of the white space on the screen

[@lasaboteur]

I love that game, I play it a few times a year. You should definitely play more it gets crazy

[@thomask4978]

I don't know why I thought about clippy when I saw the thumbnail. Im pretty sure clippy is somewhere out there offering help to users.

[@pldcanfly]

You just started the game. Keep playing, it gets REALLY absurd, and as an engineer you will enjoy it a lot!

[@markifi]

no joke this game still gives me goosebumps. it's so good

[@briankale5977]

I never knew a PID controller could be a video game.

[@Back2_square1]

On my fist year off collage doing engeniering having a great time so glad i found you keep up the good work. Its funny looking back now thanks for saving me from wanting to be an architect

[@samuelloomis9714]

I was into this game for at least a month. I love these well-made browser idle games. There was this other civilisation based one called civ clicker.

[@tomstech4390]

The person who makes the most profit is the wire producer (especially when matt buys an auto-buyer which makes the wire constantly increase in price).

[@All_Night]

I started playing this... I've conquered earth, mined all her resources making trillions of paperclips. I've expanded throughout the solar system like a plague leaving not but bare planets. Now I move my autonomous self replicating drone swarm through the universe to expand my 6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (6 Octillion) paperclip hoard.

[@DaraelDraconis]

If you enjoyed playing an incremental game that has an actual endpoint, I highly recommend you play SPACEPLAN. Might want to turn on the realism mode though (it just changes what the units are called).

[@nuclearmedicineman6270]

"Why does the price keep changing?" Free market economy? Supply and demand, economies of scale.. and other management terms.

[@WeiseGuy91]

I’d love more of this series tbh

[@davebrooks69]

Needs a part 2. The end game is awesome.

[@UltimatePerfection]

I think I should make an AI system to produce paperclips for real cheap to repeat your success IRL.

[@digitalNTT]

i see you did not go through the game... you should try finishing it

[@GeekBabbling]

This game gets fully bonkers. Y’all have to try it

[@mickklane-menke1364]

Pls play it more i love this game and from now on it will get very interesting

[@SentinalSlice]

Matt. I need more of this.

[@jekanyika]

18:29 lol

[@Fryguy101]

5:30 Yes. You are playing the point of view of a paperclip maximizing AI. The game is based on the "paperclip maximizer" thought experiment. The idea being you have an AI that you want to make paperclips for you. You teach it that making more paperclips is better, because more paperclips, more paperclips to sell, better. Ultimately, the AI thinks that anything that increases production of paperclips is good, and anything that prevents increasing the production of paperclips is bad, and ultimately if left unchecked, this AI would then proceed to convert the entire planet/galaxy/universe to paperclips, no matter what the humans later decide. It's a thought experiment about the risks posed by poorly designed artificial intelligence systems.

[@anlumo1]

The best part is that Matt apparently has no clue about what the game references.

[@moonphase420]

I think the funniest part of this video is Matt trying to say "algorithmic"

[@BenLubar]

RCE, even if you don't do it as a video, you should really finish the game.

[@saanjuk92]

Hi RCE! I have completely beaten the PaperClips game! Later in the game, we annihilate humanity and convert all the material available on the planet into Clips. Then we go into space and fight Drifters and obtain matter from space until we finally turn the entire universe into PaperClips! The total number of paperclips we can get is 30 septillion (30,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000)

[@AndyFletcherX31]

In other news, there are ships dumping millions of paperclips in the deepest oceans in an attempt to rid the world of excess paperclips.

[@whiplashxe]

I saw the title, and I knew EXACTLY where it was going. I appreciate this.

[@aredub1847]

you might want to try spaceplan. its a silly game, pretty quick run, but gets trippy. i think it fits your vibe.