A cleverMinecraftplayer has taken advantage of the game’s latest update to create what appears to be a fully functional in-game sundial. Since launching in 2011,Minecrafthas enabled free-form creation within its procedurally generated game worlds, allowing players to leverage the game’s simulation to make incredible in-game structures and mechanisms.
Despite hundreds of competitors refining the gameplay formula it helped pioneer,Minecraftcontinues to stand at the head of the list ofthe best sandbox games around. That’s in part thanks to its sheer breadth of distribution over the years. Players who want to playMinecraftcan do so on nearly any available platform, ranging from dedicated game consoles and high-end PCs to widely available smart devices. Thus, a dedicatedMinecraftplayer can exercise their creativity almost anywhere they are, whether they’re on a brand-new PlayStation or Nintendo Switch or a borrowed low-end PC only capable of “potato” graphical quality.
This isn’t to say the game can’t look good, though. The recentMinecraftVibrant Visuals updateadded new optional enhanced graphical settings, and given a creation by a player called Mrdude1269 on Reddit, the update changes the game in more ways than one. In a video shared with theMinecraftBuilds Reddit community, Mrdude1269 showed off a fully functional in-game sundial that can indicate the time of day based on the position of a shadow cast on a carefully constructed timekeeping dial. Shown from an overhead angle, the video showed off how the shadow moves across a series of numbers to denote what time it is in-game.
Minecraft Vibrant Visuals Update Allows Creation of Working Sundial
The key element in making Mrdude1269’s sundial fully functional is thechange to lighting added by theMinecraftVibrant Visuals update. While the original baseMinecraftgame features a full day and night cycle, the in-game lighting is not advanced enough to cast shadows based on the position of the main source of light (namely the sun). This would make any sundial built by a player purely decorative, since any shadows cast would not accurately reflect the sun’s position. With the update, new dynamic lighting and shadow effects allow for a natural rendition of global illumination, ensuring that, as shown in the video, the sun will accurately cast a shadow that changes position as the sun moves across the daytime sky.
Players praised Mrdude1269’s work, asking for more angles on the structure and screenshots of a ground-level view of the sundial. Given the large size of the structure, some players wondered whether a smaller sundial would also work, perhaps for aMinecraftancient cityroleplay session that eschews modern timekeeping technologies in favor of more “primitive” in-world solutions. Other players praised the Vibrant Visuals update in general, appreciating that the game’s incorporation of more built-in graphics technology allows people across servers and mod configurations to enjoy advanced creations without having to worry about implementing customized shaders or mods.
