Huh, half a year after Luanti introduced volumetric lighting. I find it hard to believe that Microsoft execs watch out for what Luanti does, but maybe a whole bunch of Android re-packagings of Luanti suddenly looked a whole lot better than Minecraft and that got through to those execs…? It’s a bit of a strange coincidence, at least.
While I would love that to be the case, I don’t think it is that simple. Java edition, at least, has been experimenting with shader-like features in resource packs for a while now. It could be that Luanti convinced them it needs to be built in and not an extra pack, but I think it is at best parallel ideas, or at worst, Luanti taking inspiration from those shader-like packs and trying to do better not even knowing they are doing the same process as Minecraft.
Yeah. Luanti following Minecraft is nothing new. Mineclonia was an early pilot game for the engine.
But there hasn’t been much effort on copying Minecraft lately. Mineclonia is done, and it’s great.
We’ve had more mobs, animals, plants, textures, and such than un-modded Minecraft for a long time. (Which is unfair, as Luanti is a mod-first design.) But my point is the core Launti dev team doesn’t have to work on any of that.
The most noticeable recent Luanti updates have been to make the configuration screens much nicer, and add I think to add native support for more graphics tricks?
I’m not paying attention to graphics in Luanti. As others have mentioned, that’s not why I play it. I actually had a conversation recently about the best way to downgrade Luanti default graphics to match un-modded Minecraft.
That said, the Minecraft team taking notice of Luanti would be new, as far as I know.
Oh yeah, I wasn’t trying to say that Luanti had an incredibly original thought with volumetric lighting. There’s been (pre-resource-pack) volumetric lighting mods for Minecraft probably already a decade ago. I was rather just wondering, when the proof of concept has existed for a whole decade, why do they decide to include it now. It probably would have worked well even on weaker phones three years ago already…
Maybe I’m blind, but I can’t see it? The target audience is PC gamers, and even though I rarely browse gaming websites anymore, this type of snark seems to be fairly standard for the last 10+ years.
Minecraft is the best-selling game of all time, but it’s looked pretty much the same for the entirety of its almost 14 year run. There’s an argument to be made that it’s showing its age in places, an argument I won’t make because I don’t think so myself, but all the same, as revealed during today’s Minecraft Live, Mojang announced that the sandbox game is getting a pretty big visual overhaul update called Vibrant Visuals. Now, don’t worry, it’ll still be all blocks and squares ‘n’ that, but it will be changing up how lighting looks.
A blog post explains things in a bit more detail, with one of the big things being that there’ll now be volumetric lighting. What that translates to is things like sunlight shining more naturally across different surfaces, even shining through windows, and every individual block will cast its own shadow. Mobs and items will glow a bit more too, so it’s not just about the overworld lighting.
This update is coming to the Bedrock Edition of the game first, with the post noting that it hopes to bring this “graphics revamp (either fully or partially) to as many devices as possible”, though there’s not even a release window for it yet. There are plans to bring it to Java Edition too.
I might not have much of a horse in this race as someone that only really plays Minecraft once in a blue moon (and normally swiftly puts it down because I’m not that kind of creative and I get too stressed out from survival mode), but honestly, I’m not a fan. Minecraft is inherently not a natural looking game, and this lighting overhaul just adds a touch to much realism for my tastes. Besides, this kind of lighting already exists in countless mods, so for plenty of people it’s not even really needed.
In any case, there were a few other announcements from Minecraft Live too, like the fact you’ll soon be able to fly around on friendly versions of ghasts, which I do quite like the look of. There’s a live event taking place from March 25 to April 7 too where you get to hang out with Jack Black’s version of Steve to defend a village in some mini-games, which’ll net you a cape if you’re successful. Bit less exciting, but to each their own!
Not sure what you’re seeing there. The Bedrock edition is also available on PC and the rest is a direct quote for the reasoning why that version gets it before the Java version.
It’s not like they’re forbidden from acknowledging the existence of other devices either. It’s just not their target audience.
I might not have much of a horse in this race as someone that only really plays Minecraft once in a blue moon (and normally swiftly puts it down because I’m not that kind of creative and I get too stressed out from survival mode), but honestly, I’m not a fan.
This says it all. This person should simply shut the fuck up and not be a games journalist.
I think journalists too often have way too little education and way often than not they have no idea what they’re talking about. The quality of news is often low. We need better journalism. I was thinking about exactly that just yesterday, by chance.
“You don’t need (and therefore shouldn’t want) this obviously good thing” has this connotation that the Minecraft team has been wasting their time on pointless features, when in reality first-party support for a feature is nearly always more stable than a mod.
Plus read the article, the author is a vehement hater of Minecraft. What a joke.
On console you can get texture packs and add-ons… from the marketplace.
On other bedrock platforms (Windows or Mobile) you can install textures and add-ons from your own files. The problem is that Bedrock add-ons are significantly less capable than Java’s mods.
Bedrock makes it easier to play with friends, it also has cross-platform support (except for Linux and Mac). Console players can only play on featured servers (unless they use workarounds).
Java is better in most other aspects (I am biased for it though, since it’s what I play): you can mod it, play older versions, use custom shaders (with mods), no microtransactions, play on any server you want, (apparently) less game-breaking bugs, etc.
Yeah, it is incovenient when you play Java and other people you know play Bedrock (or vice-versa). There is a community-made plugin called Geyser that allows Bedrock players to play on Java servers (it can be buggy sometimes but it is the closest we have to Java-Bedrock crossplay).
Java is the original and Bedrock is the C++ adaptation that came about once Microsoft bought Minecraft. Microsoft couldn’t really justify getting rid of Java edition because that’s what the entire PC userbase was using at the time, and they’ve gotten very used to the features it allows for. Namely mods. However they still wanted to unify the casual playerbase and better monetize the game.
On the topic of monetization, Minecraft originally had this nasty little clause (for Microsoft) written in I forget either the ToS, EULA, or what, but it essentially guaranteed all future updates to the game for free. I believe it also made some other guarantees about no MTX, should never have to pay for servers, etc but those I’m less certain about. Around the time MS bought the game there was a lot of talk about how the only way they’d really be able to get out of that guarantee to the millions of players who already owned “Java edition” (just regular Minecraft back then) was to make a Minecraft 2.0 that didn’t have that clause. Their approach for that problem appears to have been bedrock edition which they maintain alongside Java edition. Because it’s not the version they bought, they can make changes to the legal agreements including charging for things Java Edition users have a guaranteed right to.
Those are the two main reasons I’m aware of for the two editions. I believe the majority of the PC playerbase is currently on Bedrock Edition so although they would have some backlash if they suddenly decided to axe it I think the majority of the playerbase would chug on like normal. Afaik the main reason they don’t is because anyone who purchased Minecraft before there was a “Java Edition” would have a legal claim to say Bedrock is clearly the same game under another title, they’re not getting future updates as guaranteed, and are entitled to either updates or compensation. And I can’t imagine MS is interested in litigiously pissing off millions of players.
I really recommend Lunacid mentioned in the article from the dev doing this, it’s really an amazing retro dungeon crawler with lots of great horror touches since it’s the same dev as Lost in Vivo and such.
I went to look this up on Steam and I found that it was already in my library lol. I think I remember briefly trying it and I just suck at this type of game so I gave it up.
Ardenfall looks good and I vaguely recall liking the 2022 demo.
But it is interesting how everything is “morrowind inspired” these days. Which was especially egregious with stuff like Dread Delusion. Those aren’t “Morrowind likes”. They are Gothic.
Sort of like back in the 10s (?) when any even slightly retro aesthetic FPS was “a DOOM game”. Which was REALLY funny with stuff like Strafe where EVERYONE hated it because it didn’t feel enough like DOOM… because it was just Quake 1.
I loved Morrowind and I loved Gothic and I loved Kings Field so all this shit is great for me. But it is real annoying and I am concerned when an otherwise amazing game will get clowned on because there was more Daggerfall or Gothic than Morrowind in the “Morrowind inspired game”.
Dread Delusion is the one they mentioned and I really enjoyed it. It’s definitely a more constrained game than morrowind (a few weapon types/spells/smaller map/etc.) however I didn’t find it that limiting. Finishing most of the quests won’t feel like a slog, but there won’t be a lot to do after finishing up the main quest.
What really makes the game is the asthetic and world building. Most side quests feel meaningful and you stumble upon them naturally through exploration and progressing the main quest.
The leveling mechanic doesn’t really lock you out of any specific skillset, and items and consumables enable you to upskill when needed.
The only real let down for me was the ending. It was a bit anti-climatic. Like a lot of these games its basically a slides how at the end on how your actions impacted the world.
Cool yeah I mean the only problem with morrowind itself is the polygon count and the weird randomized combat, but the game design changes if you change the combat, so it’d be nice to have a new game with those things better
I have the same annoyance with people calling Lunacid a “King’s Field-like.” Like, if anything Lunacid is closer to Shadow Tower, NOT King’s Field. Even the music is what one would expect from a Shadow Tower soundtrack if the original game even had a soundtrack.
Playing with fire with that name, given Morrowind takes place on Vvardenfell. They just removed the V’s and changed a vowel.
Edit: Finally had a chance to watch the trailer after work, and noticed they are even using the Magic Cards font in their trailer, which is the same font used for all the text in Morrowind. Not that Bethesda owns the font (it was used by MTG before Morrowind), but could make it harder to argue the name is coincidental.
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