One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again • Hacker News Board

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#171

Post by mimimi31 » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 6:01 PM UTC

fnord123 wrote: post #68

RugnirViking wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Microsoft acquisition of Minecraft is inexplicably one of the few big tech acquisitions that hasn't completely destroyed the product. It's impressive

Eh, aside from making java and bedrock incompatible, requiring Xbox live accounts to play, deleting customer accounts in the transition to Xbox live, making realms which are different somehow from java and bedrock (many parents had a devil if a time figuring out how to setup a server for kids playing on all the platforms during lockdown)... Aside from this they didn't ruin it.

Also mass locking Microsoft accounts that were created without providing a phone number[1].

For some reason they locked my completely unused Microsoft account, that was created for the sole purpose of migrating my Minecraft account to, due to "unusual behavior" (or "activity that violates our Microsoft Services Agreement" if you go by the error message instead of the corresponding knowledge base article).

The reasonable thing to do in such a case if of course to require users to "[verify] [they] are the account owner" by receiving an SMS verification code on an arbitrary phone number (they explicitly mention the possibility of "asking a trusted friend or family member" for this).

[1] https://github.com/MultiMC/Launcher/issues/4093

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#172

Post by namrog84 » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

pests wrote: post #65

herghost wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh wow. I did not realise this was the case. Thank you!

I think this actually might be a slight negative tbh - since everything is split into chunks and generated on demand, you lose the ability to do larger passes over multiple chucks at gen time. No real way to do tectonics or weather patterns as you don't necessarily know what's in your chunk neighborhood.

You can by generating Metadata for an area larger than a chunk itself.

Also frequently when using things like peeling noise is to use different scale and resolution of the noise itself. While on smallest scale there might be 1 noise value per minecraft block. You can can also use a different scale in that 1 noise value is used per 10x10 minecraft chunk (16x16 blocks?)

Also not sure how familiar you are with noise generation like perrin but things have slopes to them and isn't just completely random per point. So even without seeing generated data. You can infer a little bit about the next value depending on the intensity and resolution.

Lastly, you can just not use noise at all and just place things at given coordinates and make the game incorporate them into the proc gen at chunk time. E.g. you want a city always at 1000,1000 coordinate far away from 0 0. When you get near you can apply smoothing filters in and around the 1000 1000 position thru various math and layering systems so no matter the proc gen at that point. City can be there and it not look completely out of place.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#173

Post by tormeh » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

poser-boy wrote: post #24

littlestymaar wrote: post #14

If you like voxel world generation, I strongly advise you to check out Veloren[1], it has a much much deeper worldgen that what Minecraft offers. [1]: https://veloren.net/ the game is still under development but it has been playable for more than a year now.

Veloren is great. I'm pretty sure it's worldgen uses Simplex noise, rather than the Perlin noise like MC does.

It uses simulation, like Dwarf Fortress. Of course randomness is involved, but there's a real attempt at realism in the geology, etc.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#174

Post by orbital-decay » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 6:31 PM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #164

orbital-decay wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Previously, the time-optimal strategy to acquire iron and diamonds was to dig a hole deep into the earth and then bore straight paths. This was exceptionally grindy (fans would say zen, detractors would say tedious), but effective. I'm not a big Minecraft player, but I'm pretty sure the time-optimal strategy for getting diamonds consistently was to set up a deliberate mine topology which is mathematically efficient…

Unless you're really working to hit ore in a limited space, you pretty much just want to make a bunch of long parallel tunnels at the right height.

If I recall correctly (I've played it years ago), efficient mining methods make use of 1x1 branches and optimized spacing between branches, which exposes more potential ore spots in less time than a simple 2x1 tunnel. Someone solved the optimization problem and calculated the optimal branch spacing to minimize the time spent on removing the blocks per one block of ore.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#175

Post by Wowfunhappy » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 6:44 PM UTC

rightbyte wrote: post #82

RugnirViking wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Microsoft acquisition of Minecraft is inexplicably one of the few big tech acquisitions that hasn't completely destroyed the product. It's impressive

Ye well MS can't wish the old offline installers out of existence I guess.

...is there an offline installer for Java Minecraft? I think it always downloads most of the real game at first run.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#176

Post by toastedwedge » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 6:46 PM UTC

ykl wrote: post #4

The new worldgen is incredible, both above and below the surface. Hats off to everyone at Mojang that worked on this! One of my favorite game memories of all time was the first time I played Minecraft during the alpha days and immediately got lost in the world. For me, going into a 1.18 world and finding a giant mountain chain and then finding a cave on the peak of the mountain that falls all the way into a giant und…

Thank you for mentioning this. I've been out of the "MCraftsphere" for a long time now, so jumping from ~1.6.4 to 1.18, alongside the plethora of mods (data packs now?) is absolutely mind blowing. I had no idea the depth to which it has been taken, but it looks like I now have an afternoon project.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#177

Post by ezfe » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 6:56 PM UTC

c7DJTLrn wrote: post #54

MildlySerious wrote: post #50

Man. I really do want to like it, but this update is the first one that gives me the Microsoft-finally-took-over vibes. Traversal and with that exploration just became so much harder. The landscape is now riddled with holes that you either build scraggly bridges over, or lead to massive detours. The sides of bodies of water are much higher and steeper on average, making it impossible to see the landscape you're passi…

I haven't tried but I believe I can't play Minecraft anymore because all players have been forced to convert their Mojang accounts, which is something I simply don't want to do. Funny how a company can just take away something you purchased and you have no recourse.

The game files continue to work, even without an account actually. You can simply keep the old launcher and/or run the game directly.

While I agree with you in principal, the truth is that if you don't update the launcher it doesn't break - and if you do update the launcher it also doesn't break, it just requires you to complete an account migration.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#178

Post by ShamelessC » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 7:12 PM UTC

jnovek wrote: post #124

ShamelessC wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Submit a pull request.

With what? A manual? Parent is checking out a game because it was mentioned on HN and finds that the game’s web page doesn’t have a manual and your response is essentially: “Play the game sight-unseen, learn everything about it, write a manual and contribute it back to the project”? That’s not very realistic. I could see creating an issue in the tracker, perhaps.

Apologies; I said "submit a pull request" when indeed I just meant "make a contribution". Creating an issue is a reasonable action. Criticizing a volunteer-supported project on hacker news will possibly net you some upvotes but writing this entire complaint in an issue tracker is far more productive in my opinion.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#179

Post by rland » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 7:13 PM UTC

pests wrote: post #36

rland wrote: post #13

It's been a while since I've played Minecraft, so I can't speak to the newer terrain. But I always thought they could significantly improve the world gen. Perlin noise is cool, but why not try to fully simulate plate tectonics, weather patterns, drainage? It would go a long way if deserts were in the rainshadow of mountain ranges, islands corresponded to real volcanic activity, etc. I guess there is a limit to what y…

What do you mean having then load on exploration? That's the current state - a chuck isn't generated until you need to load it. This means when you take an old save to a new version any already-loaded chucks you're stuck with but any new exploration causes new world gen on the new version.

Yes, I think (maybe) the reason they use perlin noise is because it’s fast. I’m saying have an actual loading screen when you go to a new area and spend some CPU cycles doing advanced plate tectonics or whatever.

Re: One decade later, Minecraft world generation is interesting again

#180

Post by dane-pgp » Sun, Dec 05, 2021, 7:15 PM UTC

jl6 wrote: post #16

The new terrain is great, but I have mostly exhausted my patience with Minecraft survival. I hope future releases will put some effort into reducing the grindyness. I know many things can be automated but they tend to rely on extremely arcane game mechanics rather than feeling like an intentional part of the game. Some elements of Factorio were inspired by Minecraft. I think Minecraft could now use some inspiration f…

I think Mojang should reconsider its objection to adding an auto-crafting system into the game. There are legitimate concerns that, if it was too easy, it would make one of the defining aspects of the game obsolete, but I think it could be balanced so that users wouldn't bother doing it for simple items like pickaxes.

As an example, the "auto-crafter" block could be powered by chorus fruit, which means the player would not have access to it until after beating the Ender Dragon. That would also mean that truly automating crafting would also require an automated chorus fruit farm, which would give the system a minimum space requirement.