Minetest Maps... Versus The Real World!

[Dokimi]

Lately I've been fiddling with mg_tectonic, and asking the question: how to make truly realistic terrain in Minetest?

So I made these for reference. Perhaps you'll find these interesting too...

This is kind of real world terrain you could actually fit in a Minetest map. (the yellow circles are the 31km radius).

Islands


Lakes


Rivers


and a few more...

[Dokimi]

Mountains


Cities


Earth layers

[v-rob]

Some people should do some things like this. I've always wanted thing like the real world that weren't scaled down.

[Dokimi]

Some people should do some things like this. I've always wanted thing like the real world that weren't scaled down.

mg_tectonic is my attempt to do that. It's inspired by the islands of New Zealand. In terms of the images above it would work out a bit like a large Malta, surrounded by the Virgin Islands, with a mini lake Taupo in the centre, and some very mini Himalayas running down the middle.

[Hume2]

Some people should do some things like this. I've always wanted thing like the real world that weren't scaled down.

This might be good, but there are also huge monotonous lands. If you spawned on one of them, you could have to travel hundreds of kilometres to see something different. (I know that Minetest world is only 60km×60km×60km.) I was experimenting with my terrainbrot. This isn't supposed to be a real landscape but still it was difficult to spawn on a location where I could find both mountains and lowlands. And it was even harder in larger-scale worlds.

[Dokimi]

... but there are also huge monotonous lands. If you spawned on one of them, you could have to travel hundreds of kilometres to see something different. ...

I had this issue with mg_tectonic.

My solution: as much small scale variation as is physically possible (rock types, sediments, plants...). The default biomes just aren't up to the task, so I didn't use biomes at all. Instead it has continuous variation across the map. Each place is (in theory) unique.

Even then... sometimes you're in the desert and you really want to see snow! (It majorly changes gameplay, I've discussed this in the mg_tectonic thread)

[Sokomine]

MT's small-scape landscape is usually better suited for gameplay than anything remotedly realistic. Players need the differend materials and some variety of places in order to enjoy the map. There's also the problem of the very limited view in MT. You just can't see the mountain in front of you, or the shores of the lake. Maybe the best way would be to just create a huge city or forrest areas where the long distance view is extremly limited.