Stumbled across this minecraft detail in GameSocio feed and had to share:
“Why Minecraft’s Water Isn’t ‘Real’ — And Why That’s Awesome!
Ever wondered why Minecraft’s rivers and waterfalls look blocky instead of flowing like real water? That’s because it uses a simple cellular automata system instead of a full fluid dynamics simulation—and it’s surprisingly clever:
Gravity Check: Each water “block” asks: Is there air below me? If yes, I fall one block down.
Spread Check: If I can’t fall, I check my four horizontal neighbors—any empty? I flow into them.
Repeat Globally: Every block follows these two rules every tick, so thousands of tiny decisions create cascading waterfalls and rivers
Real fluid sims are CPU‑heavy, but Minecraft nails performance with those two simple rules. ✨