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Manifold Releases Blocks, a 1:1 Minecraft Switzerland Built From Swisstopo Data
Manifold released Blocks, a Minecraft recreation of all of Switzerland at full scale, built from geographic data published by the Swiss Federal Office of Topography. One block equals one meter, so the Dufourspitze sits at its real 4,634m.
Reporting from 1 source: GIGAZINE.
Why it matters
Blocks shows what official national mapping data can do once it is converted automatically into a game world, and the Swiss-residents-only paid tier shows the licensing limits that come with it.
Key Facts
- Manifold released Blocks, a Minecraft recreation of all of Switzerland at full scale, using geographic data from the Swiss Federal Office of Topography.
- One block in Blocks equals one meter, and the Dufourspitze is recreated at its elevation of 4,634m.
- Blocks uses the Cubic Chunks extension to remove Minecraft's 384-block height limit and runs on Java Edition 1.12.2.
- About 2,400 square kilometers of Blocks data, including the Jungfrau-Aletsch region, is free to download.
- The full Switzerland data costs 15 Swiss francs, is about 24GB, and is limited to Swiss residents for legal reasons.
The Cubic Chunks extension removes Minecraft's 384-block height limit on Java Edition 1.12.2. About 2,400 square kilometers, including the Jungfrau-Aletsch region, is free; the full country costs 15 Swiss francs and is limited to Swiss residents.
The build runs on Java Edition 1.12.2, and the height limit had to go: normal Minecraft caps a world at 384 blocks, so Blocks uses the Cubic Chunks extension to reach the Dufourspitze at 4,634m. Glaciers, forests and other features are placed from actual geographic information rather than hand-built, and the Jungfrau-Aletsch region includes the Eiger, the Jungfrau and the Aletsch Glacier.
The official site carries an overhead map that can be laid over aerial photographs to check the recreation, and picking a spot on it produces a teleport command. The full-country download is about 24GB and needs about 60GB of free space. The developer lists water surfaces, rock walls and missing terrain near national borders as targets for future updates.
Written with AI by Yomimono from the 1 cited source below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited. See our editorial policy.
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