Just so you know, this is NOT a hate thread. I don't really care about how big a Minecraft world is since I will never make it to the end. I'm just curious.
If you don't already know, the PC Minecraft world isn't infinite. It ends 30,000,000 blocks from spawn, with a worldborder: (As of 1.8)
Why does Minecraft's terrain have to end? Couldn't Mojang make it generate forever? Why does it benefit the game to end the terrain at 30,000,000 X/Z? I'm curious to see what the answer is.
After a certain point, the terrain generation suffers from calculation errors. No program is perfect, everything is finite (except for our ever-expanding universe!) But I think someone will always complain no matter how far the distance is. What does it benefit you going farther than 30 million? Did you reeeeally want that sand block...? It's not like you got there in survival, so no matter how far the barrier is you'll just /tp there anyhow. Try to enjoy the rest of the (I don't even know how many "_illion") square meters inside the border. It's a pretty cool game when you concentrate more on what is, rather than what is not, accessible.
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You have 230,400,000,000 blocks to work with. That's 230 billion blocks. For all intents and purposes, the world's infinite. Unless you're THAT paranoid of other people. similarly, as the others said, you'll just waste memory with a world that keeps going after a point like that.
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Proud Moderator of Underground Miner, a now-dead server. 4 years of moderating, and it was a good time.
After a certain point, the terrain generation suffers from calculation errors. No program is perfect, everything is finite (except for our ever-expanding universe!) But I think someone will always complain no matter how far the distance is. What does it benefit you going farther than 30 million? Did you reeeeally want that sand block...? It's not like you got there in survival, so no matter how far the barrier is you'll just /tp there anyhow. Try to enjoy the rest of the (I don't even know how many "_illion") square meters inside the border. It's a pretty cool game when you concentrate more on what is, rather than what is not, accessible.
I'm not complaining about Minecraft being finite, I'm just wondering why it is finite. No hate here. Just curiosity.
Sorry I shouldn't have accused you of complaining, it's just that people usually are complaining about the technical stuff (more often about fps drops and red dragons etc.)
But yeah the basics is that the code has tiny errors that eventually stack up the more terrain is generated, until you see the glitches shown in previous versions. And not just the terrain derping, but other weird stuff too.
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It's to prevent lag (I believe, correct me if I am wrong). If minecraft, was endless, I'm not sure how things would work out...
But in my opinion, I'm glad they got rid of the Farlands and replaced them with world borders. I never liked the Far lands and I don't understand why people like them so much.
I'm not complaining about Minecraft being finite, I'm just wondering why it is finite. No hate here. Just curiosity.
In computers, everything is finite. I don't know it the 30,000,000 limit is arbitrary or there is a computational reason, but a computers ability to calculate really large numbers is not infinite. As the numbers get bigger, more time and power is needed to compute them, more memory is needed to hold them, more space is needed to store them . All computer software puts limits on the size of everything.
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Please actually read posts before responding, so you don't end up looking stewped.
It's only because of the mathematical errors. There is some maximal value for float, int, double.... that can't be outreached in a simple way. Infinite worlds would not cause lag, because only several chunks are loaded at one time (View distance).
Thanks for clearing that up for me.
Again, I wasn't quite sure, but I did knew it would cause some problems.
The exact value being 30M is an arbitary value, so that all the fake chunks possibly visible after that can all be generated normally. They could have potentially extended it futher, but it wouldn't be a nice round number (The actual max number would be about 33,554,432 or 2^25 before the generator couldn't handle it)
It's a bit odd that it's limited to 2^26 (including negative coords), rather than 2^16 (65,536) or 2^32 (4,294,967,296), as those are standard limits for number storage (short and int respectively), but there may be some multiplication in the generator which may hit these limits. (2^26 * 2^6 = 2^32)
Note on data sizes:
Bit = 2^1 = 2 (the smallest unit of memory only has 2 states, 0 or 1)
Byte = 2^8 = 256 (the height of the Minecraft world)
Short = 2^16 = 65,536 (the number of blocks in a chunk, also equal to 16 * 16 * 256)
Int = 2^32 = 4,294,967,296 (32 bit computers are limited in register size by this value (basically the active space onto which operations are applied by the processor), or so my minute or so of research says) Double* = 2^64 = 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 (like above, but for 64 bit computers. You can see how much this makes 64-bit computers run better)
Keep in mind that all these values represent the unsigned versions (only positive numbers), the signed values would be half the size, with the extra bit being used to determine if it was positive or negative.
I also looked for a 2^128 data type, but I only found the Quad type, which is a floating point type rather than an integer, and so doesn't belong in this list.
In any case, 2^128 = 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456
*Edit: Double is of floating-point type too, I completely forgot. Thanks to BC_Programming for reminding me.
Simple answer because it can't if we it is impossible a better idea is would to make the world loop go around the world get an achievement called around the world the game would be 30,000,000 still but it would loop people normally don't go this far as everyone above already tells you, people on factions or any other server usually set the barrier to 30,000 or 50,000 it's to reduce lag if you didn't know you should get the idea from here.
If you don't already know, the PC Minecraft world isn't infinite. It ends 30,000,000 blocks from spawn, with a worldborder: (As of 1.8)
Why does Minecraft's terrain have to end? Couldn't Mojang make it generate forever? Why does it benefit the game to end the terrain at 30,000,000 X/Z? I'm curious to see what the answer is.
Check out Mineplex, it's a very
popularcrappy server.I'm stuck at home , yay!
Oi, do you want to change the world? Yup
Then get off your bottom and see how many things you can do to help the environment.
And i dont even play minecraft anymore.
Everfree Server - A small & friendly survival build server for older 'Crafters.
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Proud Moderator of Underground Miner, a now-dead server. 4 years of moderating, and it was a good time.
I'm not complaining about Minecraft being finite, I'm just wondering why it is finite. No hate here. Just curiosity.
I would think even making it to X/Z 30,000,000 would be a memory problem though.
That makes sense. I was wondering what the technical side to it was. Thanks!
But yeah the basics is that the code has tiny errors that eventually stack up the more terrain is generated, until you see the glitches shown in previous versions. And not just the terrain derping, but other weird stuff too.
Everfree Server - A small & friendly survival build server for older 'Crafters.
But in my opinion, I'm glad they got rid of the Farlands and replaced them with world borders. I never liked the Far lands and I don't understand why people like them so much.
In computers, everything is finite. I don't know it the 30,000,000 limit is arbitrary or there is a computational reason, but a computers ability to calculate really large numbers is not infinite. As the numbers get bigger, more time and power is needed to compute them, more memory is needed to hold them, more space is needed to store them . All computer software puts limits on the size of everything.
Thanks for clearing that up for me.
Again, I wasn't quite sure, but I did knew it would cause some problems.
Check out Mineplex, it's a very
popularcrappy server.I'm stuck at home , yay!
Oi, do you want to change the world? Yup
Then get off your bottom and see how many things you can do to help the environment.
It's a bit odd that it's limited to 2^26 (including negative coords), rather than 2^16 (65,536) or 2^32 (4,294,967,296), as those are standard limits for number storage (short and int respectively), but there may be some multiplication in the generator which may hit these limits. (2^26 * 2^6 = 2^32)
Note on data sizes:
Bit = 2^1 = 2 (the smallest unit of memory only has 2 states, 0 or 1)
Byte = 2^8 = 256 (the height of the Minecraft world)
Short = 2^16 = 65,536 (the number of blocks in a chunk, also equal to 16 * 16 * 256)
Int = 2^32 = 4,294,967,296 (32 bit computers are limited in register size by this value (basically the active space onto which operations are applied by the processor), or so my minute or so of research says)
Double* = 2^64 = 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 (like above, but for 64 bit computers. You can see how much this makes 64-bit computers run better)Keep in mind that all these values represent the unsigned versions (only positive numbers), the signed values would be half the size, with the extra bit being used to determine if it was positive or negative.
I also looked for a 2^128 data type, but I only found the Quad type, which is a floating point type rather than an integer, and so doesn't belong in this list.
In any case, 2^128 = 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456
*Edit: Double is of floating-point type too, I completely forgot. Thanks to BC_Programming for reminding me.
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