What if, as part of the game release, notch added erosion. Erosion is the displacement of sediment and other dirt by means of moving water. This could be implemented in minecraft. Say that you have a minecraft stream/river. It could start out being around, say, 1 block deep and 3 blocks wide. After 5 days or so (ingame days) it would erode some of the dirt on the bottom of the river. This would then fill with water automatically. It could be done when no player is in the chunk that is being eroded so that the player doesnt notice. It would be random, so maybe a dirt block has a 1/3 chance of eroding every 5 ingame days, and a 1/9 chance of eroding sideways. This would eventually create large rivers and deep rivers, which would be nice eye candy and good stuff to explore. It would not erode through stone.
Also, regarding lakes. Say an ingame lake was around 10-20 square blocks, more or less. Every 5 days, one of the abovementioned events could happen, and the chance would increase as it got closer to the ground (1/3 for above sea level, 1/6 for sea level, 1/12 for below sea level). Minecraft also has a good algorithm to find low points of water, so ponder this: What if, every 7-10 days, minecraft would calculate the lowest spot nearest a lake and make the block closest to that low spot disapppear. This would eventually create cool looking rivers, and would mimic realistic desedimentation. This would give the game an all new look on water physics, and make players think before building underground near a lake without a sturdy cobblestone retaining wall.
I don't really like this idea, because it destroys the landscape in permeate ways. I like the idea of how slow it is, but i'm afraid that if it gets implemented to a single world for too long, the landscape may become flooded (I know that whould take weeks worth of hours to do)
Also, regarding lakes. Say an ingame lake was around 10-20 square blocks, more or less. Every 5 days, one of the abovementioned events could happen, and the chance would increase as it got closer to the ground (1/3 for above sea level, 1/6 for sea level, 1/12 for below sea level). Minecraft also has a good algorithm to find low points of water, so ponder this: What if, every 7-10 days, minecraft would calculate the lowest spot nearest a lake and make the block closest to that low spot disapppear. This would eventually create cool looking rivers, and would mimic realistic desedimentation. This would give the game an all new look on water physics, and make players think before building underground near a lake without a sturdy cobblestone retaining wall.
Constructive criticism is appreciated.
Yeah, but it would need to be slow, and I mean REALLY slow.
Also, players could end up getting pissed about their structures being eroded, and their natural canyons changing shape.
I like the idea, but doubt it will happen.