Water that reacts and trees that move

Atmosphere week. The world used to look like a stage with painted scenery. Now it actually moves.

Stylized water

The new water shader is purpose-built for our look. Color sits between turquoise and deep ink depending on depth. The surface ripples on a slow wave layer and a fast micro-noise layer at the same time, so it doesn't read as a single repeating loop. An underwater shelf fades into proper depth fog when you get close to the edge.

Shorelines got the harder job. We are not happy with shorelines that look like a perfect line drawn around an island, so the foam edge runs on noise-warped distance and a small wave runup that catches the player's eye when they walk along the coast. The result is the kind of organic edge you would draw by hand.

Volumetric clouds

The skybox got a full overhaul. Clouds are now volumetric where the arena calls for them, drifting overhead at a believable speed, with a soft sun disc burning through them. Bachiki Atoll gets thick tropical cumulus. Ruins of Valgor gets the stormy version we use to set tone. Each arena gets the sky that fits it, and a couple of arenas stay clear on purpose.

Wind in the grass

Grass tufts and tree foliage now respond to a wind field. Blades bend, branches sway, and the whole world stops looking like a paused diorama. It is subtle, but it is the difference between an arena that looks frozen and one that looks like an outdoor place where a fight just happens to be breaking out.

None of this affects gameplay. Every collider, sightline, and hitbox is exactly where it was last week. The world just looks like a world now.