22-year-old student recreated the whole of Switzerland in Minecraft on a 1:1 scale
Such an idea was born after purchasing a 3D printer.
22-year-old ETH student Beda Gude has created the whole of Switzerland on a 1:1 scale in the game Minecraft. For this, he used open geodata from the Swisstopo topographic office.
Every block in the game is equal to one meter in real life. The highest point of the virtual space — Dufour Peak in the Pennine Alps — reaches a height of 4,634 blocks, which corresponds to its real height above sea level.
The project covers an area of 41,285 square kilometers and includes mountains, forests, bodies of water, cities, and dams. There was no need to place billions of cubes by hand: a program written by the author automatically transferred the data into the game.
This idea arose after purchasing a 3D printer. The student had planned to print Swiss buildings and landscapes as close to the original as possible, but in the end, this work turned into a large-scale digital model of the entire country.
Although it was initially just a hobby, the author now plans to monetize his work by selling licenses. The proceeds will be directed toward covering costs and further improving the project. Plans include improving the graphics of lakes and rocks, as well as fixing shortcomings.
The result can also be viewed for free: a 1.1 GB demo version of the high-altitude Jungfrau-Aletsch region has been made publicly available. To run it, Minecraft Java Edition 1.12.2 with the Cubic Chunks mod installed (which removes the world height limit) and at least 16 gigabytes of RAM are required.
For now, only residents of Switzerland can purchase the full version. Its size is 24 GB, and the price is 15 francs (220 thousand soums).