Vanilla RTX Normals

Vanilla Resources Made Available for Minecraft with RTX

Vanilla RTX is the go-to ray tracing resource pack for Minecraft RTX, bringing together a solid, coherent vision for Vanilla Minecraft with RTX since 2020—Enabling players to use Minecraft's ray tracing features in any world or servers by adding thoughtfully-crafted materials and configurations to the base game without altering the vanilla experience, delivering complete ray tracing support for Minecraft in a manner that integrates seamlessly while maintaining a native look and feel.

• Every possible vanilla block is supported (Creative, Education Edition, secret or unobtainable blocks, etc...)
• All blocks feature highly detailed, unique material designs that remain consistent across different blocks made of the same material. Every material has been thoughtfully designed to give each block the character it deserves while also preserving its original style and functionality—without diverging from the artist's intent inherent in the texture.
• Everything has been fine-tuned for Minecraft's ray tracing.
• Compatibility errors of vanilla resources with ray tracing are resolved through the Enhanced option as much as possible. (accessed from resource pack's settings)

For installation guide, visit Vanilla RTX's page.

Core Projects:

• Vanilla RTX uses 16x heightmaps with 192x normal maps generated based on height differences.
• Vanilla RTX Normals features handcrafted 16x normal maps instead.

Related Projects:

• Vanilla RTX Opus is the composition of both Vanilla RTX & Vanilla RTX Normals. (Coming Soon!)
• Vanilla RTX Pure is a derivation of Vanilla RTX without any height or normal mapping, resulting in flat textures that to some players is a more faithful representation of Vanilla RTX.
• Vanilla RTX Add-Ons are a series of smaller packages that give you the option to customize certain aspects of Vanilla RTX resource packs.
• Vanilla PBR is a branch of Vanilla RTX for Vibrant Visuals graphics mode usable on a wider range of hardware.

What is the difference between Vanilla RTX and Vanilla RTX Normals?

Vanilla RTX uses 16x heightmaps, which are later converted to a higher resolution normal map to simulate depth on a flat surface, Vanilla RTX Normals uses 16x normal maps instead, which simulate curvature on surfaces and how light should bounce off each individual pixel.
Only one can be used at a time, each will provide a vastly different appearance for all blocks.

First image showcases example blocks from Vanilla RTX while second image shows Vanilla RTX Normals.

Updated on June 28

Release Notes:

• All files within the pack now use TARGA format (where applicable), which comes with a few benefits:
- Less unnecessary data.
- More efficient batch-processing of files (benefits the upcoming Tuner app)

- Distributable package sizes have been reduced by up to 50% (This is also great for the Tuner app, which comes with the ability to auto-update Vanilla RTX)
- Unpacked package size is up to 10 times larger, which in turn leads to snappier load times in-game. (raw data, no decoding overhead)
- Unified colorspaces of all images to 8-bit per-channel RGBA.

• Removed Fogless Option
Note: Fog will be tunable in the future via the Vanilla RTX Tuner app, you will soon be able to thicken, lighten, or completely disable fog permanently!

• Removed all Education Edition content from the pack (decoupled into standalone, world-only packs which will be available soon)
• Updated fog format versions to 1.21.90
• Fixed missing MER animation of respawn anchor top, consistent with nether portals, through uniformly brighter, this inconsistency is intentional.
• The pack now utilizes textures_list.json and contents.json (built-in Minecraft features for caching)
•  Minimum engine version is now 1.21.90
• Other Changes
- Readded a subtle emissivity effect to dragon egg as it became clear in vibrant visuals this is the intended look of dragon egg.
- Increased Education Edition-related blocks' normal intensities, these changes transferred over the now-decoupled Chemistry RTX Normals pack, as well as Chemistry RTX Opus.
- Updated various MERs for consistency
- Quality adjustments to a variety of textures, sunflower, torches, allium flower, alongside various other normal map adjustments
- Revamped cobweb, with a new silky touch!
- Revamped lever, now consistent with cobblestone and wood.

▣ Enhanced (Option) Changelogs:

• Once again reverted spyglass workaround to 1.21.20, previous workaround's file size was unsensible.
• Lava now appears brighter in Enhanced option.
• Soul Torches emissivity workaround is now stronger in Enhanced option.

Updated on June 18

Release Notes:

• All 118 Element blocks (+ Unknown Element!) have been revamped, with each elemental category now exhibiting features that reflect the real-world appearance of their group:

- Alkali metals appear somewhat rough and heavily oxidized, while alkaline earth metals are a bit less so.
- Transition metals exhibit the highest metallicity, while other metals and metalloids appear significantly less metallic.
- Noble gases and halogens now feature an icy/crystalline look, indicating how they'd likely appear in solid form.
- Biologically essential nonmetals like hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon now have a plastic-like finish.
- Actinides use a rough, corroded surface with a subtle glow to suggest radioactivity — visually similar to alkaline earth metals, but with that added effect—other groups follow similar material logic to reflect their physical nature.

Each category also comes with new distinct normal maps designs to add an additional layer to their visual identity.

• Other Minecraft: Education Edition blocks have also been overhauled!

- Lab Table, Element Constructor, Material Reducer, and Compound Creator now feature fully-fledged designs.
- Chemical Heat Block PBR textures now use the correct size.

• Revamped appearance of TNT and Underwater TNT
• Other Changes:

- Updated various color texture formats for consistency.
- Minor texture tweaks and visual improvements across various blocks.
- Fixed anomalies on the stone normal map.

• Updated Lava Texture to 1.21.90:
The texture was changed to include 32 stages instead of 20, normal maps and MERs were updated to match the new size
- Lava now appears more vibrant than before
- Revamped normal map

• Improved emissivity of soul torch and underwater torch in the absence of hardcoded pointlights
-  Minor improvements to other torch types

▣ Enhanced (Option) Changelogs:

• Updated block destruct and slide particle configs to match recent vanilla game changes.
• Updated entity geometry format versions in Enhanced option to align with the latest vanilla changes.

Other Notes:

Vanilla RTX Normals 1.21.140 targets the upcoming 1.21.90 update of Minecraft. As such, minor issues (like missing block particles in the Enhanced option) will occur when using it with older game versions such as 1.21.80
Minimum engine version will be bumped to 1.21.90 in the next update!