Orbital Laser 0.5.1: Downfall

A sixth laser: Downfall. The Mothership drops in and starts to charge, but a meteor the size of a hill is coming down on it. Its roof turrets turn and fire and break the rock up, the pieces hit it anyway, and the ship falls out of the sky, crashes into the land and buries itself half its height. Then the black hole engine in its stern ruptures and swallows the wreck.

Install

1. Get the Orbital Laser build of Horizon (0.5.1 needs the new one, orbital-mod-api-3: it runs on Horizon's new renderer, and flying speed and typing on the mod's screen are new in its mod API): download horizon-orbital-linux-x86_64.tar.gz from Stink-O/horizon releases and unpack it to ~/horizon-orbital. Prepare its resources once from your own Minecraft 26.3 (./horizon-prepare --prepare --server-jar PATH/TO/server.jar), or point HORIZON_RESOURCES at the prepared resources of a Horizon you already have.
2. Download orbital-laser-v0.5.1.zip below, unzip it, and with the game closed run python3 install.py.
3. Run ./play.sh (a creative test world) or ./play.sh MyWorld.
4. In the game, type /orbital give. Press R (or right-click the Orbital Remote) for the laser wheel, and hold right-click with the Designator on a target to fire. The Downfall is on the wheel's second page.

Stuck, or want an AI agent to do it? Paste the prompt from the README into your coding agent.

Needs: the Orbital Laser build of Horizon (with your own copy of Minecraft Java 26.3) and Python 3.8 or newer for the installer.

Warning

A strike is destructive and permanent. Every laser digs a crater and a shaft to bedrock and kills the mobs round it. The Downfall is the biggest yet: it buries a kilometre-long wreck at least 360 blocks in front of you, crushes the land under its whole length, heaps the ground it displaced up along both its sides, and its black hole leaves a crater with arms out to 150 blocks and a shaft to bedrock. The crushing carries on for up to a minute after the strike. Back up your world first, or switch terrain damage off on the wheel.

Important

Stock Horizon can't run this mod. Horizon's mod API doesn't yet let a mod catch an item's use, open its own screen, draw effects or change the world. The Orbital Laser build is a Horizon fork that adds those four, from Horizon's own roadmap. On stock Horizon, python3 install.py --legacy sets up 0.1's way of doing it instead.

Warning

Early and experimental. Developed and tested on one Linux PC (Fedora, NVIDIA). Windows and macOS are untested, and the ready-built Horizon is Linux x86-64 only.

New

• Downfall, the sixth laser, on the wheel's second page and /orbital downfall:
  • the Mothership drops in and charges, then the charge is cut and its power thrown to the turrets along its roof as a meteor comes in, first a point of light far off, then a burning, tumbling rock;
  • the turrets turn on their rings, lay their twin barrels on it and fire, and the rock breaks up past the ship's bow;
  • the pieces hit it anyway: fire bursts through the hull, chunks come away burning, and it lurches down as its lift gives, then falls free;
  • its stern strikes, its bow slams down and the hull shudders, blasts bursting along it and earth flung up in sheets, until it is buried half its height, crushing what it landed on;
  • then its black hole engine fails and ruptures, tearing the wreck apart piece by piece and drawing it in, before it collapses in a flash and bores a shaft to bedrock.
• A second page on the wheel, turned with its arrows, its tabs or a right-click.
• A colour for each ship: the Mothership green, the Downfall red, or amber, blue, violet or white, from the swatches beside the arrival row or /orbital colour ….
• Faster flying for getting round the craters: the FLY SPEED bar over the wheel's title (1x to 40x) and the box beside it (type any speed up to 1000x), or /orbital flyspeed N.
• Switches for the clutter: MESSAGES turns off the strikes' messages over the hotbar, and PANEL hides the status panel (/orbital messages off, /orbital hud off).
• /orbital skip SECONDS starts the next strike part way in, with terrain damage off, to look at one moment of it.
• Every blast now clears to the sky: a strike under a hill or a mountain no longer leaves a tunnel or floating hilltops.
• No more "it took too long": a strike's heavier world changes are worked out a little each tick.
• On Horizon's new renderer. Horizon replaced its shader-pack support, and the fork now gives a mod its own post pass on the new renderer; the effects look as they did.
• A new logo.

Assets

file	what
orbital-laser-v0.5.1.zip	the mod (orbital/), install.py and play.sh: unzip and run python3 install.py; needs the Orbital Laser build of Horizon
Source code (zip / tar.gz)	the whole repository: the mod's source, the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon, and the tools

Important

Nothing from Minecraft is included. This is an independent fan project, not affiliated with Mojang, Microsoft or Horizon's author. It runs on top of Horizon and needs your own copy of the game.

Orbital Laser 0.5.0: Mothership

A fifth laser: Mothership. A kilometre-long ship of dark metal and green light drops out of hyperspace over the target, drills a shaft to bedrock and sweeps its beam across the land, cutting a molten trench, then is gone. And every laser now shakes the real camera.

Install

1. Get the Orbital Laser build of Horizon (0.5.0 needs the new one, orbital-mod-api-2: the camera shake and the longer raycast are new in its mod API): download horizon-orbital-linux-x86_64.tar.gz from Stink-O/horizon releases and unpack it to ~/horizon-orbital. Prepare its resources once from your own Minecraft 26.3 (./horizon-prepare --prepare --server-jar PATH/TO/server.jar), or point HORIZON_RESOURCES at the prepared resources of a Horizon you already have.
2. Download orbital-laser-v0.5.0.zip below, unzip it, and with the game closed run python3 install.py.
3. Run ./play.sh (a creative test world) or ./play.sh MyWorld.
4. In the game, type /orbital give. Press R (or right-click the Orbital Remote) for the laser wheel, and hold right-click with the Designator on a target to fire.

Stuck, or want an AI agent to do it? Paste the prompt from the README into your coding agent.

Needs: the Orbital Laser build of Horizon (with your own copy of Minecraft Java 26.3) and Python 3.8 or newer for the installer.

Warning

A strike is destructive and permanent. It flattens everything above the ground within about 44 blocks (52 for the Black Hole), digs a crater about 60 blocks across and a shaft down to bedrock, and kills every mob and dropped item within 40 blocks (players are spared). The Meteor Storm is far bigger: craters across 120 blocks, everything above the ground flattened out to 100 blocks, a crater about 125 blocks across, the land charred out to 135, rubble thrown out to 250 and every mob within 130 blocks killed. The Mothership vaporises the land out to 34 blocks, digs a crater 22 across and a shaft to bedrock, and cuts a trench 100 blocks long, up to 15 wide and 17 deep, away from you. Back up your world first, or switch terrain damage off on the wheel.

Important

Stock Horizon can't run this mod. Horizon's mod API doesn't yet let a mod catch an item's use, open its own screen, draw effects or change the world. The Orbital Laser build is a Horizon fork that adds those four, from Horizon's own roadmap. On stock Horizon, python3 install.py --legacy sets up 0.1's way of doing it instead.

Warning

Early and experimental. Developed and tested on one Linux PC (Fedora, NVIDIA). Windows and macOS are untested, and the ready-built Horizon is Linux x86-64 only.

New

• Mothership, the fifth laser, on the wheel and /orbital mothership:
  • a slab of dark metal over a kilometre long drops out of hyperspace and stops dead over the target; the air ripples, the land dims under its shadow and its green lights cascade on from stern to bow;
  • its emitters charge and converge under its eye, and a green beam with a white-hot core drills a shaft to bedrock;
  • the beam sweeps away from you, cutting a molten trench 100 blocks long that crusts over and steams as it cools;
  • then it pulls away into a streak, and its boom follows it out.
• Pick the approach and the arrival on the wheel, in two rows under the ring: ahead, behind, left, right or straight down from above; and a film-style snap, unfolding out of a point, or out of a warp streak. Also /orbital approach … and /orbital arrival ….
• Range out to 1000 blocks for the Mothership. Past your render distance it aims across Horizon's distant terrain, so turn on LOD Distance in Video Settings for the full range.
• Real camera shake on every laser. The old screen jitter is gone: the game turns the camera itself, so the world, your hand and the effects move together, and each jolt lands with the sound, weaker the further off you are.
• The ground breaking is heard from the impact, not in your ears wherever you are.
• The Mothership is mod-only: the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon still has Plasma and Godly.

Assets

file	what
orbital-laser-v0.5.0.zip	the mod (orbital/), install.py and play.sh: unzip and run python3 install.py; needs the Orbital Laser build of Horizon
Source code (zip / tar.gz)	the whole repository: the mod's source, the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon, and the tools

Important

Nothing from Minecraft is included. This is an independent fan project, not affiliated with Mojang, Microsoft or Horizon's author. It runs on top of Horizon and needs your own copy of the game.

Orbital Laser 0.4.0: Meteor Storm

A fourth laser: Meteor Storm. 72 meteors pound the land for 120 blocks round the target, then one the size of a hill comes down on it. The most destructive of the four.

Install

1. Get the Orbital Laser build of Horizon: download horizon-orbital-linux-x86_64.tar.gz from Stink-O/horizon releases and unpack it to ~/horizon-orbital. Prepare its resources once from your own Minecraft 26.3 (./horizon-prepare --prepare --server-jar PATH/TO/server.jar), or point HORIZON_RESOURCES at the prepared resources of a Horizon you already have.
2. Download orbital-laser-v0.4.0.zip below, unzip it, and with the game closed run python3 install.py.
3. Run ./play.sh (a creative test world) or ./play.sh MyWorld.
4. In the game, type /orbital give. Press R (or right-click the Orbital Remote) for the laser wheel, and hold right-click with the Designator on a target to fire.

Stuck, or want an AI agent to do it? Paste the prompt from the README into your coding agent.

Needs: the Orbital Laser build of Horizon (with your own copy of Minecraft Java 26.3) and Python 3.8 or newer for the installer.

Warning

A strike is destructive and permanent. It flattens everything above the ground within about 44 blocks (52 for the Black Hole), digs a crater about 60 blocks across and a shaft down to bedrock, and kills every mob and dropped item within 40 blocks (players are spared). The Meteor Storm is far bigger: craters across 120 blocks, everything above the ground flattened out to 100 blocks, a crater about 125 blocks across, the land charred out to 135, rubble thrown out to 250 and every mob within 130 blocks killed. Back up your world first, or switch terrain damage off on the wheel.

Important

Stock Horizon can't run this mod. Horizon's mod API doesn't yet let a mod catch an item's use, open its own screen, draw effects or change the world. The Orbital Laser build is a Horizon fork that adds those four, from Horizon's own roadmap. On stock Horizon, python3 install.py --legacy sets up 0.1's way of doing it instead.

Warning

Early and experimental. Developed and tested on one Linux PC (Fedora, NVIDIA). Windows and macOS are untested, and the ready-built Horizon is Linux x86-64 only.

New

• Meteor Storm, the fourth laser, on the wheel and /orbital meteor:
  • 72 meteors, from tiny to big, come in from high in the atmosphere along curved paths, burning, with trails of fire and smoke that hang in the sky;
  • they land scattered and in clusters across 120 blocks round the target, each with a flash, a ground shockwave and a dust skirt, and each blows out a real round crater with a meteorite at the bottom, a lip of rubble and fires;
  • then the big one: a white-out, and a fireball that tears open in a different shape every time and throws glowing ejecta out every way;
  • everything above the ground goes out to 100 blocks, a crater about 125 blocks across is blown out with a raised rim, a shaft to bedrock and lava on its floor, and the land is charred out to 135;
  • real blocks are thrown out as far as 250 blocks, and ash comes down over everything.
• Its own sounds, made to sound like real footage rather than a game: a whoosh as each meteor comes in, hits sized to the meteor that arrive later and muffled the further off they land (sound travels at its real speed), and a deep blast for the big one with rumbling debris after it.
• Faster strikes. Block changes are spread over the ticks (up to 20,000 blocks a tick) instead of landing all at once, the biggest stages are worked out only when they're due, the post pass is warmed up when the mod loads so the first strike doesn't hitch, and the Black Hole costs less to draw.
• The Meteor Storm is mod-only: the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon still has Plasma and Godly.

Assets

file	what
orbital-laser-v0.4.0.zip	the mod (orbital/), install.py and play.sh: unzip and run python3 install.py; needs the Orbital Laser build of Horizon
Source code (zip / tar.gz)	the whole repository: the mod's source, the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon, and the tools

Important

Nothing from Minecraft is included. This is an independent fan project, not affiliated with Mojang, Microsoft or Horizon's author. It runs on top of Horizon and needs your own copy of the game.

Orbital Laser 0.3.0

A third laser: Black Hole. A singularity snaps open over the target, bends the light round it, rips the terrain up into orbit and swallows it.

Install

1. Get the Orbital Laser build of Horizon: download horizon-orbital-linux-x86_64.tar.gz from Stink-O/horizon releases and unpack it to ~/horizon-orbital. Prepare its resources once from your own Minecraft 26.3 (./horizon-prepare --prepare --server-jar PATH/TO/server.jar), or point HORIZON_RESOURCES at the prepared resources of a Horizon you already have.
2. Download orbital-laser-v0.3.0.zip below, unzip it, and with the game closed run python3 install.py.
3. Run ./play.sh (a creative test world) or ./play.sh MyWorld.
4. In the game, type /orbital give. Press R (or right-click the Orbital Remote) for the laser wheel, and hold right-click with the Designator on a target to fire.

Stuck, or want an AI agent to do it? Paste the prompt from the README into your coding agent.

Needs: the Orbital Laser build of Horizon (with your own copy of Minecraft Java 26.3) and Python 3.8 or newer for the installer.

Warning

A strike is destructive and permanent. It flattens everything above the ground within about 44 blocks (52 for the Black Hole), digs a crater about 60 blocks across and a shaft down to bedrock, and kills every mob and dropped item within 40 blocks (players are spared). Back up your world first, or switch terrain damage off on the wheel.

Important

Stock Horizon can't run this mod. Horizon's mod API doesn't yet let a mod catch an item's use, open its own screen, draw effects or change the world. The Orbital Laser build is a Horizon fork that adds those four, from Horizon's own roadmap. On stock Horizon, python3 install.py --legacy sets up 0.1's way of doing it instead.

Warning

Early and experimental. Developed and tested on one Linux PC (Fedora, NVIDIA). Windows and macOS are untested, and the ready-built Horizon is Linux x86-64 only.

New

• Black Hole, the third laser, on the wheel and /orbital blackhole:
  • the sky goes dark and starry, a violet spiral winds in on the ground, and the whole picture is sucked in towards one point;
  • then it snaps open 28 blocks up: the picture flashes negative and a ripple of bent space tears across the screen;
  • its light bending is traced for real, so the land and sky behind it warp round it, and its accretion disk shows its far side over the top and under the bottom, brighter on the side turning towards you;
  • a jet pours out of both poles and bores down to bedrock;
  • it evaporates in a blinding flash after about ten seconds.
• Terrain ripped into orbit. 160 blocks and chunks are torn out of the ground round the crater (the real ones are removed as they go) and tumble up round the hole. Most stretch, glow red-hot and are swallowed at the horizon, some are slingshotted away, and real blocks spat out of the disk come down as rubble across the land.
• What it leaves: the land dragged into spiral arms of sculk and black concrete, streams of rock reaching up towards where it hung, a crater lined with obsidian and crying obsidian, and a ring of rock left hanging where the disk was.
• Its own sounds, synthesized from scratch: an inhale that cuts dead, a vast low blast, the hole's drone, the evaporation.
• The Black Hole is mod-only: the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon still has Plasma and Godly.

Assets

file	what
orbital-laser-v0.3.0.zip	the mod (orbital/), install.py and play.sh: unzip and run python3 install.py; needs the Orbital Laser build of Horizon
Source code (zip / tar.gz)	the whole repository: the mod's source, the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon, and the tools

Important

Nothing from Minecraft is included. This is an independent fan project, not affiliated with Mojang, Microsoft or Horizon's author. It runs on top of Horizon and needs your own copy of the game.

Orbital Laser 0.2.0

Orbital Laser is now a mod that runs inside the game. Hold the Orbital Laser Designator on a target, and a beam drops from orbit and digs a crater and a shaft down to bedrock. Pick the laser from a wheel: Plasma or the new Godly.

Install

1. Get the Orbital Laser build of Horizon: download horizon-orbital-linux-x86_64.tar.gz from Stink-O/horizon releases and unpack it to ~/horizon-orbital. Prepare its resources once from your own Minecraft 26.3 (./horizon-prepare --prepare --server-jar PATH/TO/server.jar), or point HORIZON_RESOURCES at the prepared resources of a Horizon you already have.
2. Download orbital-laser-v0.2.0.zip below, unzip it, and with the game closed run python3 install.py.
3. Run ./play.sh (a creative test world) or ./play.sh MyWorld.
4. In the game, type /orbital give. Press R (or right-click the Orbital Remote) for the laser wheel, and hold right-click with the Designator on a target to fire.

Stuck, or want an AI agent to do it? Paste the prompt from the README into your coding agent.

Needs: the Orbital Laser build of Horizon (with your own copy of Minecraft Java 26.3) and Python 3.8 or newer for the installer.

Warning

A strike is destructive and permanent. It flattens everything above the ground within about 44 blocks, digs a crater about 60 blocks across and a shaft down to bedrock, and kills every mob and dropped item within 40 blocks (players are spared). Back up your world first, or switch terrain damage off on the wheel.

Important

Stock Horizon can't run this mod. Horizon's mod API doesn't yet let a mod catch an item's use, open its own screen, draw effects or change the world. The Orbital Laser build is a Horizon fork that adds those four, from Horizon's own roadmap. On stock Horizon, python3 install.py --legacy sets up 0.1's way of doing it instead.

Warning

Early and experimental. Developed and tested on one Linux PC (Fedora, NVIDIA). Windows and macOS are untested, and the ready-built Horizon is Linux x86-64 only.

New

• A real mod. The strike, the crater and the sounds run inside the game, with no script and nothing in chat.
• Real items: the Orbital Laser Designator and the Orbital Remote, with their own textures, and /orbital give to get them.
• The laser wheel, on the remote or R: Plasma, Godly, and terrain damage on or off in the middle. Rebind R in Options → Controls → Key Binds.
• Godly, the new laser:
  • a golden sigil burns into the ground while the clouds roll in and tear open overhead;
  • a calm pillar of light comes down, with halo rings and wings standing in the sky;
  • six pillars of light land round it and a dome of light swells out;
  • it leaves a crater of quartz and gold, the sigil etched in gold, six quartz pillars, a wave of flowers and chunks of rock floating above the crater.
• Plasma, reworked:
  • a 3D fireball that climbs into a mushroom cloud;
  • the crater's walls fused into obsidian, black glass and magma;
  • lava pools that crust over into obsidian, fires round the rim, and rubble coming down across the land.
• Everything is in the world. The effects stay put when you move and sit behind hills in front of them. Nothing is painted flat on the screen but the lens.
• No packs to select. The effects are the mod's own post-processing pass and the sounds ship inside the mod.
• A status panel while you hold either item: the loaded laser and whether terrain damage is on.

Assets

file	what
orbital-laser-v0.2.0.zip	the mod (orbital/), install.py and play.sh: unzip and run python3 install.py; needs the Orbital Laser build of Horizon
Source code (zip / tar.gz)	the whole repository: the mod's source, the 0.1 setup for stock Horizon, and the tools

Important

Nothing from Minecraft is included. This is an independent fan project, not affiliated with Mojang, Microsoft or Horizon's author. It runs on top of Horizon and needs your own copy of the game.

Orbital Laser 0.1.0

The first release: a terrestrial orbital laser strike for Horizon. Scope in with the Orbital Laser Designator, point at anything up to 200 blocks away, and a beam drops from orbit and digs a crater and a shaft down to bedrock.

Install

1. Download orbital-laser-v0.1.0.zip below and unzip it.
2. Run python3 install.py. It copies the shader pack and the sound pack into Horizon's game folder (~/.local/share/horizon, or $HORIZON_HOME).
3. Turn them on: with the game closed, run python3 install.py --enable. Or in the game: Options → Video Settings → Shader Packs → orbital-laser-shader → Apply, then Options → Resource Packs → enable orbital-sounds.
4. Start Horizon through its control tool in a world with cheats on: ./horizon-ctl launch --world MyWorld --creative --wait
5. Run python3 strike.py --daemon, press 9 for the Orbital Laser Designator, right-click and hold to look through the scope, aim, and keep holding for about a second.

Stuck, or want an AI agent to do it? Run python3 strike.py --doctor, or paste the prompt from the README into your coding agent.

Needs: Horizon (with your own copy of Minecraft Java 26.3) and Python 3.8 or newer. If horizon-ctl isn't on your PATH, pass --ctl /path/to/horizon-ctl or set HORIZON_CTL.

Warning

A strike is destructive and permanent. It carves a crater about 20 blocks across and a shaft down to bedrock, and kills every mob and dropped item within 40 blocks (players are spared). Back up your world first.

Warning

Early and experimental. Developed and tested on one Linux PC (Fedora, NVIDIA), against the Horizon build released 2026-10-19. Windows and macOS are untested. The designator is a renamed spyglass and the strike is run by a script outside the game, because Horizon's mod API can't change the world yet.

New

• The strike:
  • a red designator beam and converging reticle rings while it charges;
  • a plasma beam from orbit with twisting strands, surges, sparks and forked lightning;
  • a shockwave, camera shake and a molten crater glow;
  • a dark smoke column that rises and disperses.
• Real terrain damage:
  • a rough crater about 20 blocks across, trees stripped from a 24-block radius and the ground scorched to blackstone;
  • a shaft that funnels down and then runs straight to bedrock, with magma and lava at the bottom;
  • every mob and dropped item within 40 blocks killed, except players.
• Custom sound design: eight sounds synthesized from scratch (charge-up, lock-on, impact, plasma roar, rumble, crackle, rockfall, spool-down), layered with vanilla thunder.
• No two strikes alike: each one picks a colour (blue, magenta or green), power surges, beam sway and lightning density at random.
• Point and fire: the spyglass designator fires where your crosshair lands, up to 200 blocks away, with no block in reach needed.
• Quiet: nothing it does appears in chat.
• Easy setup: python3 install.py --enable installs and switches everything on, python3 strike.py --doctor checks the whole setup and says how to fix it, and the README has a copy-paste prompt that lets an AI agent do the setup for you on any system.
• Tools: an offline shader validator, a sound generator and a screenshot helper that recovers the real colours.

Assets

file	what
orbital-laser-v0.1.0.zip	the shader pack, the sound pack, strike.py and install.py: unzip and run python3 install.py; needs Horizon
Source code (zip / tar.gz)	the whole repository, including the developer tools

Important

Nothing from Minecraft is included. This is an independent fan project, not affiliated with Mojang, Microsoft or Horizon's author. It runs on top of Horizon and needs your own copy of the game.