Complementary Unbound Shaders

When it comes to choosing a shader pack, most Minecraft YouTubers and streamers opt for one of the two variants of the Complementary shader pack - Reimagined or Unbound. This is because Complementary provides mesmerizing visuals and is highly configurable. While Complementary Reimagined focuses on enhancing vanilla visuals, Complementary Unbound focuses on realism. Let us take a look at some of the best features of Complementary Unbound.

Photorealistic Lighting

Photorealistic Lighting

Global illumination that looks natural

The lighting introduced by this shader pack behaves in a very realistic manner. The light rays seem to exhibit features like volumetry, where the light appears to interact with particles in the air. The pack simply provides lighting that are on par with many other high-end shader packs.

Dynamic Shadows

Reactive Shadows

Shadows are dynamic and react to changes

The shadows introduces by this pack are very reactive to changes in the environment. They are dynamic, meaning their shape and size depends on the angle light falls on them. And they are highly reactive, as changes in environment causes a direct change in their appearance. The shadows also appear to soften as they get further from the object, simulating realism.

Volumetric Clouds and Fog

Volumetric Behavior

Clouds and fog are volumetric

When comparing Complementary Reimagined and Unbound, one of the most notable difference is in the clouds. While the Reimagined version has rectangular clouds with rounded edges, the Unbound version has three-dimensional volumetric clouds. The fog effect in both shader versions are volumetric.

Weather Effects

Rain Effects

Rain induced fog and darkness

In the vanilla game, the only difference between clear weather and rain are the rain droplets. But this is not the case with Complementary shader pack installed. When the weather turns to rain on thunder, the entire world reacts to it. Clouds become denser, hiding the sky. Fog thicken, and the environment becomes darker overall.

Realistic Water

Realistic Water

Water surface behaves realistically

This is another place where a major difference between Reimagined and Unbound can be noticed. In the Reimagined version, water surfaces appear pixelated, similar to vanilla water. But in the case of Unbound, the water appears to have wave and distortions with no pixelation whatsoever. This is very much evident of the fact that Unbound focuses on realism, unlike Reimagined.

Underwater Visuals

Underwater Effects

Refraction and Caustics

Certain effects can be noted to be in play when underwater. Light appears to scatter into rays when coming in through the water surface, simulating refraction. If you take a look at the bottom surface of the water body, you can notice caustics forming on them. Caustics are the wave like patterns that appear at the bottom of pools.

Integrated PBR

In-built PBR

No resource pack required!

Both versions of the Complementary shader pack comes with an integrated PBR feature that can be toggled in the front page of the shader pack settings itself. This effect makes all block surfaces have features that react to light as if they were three-dimensional textures.

LabPBR Support

LabPBR Support

Resource pack required!

The integrated PBR option can be clicked to toggle it to LabPBR. This allows you to use resource packs that introduce high-quality PBR textures. The shader light reacts and reflects off these PBR surfaces in a very realistic manner.

The Nether

The Nether

Colorful fog effects and more!

The Nether is a place filled with many different light variations and light sources. This makes path for many different effects to take place. One notable feature introduced to the Nether is the colored fog effect. The color of fog depends on the biome you are in, as seen in the image above.

Blocks like warped and crimson fungi appear to have glowing particles on them. Their stems appear to have the same effect. The colored fog makes exploring the Nether a truly unique experience.

The End

The image comparison above pretty much sums up all the effects in the End dimension. Purple sky, stars, and an overall purple tint that is seen to be applied on almost all blocks. The End effects introduced by this pack is very unique and manages to place this pack amongst a collection of few packs that overhaul the End dimension.

Distant Horizons

Distant Horizons Compatible

View the horizon and beyond!

One of the main selling point of the Complementary shader pack is the support Distant Horizons, an LoD mod that allows you to generate and view thousands of chunks. With Complementary, shaders effects will apply to the LoD chunks too, helping make the game look more immersive.

Euphoria Patches

Euphoria Patches

Further enhance the visuals!

Euphoria Patches is an add-on mod made to be used alongside the Complementary shader pack. Visual effects like the Crystal Vortex and Influential Auroras that are shown in the image above are only possible with Euphoria Patches installed alongside the shader pack. There are many more effects introduced by this add-on that can be explored in our Euphoria Patches article.

Performance

This is a shader pack that is made for performance. Even if the default settings seem resource intensive, you can simply lower shader settings with just a click. Many different presets, ranging from Low to Ultra are provided in the shader pack settings, which will help improve performance.

Our testing was conducted on a mid-end laptop: AMD Ryzen 5 processor and AMD Radeon RX6500M GPU. The pack provided around 40-50 FPS on High preset and 30-40 on Ultra preset. If you have a system with a low-end integrated GPU, you can try the Potato preset and the shader pack should give decent performance.