Japan's government uses Minecraft to show off a huge, real-world infrastructure project

(Image credit: Mojang/国土交通省九州地方整備局 via YouTube)

A branch of Japan's government has used Minecraft to demonstrate how it plans to build a real-world dam.

As Automaton Media reports, a YouTube account linked to Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism has uploaded the video just below. The video's title is 'We tried making the Tatsuno Dam in Minecraft!' because it's actually a recreation of a real-world dam project currently underway in Kumamoto, Japan.

In just over a minute, the YouTube video gives viewers a bird' s-eye view of what the Tatsuno Dam will look like when it's eventually completed. The dam is fully there in its finished form, and the Minecraft recreation has even factored in the surrounding landscape and vegetation on either side of the dam once it's been completed.

The brief video is quietly very funny - it's got a 'homemade' vibe to it, what with the Apple desktop bar still very clearly visible at the top of the screen. Certain sections were seemingly recorded at eight in the evening - please stop working and go home, Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism worker!

According to Automaton Media, the video has caused a bit of a stir in the Japanese online community, with some jumping to praise the detail displayed in the recreation. It's even got people speculating about the hardware the dam was reconstructed on, since there's a lot of pop-in during the presentation.

Tatsuno Dam will apparently be up and operational in the real world at some point next year in 2024. Nagano Prefecture already has plenty of dams, from a cursory Google search, but it looks as though Tatsuno Dam will stand head and shoulders above these smaller counterparts once it's finished.

Last month, Minecraft became the first game to sell over 300 million copies ever, and we wonder how many of those copies have been purchased by Japanese government workers.

Hirun Cryer is a freelance reporter and writer with Gamesradar+ based out of U.K. After earning a degree in American History specializing in journalism, cinema, literature, and history, he stepped into the games writing world, with a focus on shooters, indie games, and RPGs, and has since been the recipient of the MCV 30 Under 30 award for 2021. In his spare time he freelances with other outlets around the industry, practices Japanese, and enjoys contemporary manga and anime.