Sodium Shadowy Path Blocks

Mod

by Rynnavinx

Reintroduces vanilla-like smooth lighting to non-full blocks (e.g. dirt paths and how they have dark shading when directly next to a full block) when using Sodium.

Type

Mod

CurseForge Downloads

9,708,927

CurseForge ID

556408

Modrinth Downloads

25,107,293

Modrinth ID

EIa1eiMm

Last Updated

Nov 7, 2026

Description

Sodium Shadowy Path Blocks (SSPB)

Sodium Shadowy Path Blocks (or SSPB for short) is an addon to Sodium that reintroduces vanilla-like smooth lighting to non-fluid non-full blocks (e.g. dirt paths and how they have dark shading when directly next to a full block), as Sodium removes this (or rather, fixes this, as it's technically a bug).

This was mainly made because I liked the shadowyness of the vanilla dirt paths, hence the name.

Unless "Use vanilla lighting for path blocks" is enabled, this lighting will not be exactly the same as vanilla, only vanilla-like, as the way I'm doing this is entirely based on Sodium's smooth lighting code.

Requires Sodium (duh) and only has an effect with smooth lighting enabled.

Not associated with Sodium or CaffeineMC.

Options

Shadowyness: How strong these "bugged" shadows are from 0-100%. Won't affect path blocks if "Use vanilla lighting for path blocks" is on. Defaults to 85%.
Only affect path blocks: This lighting "bug" (both in vanilla and this mod) also affects other non-full blocks, such as farmland, slabs, stairs, fences, etc. Turn this setting on to only apply the "bugged" lighting to path blocks, and use sodium's fixed lighting for everything else. Defaults to off.
Use vanilla lighting for path blocks: Use a vanilla-accurate algorithm to render path block lighting, rather than a modified version of Sodium's lighting algorithm. Will disable the effect of the "Shadowyness" option on path blocks. If used on a version before 4.x.x, requires Indium and Fabric API (or Quilted Fabric API if using Quilt) to enable. Defaults to off.

Incompatibilities

On MC versions before 1.19, when using any mod that renders path blocks with Indium (for example, mods that give path blocks connected textures), they will not become shadowy with this mod. The lighting changes, however, still work on other blocks, and the game will still launch.
If you still want shadowy path blocks: Go to .minecraft/config/indium-renderer.properties and change "ambient-occlusion-mode=auto" to "ambient-occlusion-mode=hybrid". You will no longer need SSPB after this unless you still want the lighting changes for blocks other than path blocks. Note that if you keep SSPB installed, the shadowyness option will still have no effect on path blocks. The shading for path blocks will look like the vanilla screenshots below, rather than the SSPB screenshots, regardless of whether or not SSPB is installed.

Screenshots/Comparisons (using all default options)

Comparison on a fancy path (and also some bamboo)