Getting Metals, Gems, and Netherite Blocks to Reflect Properly

Why metal blocks look wrong

Block of Iron, Block of Gold, Block of Diamond, Block of Emerald, Block of Netherite, Block of Coal, and Block of Redstone all carry specular and roughness maps in Optimum Realism. Without a shader reading those maps, they render as flat colored cubes. With PBR active, they gain metalness, sharp highlights, and environment reflections.

Configure reflections

In your shader options, enable Specular Map and Roughness Map. Then enable screen-space reflections (SSR) or a sky/IBL reflection source — without one of these, metals have no environment to reflect and look dull. Set the reflection quality to at least medium; low settings blur the highlights into mush. If your shader has a 'Metalness' or 'PBR' master switch, make sure it is on.

Tune per-material look

Place Block of Gold, Block of Iron, and Block of Netherite side by side in daylight and at night. Gold should be warm and highly reflective, iron cooler and slightly rougher, netherite dark with subdued highlights. If all three look identical, your shader is ignoring the roughness map — check that 'Roughness' is enabled separately from 'Specular'. If highlights are blown out, lower the specular intensity in shader options rather than editing the pack.