Modern 2D Water

Demo Videos ▶

First Steps & Setup 🚀

Requirements

Setup Steps

1. Ensure URP is Configured

   Go to Edit → Project Settings → Graphics and confirm a URP Pipeline Asset is assigned. If starting a new project, use the URP template.

2. Enable Read/Write on Custom Textures

   If you use custom textures for distortion or alpha, enable Read/Write in the texture import settings. The asset's built-in textures already have this enabled.

3. Add Water to Your Scene

   Create an empty GameObject and add the ModernWater2D component. A default water sprite is loaded automatically — no sprite assignment needed. Alternatively, drag a water prefab from the demo scenes.

4. Done!

   Layers (Water, WaterPostProcessing) and manager objects (2DWaterManagers) are created automatically. The water is ready to configure in the inspector.

Feature Overview ✦

Top-Down Water & Tilemap Mode 🗺

Modern 2D Water supports two render modes, selectable in Global Settings → Render Mode.

SpriteRenderer Mode (Default)

The standard mode. The ModernWater2D component lives on a GameObject with a SpriteRenderer. All features are available.

Tilemap Mode

For large, irregularly shaped, or tile-based bodies of water. Switching creates a child object WaterTilemap with Grid, Tilemap, and TilemapRenderer. The child is counter-scaled so Grid cells are always 1:1 in world space.

Paint water tiles on the child's Tilemap component. The water shader and material are applied automatically.

Top-Down Reflections 🪞

The top-down reflection system renders reflections from an overhead camera angle — the standard look for RPG, strategy, and overhead 2D games with water.

Setup

Enable Reflections → Enable Top Down Reflections in the inspector. The system creates a ReflectionsManagerTD camera automatically.

Key Settings

→ Default reflection x-orientation — flip reflections horizontally if they appear mirrored incorrectly.

→ Angle — rotation angle of top-down reflections in degrees (-90 to 90).

→ Tilt — creates a perspective-like depth effect on the reflections.

→ Falloff start / strength / color — fade reflections based on distance from water edge. Supports mesh reflections.

Platformer Reflections 🪞

The platformer reflection system renders mirrored reflections below a configurable horizontal line — the standard look for side-view 2D games.

Setup

Enable Reflections → Enable Platformer Reflections. The system creates a ReflectionsManagerPL camera that captures specified layers.

Key Settings

→ Custom reflections starting point — override where the mirror line sits vertically.

→ Infinite scrolling — scroll reflections based on a player transform for parallax games.

→ Reflected layers — choose which Unity layers appear in reflections (found in Edit → Project Settings → Tags and Layers).

→ Perspective — pseudo-3D distortion on reflections (SpriteRenderer mode only).

→ Falloff — fade reflections based on distance from the mirror line.

Raymarched Reflections 🪞

The raymarched reflection system uses screen-space raymarching to create high-quality reflections that capture vertical detail above the water surface. Performance is comparable to the other reflection types.

Setup

Enable Reflections → Enable Raymarched Reflections (only available with Normal water type). The system creates a ReflectionsManagerRM camera.

Key Settings

→ Raymarch units — world-space height the raymarch covers above the water. Determines how far up reflections capture.

→ Falloff start / end — UV range where raymarched reflections fade.

→ Reflected layers — which Unity layers are captured.

→ Type2 raymarching — alternative algorithm. Try this if the default produces artifacts.

Obstructions

The obstruction system renders objects that interact with the water — creating depth data for coloring gradients, edge effects, and driving the fluid simulation.

Setup

Enable Obstructions → Enable in the water inspector. Then add the Obstructor component to any GameObject that should interact with the water. The system renders all obstructors to a depth texture that the water shader samples.

Key Settings

→ Resolution — render texture resolution multiplier for the obstruction capture (0–1).

→ Alpha / Color / Width — control the visual edge glow that appears where obstructors meet the water surface.

Simple Simulation (Object-Space) 💧

The simple simulation runs a GPU fluid simulation in the water sprite's local UV space. Ripples propagate from obstructor interactions and optional rain drops. The simulation quality depends on the sprite size — larger sprites have lower effective resolution per unit.

Setup

Enable Simulations → Enable and set simulation type to Simple. Obstructions must also be enabled.

Key Settings

→ Resolution — simulation texture size (256 to 4096, powers of 2). Higher = finer ripples.

→ Iterations — simulation passes per frame. 3 is recommended. More = faster wave speed.

→ Wave height / Dispersion — amplitude and energy decay of the simulation.

→ Rain effect — spawns random ripples across the surface.

Advanced Simulation (World-Space) 🌊

The advanced simulation runs in world space — the simulation texture follows the camera and covers a viewport-relative area. This means the water body can be infinitely large with no additional performance cost. The simulation quality stays constant regardless of how big the water is.

How It Works

The simulation texture covers a slightly larger area than the camera viewport (1.5× margin). As the camera moves, the simulation offsets its content to follow, so ripples persist naturally during camera motion. This is fundamentally different from simple simulation which is locked to the sprite's bounds.

Setup

Enable Simulations → Enable and set simulation type to Advanced. Same controls as simple, but the resolution cap is 2048 instead of 4096.

Wet Surface / Below Water 💦

Renders the scene behind the water and applies distortion — creating effects like rainy windows, underwater refraction, or wet pavement. Uses the SurfaceRenderingManager to capture a layer texture of the scene.

Enable in Wet Surface → Enable. Control visibility with alpha and distortion strength.

Sprite Atlas & Reflection Support 🖼

Sprites used in the reflection system — including those from sprite sheets and sprite atlases — work correctly with all three reflection types. The reflection cameras capture whatever is rendered on the specified layers, so atlas-packed sprites, animated sprites, and spritesheet-based characters all appear in reflections and interact with the obstruction system without any special setup.

Spline Support 〰

The asset supports spline based animated sprites. Sprites with the spline system work with the reflection and obstruction systems.

Check the "splines" demo scene for an example.

Limited Mesh Support ◈

The reflection systems can capture and reflect 3D mesh renderers (not just sprites), and the obstruction system supports mesh-based obstructors. The water surface itself is always 2D.

Check the "3d objects reflections" demo scenes for examples.

Limited Perspective Support 📐

A pseudo-3D perspective mode applies distortion to both the water surface and reflections, creating depth illusion in side-view games. Enable in Reflections → Platformer → Use Perspective.

Prefab & Multi-Scene Workflow 📦

Each water instance creates its own material instance, so multiple water objects can have different settings. Manager objects (2DWaterManagers) are shared and auto-created.

Use Utils → Copy Water Settings in the inspector to clone settings from another water object. Or drag a water prefab from any demo scene.

Properties Overview 🔧

All properties are organized into foldout sections. Every field has a tooltip — hover for a description.

Global Settings

Looks — Alpha & Tiling

Looks — Coloring

Looks — Foam, Strips, Distortion

Reflections

Simulation

Surface Waves

Shaders & Subgraphs ⚙

Built with Shader Graph, organized under Resources/Shaders/.

Shader Variants

Subgraph Folders

Code Structure { }

Runtime code under Assets/ModernWater2D/Runtime/.

Key Runtime Folders

Changing Water at Runtime ⚡

All properties are changeable at runtime via the WaterCryo<T> reactive system — set .value and the shader updates automatically.

var water = GetComponent<ModernWater2D>();

// Change water color
water.settings._waterSettings.color.value = Color.blue;

// Change foam speed
water.settings._waterSettings.foamSpeed.value = new Vector2(0.5f, 0.1f);

// Toggle reflections
water.enableReflections.value = false;

// Switch render mode
water.renderMode = WaterRenderMode.Tilemap;
water.ApplyRenderMode();

// Access the active material
water.ActiveSharedMaterial.SetFloat("_surfaceAlpha", 0.5f);

Key Access Paths

Demo Scenes 🎬

20+ demo scenes in Assets/ModernWater2D/Scenes/demo/.

Production tested !

Support & Requests 💬

FAQ ❓

The water is pink / magenta

Your project is not using URP. Switch in Project Settings → Graphics.

Reflections don't show anything

Make sure objects are on layers listed in the reflected layers list. Find layer indices in Edit → Project Settings → Tags and Layers.

Simulation doesn't react to objects

Objects need an Obstructor component and both obstructions + simulation must be enabled.

Water looks different in Tilemap mode

Tilemap UVs scale with bounds. Adjust tiling settings to compensate.

Performance is poor on mobile

Switch to Mobile type, reduce simulation resolution, disable or lower reflection resolution.

Camera.main is null errors

Your camera needs the MainCamera tag.

Can I have multiple water objects?

Yes. Each creates its own material instance. Managers are shared.

Can I use infinite water?

Yes — use the Advanced simulation type. It runs in world-space and follows the camera at constant cost.