Introduction

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Global Snow for Unity - Built-in Render Pipeline

What is Global Snow (Built-in)?

Global Snow (Built-in) is a drag-and-drop snow solution for the Built-in Render Pipeline in Unity. Attach it to your Main Camera and your entire scene is transformed into a winter landscape with realistic snow coverage, automatic occlusion, footprints, terrain marks, snowfall, and camera frost.

The Built-in version supports three rendering modes - Deferred, Forward, and Decal - giving you maximum flexibility for any hardware target.

Two packages, one purchase - Global Snow ships with both a Built-in RP and a URP package. Import only the one that matches your project's active render pipeline.

Rendering Modes

Mode	How It Works	Best For
Deferred (recommended)	Modifies GBuffers directly during the deferred lighting pass. No extra full-screen blit.	Desktop, consoles, VR - best quality and performance.
Forward	Uses shader replacement to render snow-covered versions of qualifying materials, then composites the result as a screen-space image effect.	Projects that require the forward rendering path.
Decal	Stamps snow decals directly onto terrain geometry. Available as a separate download from the support forum.	Mobile and low-end devices where fill rate is limited.

Built-in Exclusive Features

The Built-in version includes several features not available in the URP variant:

Snow Volumes - trigger-based zones that lerp snow properties when the camera enters them. Ideal for caves, interiors, and areas with different snow intensity.
Distance Optimization - a simplified snow algorithm for surfaces beyond a configurable distance, with separate tint color and the ability to ignore normals and coverage for maximum performance.
Smooth Coverage - smooths the zenithal coverage result for softer transitions between snowed and non-snowed areas.
Forward and Decal rendering modes - additional rendering approaches beyond deferred.
Material fix utilities - Fix Materials, Opaque Cutout, and Fix Tree Opaque options to handle non-standard shaders.
SpeedTree integration - dedicated SpeedTree snow support with leaf removal option.
VertExmotion support - integration with the VertExmotion asset for vertex-animated snow.

Key Features

Snow Rendering

Three quality levels - Flat Shading, Normal Mapping, and Relief Mapping (raymarched 3D waves).
Automatic coverage - zenithal depth pass detects which surfaces are exposed to snowfall.
Occlusion and glitter - ambient occlusion shadows and sparkling glitter on the snow surface.
Distance optimization - simplified shader for far-away snow to reduce GPU cost.

Snow Interactions

Footprints - human-shaped footprint decals with configurable fade-out duration.
Terrain marks - collision-driven deformable trails from characters, vehicles, and projectiles.
Snowfall - built-in particle system with intensity, speed, and wind controls.
Snow dust - wind-driven dust particles near ground level.
Camera frost - screen-space frost overlay for immersive cold environments.

Coverage Control

Layer mask exclusion - exclude entire layers from snow coverage.
Per-object exclusion - attach GlobalSnowIgnoreCoverage to any GameObject.
Coverage mask - paint snow on/off using an alpha mask texture with a built-in Scene View editor.
Snow Volumes - trigger-based zones that modify snow properties when entered.

Requirements

Requirement	Minimum
Unity	2020.3 LTS or later
Render Pipeline	Built-in (Forward or Deferred)
Graphics API	DX11, OpenGL Core, Metal, Vulkan
Platform	Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS, consoles

Next Steps

Quick Start - set up Global Snow in under 5 minutes.
Parameters - full inspector reference.
Snow Volumes - configure trigger-based snow zones.

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