The transparent revolving cube allowed for the quick appearances and disappearances of characters, and for a spritely magical feel. Without the cube, characters such as the Queen of the Night would have had to run onto stage for a semblance of a dramatic entrance, and sets would have had to be changed much more often than they were during this performance. With the cube, transitions between scenes and arias flowed seamlessly.
The only other non-cube staging was the staircase temple of Sarastro. The staircase/temple visibly led to the triangular sunlike pattern. When this temple was present onstage, Sarastro almost always stood on the highest level of it. His positioning on the staging highlighted his powerful godliness and “all-knowing” nature (being above all others allows you to symbolically or literally watch all events and doings below you).
Both main staging devices were transparent and/or relatively colorless. The lack of radical pigmentation on either one allowed the lighting to flood the stage with orange, blue, green, white, etc. and magnify the resulting desired mood.