The latest Minecraft: Bedrock Edition beta kicks off a new chapter

Source: Mojang Studios | Twitter

The journey for Minecraft to reach the second half of the Caves and Cliffs Update has been a long and winding one, but Mojang Studios has tirelessly continued their work. Today, a huge milestone is being reached in the development phase, as Minecraft: Bedrock Edition 1.18.0.20 officially breaks cover and becomes available to Minecraft testers on Xbox, Windows, and Android devices.

The latest Minecraft beta is the first build to move under the 1.18 version umbrella that will contain Part Two of the Caves and Cliffs Update. While a version number is ultimately arbitrary and doesn’t affect much, what does matter is that all of the features and changes that were previously being hidden under the “Experimental Features” toggle are now out in the open and affect nearly all worlds in this beta. This means 1.18 Caves and Cliffs Update Part Two features are now enabled by default, and will inevitably be tested by considerably more players in the beta program.

We may hear more about the 1.18 Caves and Cliffs Update Part Two (and when it might release) during Minecraft Live 2021 later this year, and even what other games Mojang might be working on. Until then, though, Minecraft continues to be one of the best Xbox games around, with this constant influx of testable features confirming the notion.

In case you missed it, Minecraft’s Steve and Alex are becoming amiibo figures for the Switch. These figures aren’t coming until sometime in 2022, but will almost certainly be considered some of the best Minecraft toys and gifts when they do.

The full changelog for Minecraft: Bedrock Edition Beta 1.18.0.20 includes:

Caves and Cliffs Update features

• Features related to Caves & Cliffs Part II have been moved from the Experimental Toggle and are now enabled by default
• Note: Upon loading your world into this beta, new Caves & Cliffs Part II world generation will automatically be introduced with no default world copy created. You can read more about how new generation will be added below your existing chunks in our FAQ!
• New world generation in Caves and Cliffs Part II is currently incompatible with the ‘Creation of Custom Biomes’ experiment. In this beta, expect worlds with custom biome generation to be potentially unstable and for custom biomes to only exist in currently saved out areas of the world
• Changed ore generation rates to be in parity with Java Edition
• Fixed an issue that prevented large trees from growing below y=0
• Small Dripleaf now properly generates as part of Lush Caves biome

Cave generation

• Old caves can now reach all the way to the surface
• Old cave carver placement is now on parity with Java Edition
• Floating water no longer generates in caves

Feature placement

• Meadow Flowers no longer replace blocks in villages or other structures
• Tuff blob features now generate below y=0
• Deepslate patches no longer generate above y=0
• Amethyst Geodes now get placed in the correct y-range during world generation

World generation

• Updated feature placement of Granite, Andesite, Diorite, Dirt, and Gravel to match Java Edition
• Tweaked peaks to make small mountains look more like proper jagged mountain peaks instead of flat hilly mounds
• Improved blending between old and new chunks
• Mineshaft tunnels can’t replace Bedrock anymore

Features and bug fixes

Stability & performance

• Players are no longer disconnected if server and client have different Runtime Block IDs
• Optimized the time it takes to place vines in the Overworld

Accessibility

• Added missing screen reader on the “Controller lost connection” prompt

Gameplay

• Corrected Portal locations when the Portal was moved but the location was not updated
• Breaking a block below fire no longer creates an invisible fire block when the doFireTick gamerule is disabled

General

• Players with higher than recommended render distance settings are now prompted to change it to the recommended value
• Render distance default and max settings have been updated for better performance
• A prompt now warns players that they will be taken back to the main menu if they sign-in while in-game

Graphical

• The Carved Pumpkin enchantment glint now only covers the item instead of the entire slot
• Fixed a bug that could occur on older worlds where looking up in a Minecart would display the inside of the Minecart, blocking the player’s view
• Updated item rendering so enchanted items are no longer be invisible in the Nether

Marketplace

• Store update prompt no longer appears for no internet connection or session start failure

Mobs

• Mobs can now path over Trapdoors
• Mobs no longer walk through Campfires
• Axolotls now animate correctly when airborne
• Sweet Berry Bushes now damage mobs
• Mobs no longer try to path through Sweet Berry Bushes

User interface

• Structure Block can now be saved and loaded within current dimension height limits
• Fixed an issue where searching for non-existent content brought up the incorrect “1 result” message
• Fixed overlapping text on offerings occurring in 4:3 resolution screens
• Fixed Java Edition parity while lying in bed in multiplayer game. A message will show how many players are lying in bed while waiting for all players to fall asleep
• Provide better visual feedback and hints for different render distance settings

Vanilla parity

• Raid mobs now despawn after a raid ends if the player moves too far away
• Raid boss bar color changed to red from purple
• Vindicators no longer naturally spawn in Illager Patrols

Villages

• Hero of the Village effect now applies to all players who helped kill a raider once a raid is defeated, and the effect remains on the players, even if they travel outside the village

Technical update

Commands

• Order of function calls triggered by /execute inside a function are now consistent

General

• Added caching support for subchunk requests and fixed issues with holes in the terrain
• Fixed a rendering error that could occur when attempting to render a Vanilla mob in a base game version prior to the version that mob was introduced through JSON files
• Most content errors and warnings will now only display once per world

Item scripting

• Implemented first past of Item Script Components
• ItemStack
  • Exposed interfaces for accessing script-enabled ItemComponents on ItemStack
  • hasComponent(componentId: string) – returns true if the ItemStack has the component [componentId] attached to it
  • getComponent(componentId: string) – returns a handle to the component attached to this ItemStack. Returns an undefined handle if the component does not exist or if the component is yet to be exposed to script
  • getComponents() – returns an array of all attached script-enabled components on this ItemStack
• NumberRange
  • A class to describe a random value between a min and max number
  • Property min – the minimum value in the range
  • Property max – the maximum value in the range
  • next() – returns a random number between min and max
• Items Registry
  • Added Items registry class to get all Items by name
  • get(itemId: string) – returns a handle to an ItemType if a type by the given name exists
• Script enabled Item components
• minecraft:food
  • Read-only property nutrition – number that describes how much nutrition this food item gives the player when eaten
  • Read-only property saturationModifier – number that is the saturation modifier used to apply the saturation buff when eaten
  • Read-only property canAlwaysEat – if true the player can always eat this item (even when not hungry)
  • Read-only property usingConvertsTo – string name of the Item this will be converted to when eaten. If empty, the item will not convert to anything else
• minecraft:durability
  • Read-only property maxDurability – the number amount of damage this item can take before breaking
  • Read-only property damageRange – a NumberRange describing the chance of the item losing durability
  • Property damage – gets or sets the current damage on the ItemStack
  • getDamageChance(unbreaking: number = 0) – gets the maximum chance that this item would be damaged using the damageRange property if given an unbreaking level. Incoming unbreaking parameter must be greater than 0