MOB MAYHEM

The ‘Spring To Life’ update was Minecraft’s first game drop of the year, hitting all platforms on March 25! The drop included new mob variants for the pig, cow, and chicken, with warm and cold versions able to be found in sandy and chilly biomes, as well as a sheep spawning update where most brown sheep now spawn in sandy biomes, black sheep in chilly biomes, and white sheep in green biomes. Don’t worry – rare pink sheep can still be found in all climates! You might also notice that now, when a wolf spawns, it will get one of seven personalities, and each wolf will bark, growl, pant, whine, and express themselves in a unique way!

BETTER BIOMES

Thanks to Spring To Life, you’ll also find changes to the biomes themselves! Keep an ear our for new desert sounds, like howling wind, chirping crickets, or the whispers of sand from terracotta blocks, sand blocks, and the dead bush. Prepare to frolic under new falling leaves, and you’ll even notice that the ‘leaf litter’ can be used to decorate blocks – plus, it makes a rustling sound when players walk through it. Explore forests, dark forests, and wooded badlands to find different leaf litter, or craft it by placing leaves in a furnace. There are plenty more plant updates, like the new Cactus Flower (a prickly addition that can be crafted into dye and attracts bees), Firefly Bush (spawns moving firefly particles that glow in the dark and helps make your builds sparkle), dry grass (great for sheep’s wool), and wildflowers (useful for dye).

AWESOME ADVENTURE

There are some crafty gadgets and visual updates too! Lodestone has an updated recipe, needing only an iron ingot with chiselled bricks to craft is. Using a compass on a lodestone in a player’s base will make it always point home, so you can explore even further! There are new maps available to purchase from cartographers, and the more you explore, the more cartographers you’ll find with new maps! For any players in Creative Mode, the Spawn eggs will now look like the mob type it spawns (so much easier to find when you’re looking in your inventory)!

VIBRANT VISUALS

Minecraft has a fresh coat of paint with its new ‘Vibrant Visuals’ upgrade! Water looks incredible with rippling reflections of the world around, while the sun’s light now shines through windows and lights up leaves. Wait until you see how atmospheric places like the Deep Dark are now! Vibrant Visuals is the Minecraft devs’ vision for what the game looks like with improved visual elements like directional lighting, and more.

NO WORRIES

This is a visual boost only, and there are no changes to Minecraft’s gameplay. For example, shadows will not impact light levels where it matters for how you play the game, or affect where hostile mobs spawn. Vibrant Visuals will be easy to access as it will be available on many platforms as a menu toggle – it’s already on Bedrock, with Java to follow.

YOU’LL BE AGHAST!

What’s next in Minecraft? Players have already been able to test drive a few of the updates from the second game drop of 2025, like the exciting ability to fly across the Overworld on a happy ghast! Yes, the happy ghast is a new mob that prospers in the Overworld – just find a new block called a ‘dried ghast’ (in the Nether or crafted from ghast tears and a bone block), take it back to the Overworld and re-hydrate it and it will to spawn a new mob variant called a ‘ghastling’ (totally adorable and loves snacking on snowballs). This adorable little critter eventually grows up… into a happy ghast! You can even pop a ghast harness on it (crafted from leather, glass, and wool) and fly around with up to three friends! This will be super useful in Survival!