The Wild Update comes to Minecraft

I haven’t written anything about Minecraft for quite a while.  I haven’t even thought about it much, what with Valheim taking up the exploration and survival niche in my gaming cycle once again.  But a friend I follow on Twitter was excited about the coming of the latest update, dubbed The Wild, and was resetting their world over on Minecraft Realms to give the new changes a try.

The Wild update arrives

The update, which is version 1.19 for the game, comes with a host of new things to look into.

There are new mobs, from frogs to the Warden, new biomes like the mangrove swamp and the dark deep, the latter which can new ancient city structures within it.  Then there are the usual host of new blocks and things to craft that go with the introduction of new materials.

And, as I was looking this up, I realized that I hadn’t actually done much at all with Minecraft since the Nether update back in 2020.

In poking around I found out that I missed both of the Cliffs and Caves updates, version 1.17 and version 1.18 of the game, which naturally introduced a host of other features I haven’t seen.  So there is actually a lot more to be explored than I though.

One other thing came along with this weeks update, something of a unification of the Java and Bedrock editions of the game.  The two have always be separate, and at one point Microsoft seemed eager to divide the two further, downplaying the Java version in hopes of pushing the Bedrock version which not only runs on more platforms, but which has a cash shop.

Go figure, right?

It felt for a while that the Java version might be neglected.  But Microsoft has decided to take a different tack these days.  With the launch of 1.19 if you own or buy either Java or Bedrock editions of the game, you end up owning both versions.

It still feels like they want to get more people on the version with the cash shop, but at least they are making the Java version feel more on par in their priorities, and the Java version is the one that you can mod up.

Anyway, it might be time to go take a peek back at Minecraft to see what is new.  I mean, unless there is some open world, co-op, survival game based on something crazy like… I don’t know… being a vampire maybe… that could pull our group in another direction.  We’ll have to see.