The Spawn Chunks 233: Smells Like Cherry Groves

Feb 20, 2023 | podcast

Jonny, and Joel share their first impressions of archeology, and cherry groves in the latest Minecraft 1.20 snapshot, Jonny catches up on the full list of the 1.20 Update features, and a listener asks if the coming update is “sandboxy” enough for everyone.

Support The Spawn Chunks on Patreon

Login

Joel

Jonny

  • Minecraft 1.20 – Snapshot 23W07A
    • Went on holiday and Mojang announced the entire Update 1.20 feature list.
    • Upon returning, tried to find everything coming in 1.20 in a single snapshot seed.
  • Empires, Season 2
    • Killing withers to help fWhip with his build at Empires’ spawn.

Chunk Mail

FROM: Pine1needle
SUBJECT: A Novel Name For Our Favourite Game

Hi Jonny and Joel,

After the final features for Minecraft 1.20 were announced, MythicalSausage and Cubfan135 both started popular threads on Twitter to discuss potential names for the update. Kingbdogz previously described the theme of 1.20 as “self expression, representation and storytelling”. Features like bamboo blocks, and camels seem to be inspired by locations around the globe, and features like chiseled bookshelves, and hanging signs allow players to write down their stories in new ways. 

Given these themes, I propose calling Minecraft 1.20 the “Travels and Tales Update“. Do you like this name? Or do you have ideas of your own for a name for the update? I look forward to hearing what you think!

Pine1needle got lost on an adventure, but at least it will make a good story later.

FROM: Shepard
DISCORD MEMBER: Landscape Artist
SUBJECT: Are 1.20 Feature Sandboxy Enough?

Dear Jonny and Joel,

Minecraft 1.20 is supposed to be, among other things, centered around self-expression. Features that potentially fall into that category are the armour trims, mob heads on note blocks, and now pottery.

One of Minecraft’s strengths has always been how sandboxy it is: you can combine things provided by the game in new and unexpected ways that the game designers may not have even thought of. I get the feeling that these latest additions fall a bit short of that.

Yes, there’s many many combinations of armour and armour trims. But wouldn’t it be cooler if the patterns could be layered to create something entirely new by the player, like with banner patterns?

The pots look a lot more polished than when they were first presented, but at present they can only show four different patterns on four sides, and there’s no way for players to change the colour of pots, or the patterns. It’s just a decoration feature now, not for storytelling.

And mob heads placed on note blocks play a limited, and random selection of that mob’s sounds – you can not control which sound you get – instead of giving us the tools to create more diverse music, for example by extending the length of notes generated by note blocks.

Are we just getting a lot of predefined stuff to choose from instead of tools to create our own stuff?

A counter-argument could be that the self-expression lies in how you combine these things with other things in the world, how you can integrate them as details into a larger picture. But isn’t that true for every new block in the game that extends our build palette?

I might be playing devil’s advocate a bit here, but I’m still eager to hear your thoughts!

Shepard was killed by the /damage command.

Thank you to our Patrons!

Content Engineers

Hunter555

Jumbosale

MindTripMedia

PartyVoyager

Yitz

Ore Producers

AnnagraM

ArchaeoPlays

Fire_Dragon_19

Keileon

Loewe88

Rhewtani

Sarunint

TheN00K1E

Community Miners

Alexander

Banchor

Brock

Coraxchimera

Cynebeald

Dosage

ErikTheP

Gingerlily

GrandpaCrafter

GunsAndChips

Ikea Sub

Jeffrothian

Joner

Kenma Creations

KraftDragon

Landon

Loki_Icarus

LuckyLittleUnicorn

OhDoctor

Protius

Rocktiki

Scotsman

Shakespeargirl

Smurph588

TheVixen38

Xacris

Join us on

Jonny Shares His Thoughts On Minecraft 1.20 Features

Mojang has stated that while iterations in snapshots are likely, the feature list for the Minecraft 1.20 Update is complete. Jonny takes an opportunity at the podcast lectern to share his thoughts on everything we know so far, and Joel chimes in on the first in game look at sniffers, and archeology in the latest snapshot.