Is it a Bug, Or a Feature?
If there are any veteran Minecraft players reading this, hearing a name like “Glacier” might ring a few bells. Back in the day, there used to be a handful of world-generation seeds that caused some truly beautiful vistas. There wasn’t really an equivalent for that with modern Minecraft, with current terrain generation focusing on more realistic landscapes. And that could remain true for the forseeable future… but today is an exception.
Right now, in an experimental preview build of the latest update, some people are finding extraordinary, unforgettable sights.
New Cliffs gen + Lush Cave over a Coral Reef
1.18 experimental-3
SEED: 491082226142499185
COORDS: -1456.81 79.96 -3143.33 -359.95 -6.96 pic.twitter.com/EhYkK89Q3y— Phoenix SC / Hamish (@phnixhamsta) August 12, 2021
The current update being worked on for Minecraft is the “Caves & Cliffs” update, which – as you might be able to guess – heavily modifies the way the game generates terrain. The part that’s relevant here is the way Biomes are formed: they used to be the same shape vertically, but now biomes can form on top of others. The intended use for this was to probably allow the newly-added mountains to change in biome as they ascended (such as becoming snowy near the top), but it applied to everything else too. In that tweet, we see everything being generated atop a “Coral Reef” biome (among many other quirks), creating the sheltered tropical ocean you see there.
Whether Mojang considers these landscapes to be “bugs” or “features”, the result is the same. That tweet is just one screenshot of many; countless fans are in awe of the sights before them. Images are being shared across multiple platforms, with reactions ranging from joy to fascination. Perhaps this reaction could inspire Mojang to re-work their intended goal for Minecraft terrain generation – stranger things have happened in this industry.