Pretty Scary Update



The Pretty Scary Update is the name for Minecraft version 1.4.2, a major update officially released on Thursday, October 25, 2012. Among the main changes were a number of new mobs and variants (witches, bats, zombie villagers, wither skeletons), wearable and placeable heads, a new boss (the wither), the command block, the anvil, the beacon, new food (potatoes, carrots and pumpkin pies), carrots on sticks for controlling pigs and new decoration items (such as item frames, flower pots and cobblestone walls).

The official name of the update was revealed at PAX Prime 2012 during the Minecraft panel, then later with snapshot. Dinnerbone first revealed the 1.4 release date with snapshot, where he stated that he was fully into the "Prepare for release" mode.

Development on the Pretty Scary Update began the week after, which was released on August 1, 2012. 15 development snapshots for 1.4 from to  were released. During the development period, 1.3.2 was released. The 1.4 Pre-release was unveiled on October 19, 2012, so that modders could start preparing their mods before the launch on October 24, 2012.

Mojang found a mob suffocation bug after this was released, and was forced to delay the launch by a day. The 1.4.1 Prerelease was unveiled on October 23, 2012, and the release was pushed back a day.

Mojang then found yet another bug, and fixed "a severe memory leak in the server". This, as well as correct rendering of fences and cobble stairs, came in the 1.4.2 Prerelease, released on October 24, 2012. 1.4.2 was the first official release of 1.4, available through the launcher on October 25, 2012.

A bug was introduced whereby a player could not achieve the The end? achievement.

The Pretty Scary Update was originally intended to include the Modding API, however this had been pushed to a later version.

Lighting bugs present in 1.3.2 were only partially fixed. Dinnerbone first introduced changes in snapshots. Dinnerbone tweeted to revert and push this to 1.5. Other changes postponed to 1.5 include redstone changes and a rendering overhaul.

Notable Features
The biggest feature seen in this update was the introduction of a new boss, the Wither. Other major features were anvils, beacons and command blocks.

Notable Additions:
 * Beacons
 * Carrot on sticks
 * Item frames and flower pots
 * Potatoes, carrots, and pumpkin pies
 * Anvils
 * Infections
 * The Wither and wither skeletons
 * Bats and witches
 * Monsters can now pick up items, weapons, and armor.
 * Command blocks

Trailer
A trailer documenting some of the Pretty Scary Update's major features was released on Mojang's official YouTube channel on the 26th of October, 2012. The trailer was made by Hat Films, who have made update trailers for Mojang in the past.

Further revisions

 * 1.4.4 introduced the command, and fixed many bugs from 1.4.2.
 * 1.4.5 addressed many further bugs.
 * 1.4.6 was released in December, and notably introduced fireworks, enchanted books and the Thorns enchantment.
 * 1.4.7 addressed crashes and bugs introduced in 1.4.6.

Trivia

 * In the promotional poster, "potatoes" is accidentally misspelled as "potatos".