Java Edition Beta 1.8

Beta 1.8 is the first release of the Adventure Update. It introduced features that focused on fighting, exploration, and adventuring, as well as other aspects.

Blocks

 * Cracked stone bricks
 * Brick slab
 * Brick stairs
 * Fence gate
 * Glass pane
 * Iron bars
 * Melons
 * Mossy Stone Bricks
 * Stone Bricks
 * Stone Brick Slab
 * Stone Brick Stairs

Items

 * Cooked chicken
 * Cooked raw chicken.


 * Cooked porkchop
 * Has a new texture.
 * A tan shade of the same sprite.


 * Ender pearls
 * Item which doesn't serve any purpose in the game for now, and had an uncentered icon.


 * Melon seeds
 * New seed type that grows melons.
 * Can only be found in abandoned mineshaft chests.


 * Melon slices
 * Harvested from melons.
 * Can be used to get melon seeds back.


 * Pumpkin seeds
 * New seed type that produces pumpkins.
 * Cannot be obtained from a pumpkin as of now, only available in abandoned mineshaft chests.


 * Raw chicken
 * Dropped from chickens.


 * Raw beef
 * Dropped from cows.


 * Steak
 * Cooked raw beef.
 * Has the cooked porkchop's old texture.

Mobs

 * Cave spiders
 * Smaller variant of spiders.


 * Enderman
 * New tall mob.
 * As a placeholder, endermen used zombie sounds.


 * Silverfish
 * A small hostile mob.

World generation

 * Abandoned mineshafts


 * Biomes
 * New fractal-based biome code.
 * Added and removed some biomes while making all of them more vast than before.
 * Added:
 * Mountain
 * Ocean
 * Deeper and more vast than before.
 * Floor is now made up of sand, dirt, and clay.
 * Clay is now more commonly found due to this.
 * Rivers
 * Now flows through/in between biomes.
 * Swamp
 * Taiga & tundra now generate with snow.
 * It does not generate in this update though due to technical reasons.


 * Ravines


 * Strongholds


 * Villages

Gameplay

 * Achievements
 * Added: "Kill a skeleton with an arrow at 50 meters".


 * Combat
 * Hold-to-charge bows.
 * Critical hits.
 * Players can parry with a sword by holding
 * Hostile mobs perform attack animations.
 * Mobs killed by players drop tiny flashing experience orbs that add to the experience bar.


 * Creative
 * New game mode.
 * Players can fly and take no damage from entities.
 * Players have access to (as of right now) a limited number of blocks.


 * Hunger
 * New food system.
 * There is now a food meter.
 * Food no longer heals directly, but indirectly: if the food meter is above 90%, heals every 4 seconds.
 * All food (except mushroom stew) are now stackable.
 * Food takes 1.6 seconds to consume, accompanied with an animation.


 * Sprinting
 * New way to travel.
 * Gives the player a boost in speed.
 * The player can now jump four blocks horizontally while sprinting.

General

 * Particles
 * Performing a critical hit on any mob will cause 'sparks' to fly.
 * Explosion particles are now shockwaves instead of smoke.
 * Tiny stationary bubble particles can be seen when underwater.
 * Fog is now thicker and darker deep underground, and gives off particles. Due to this, the void appears black.


 * Splash screen
 * New Mojang logo in the splash screen.

Blocks

 * Chests
 * Added a 3D lock to the model.


 * Farmland
 * No longer un-tills when stepped on and only now when jumped on.


 * Leaf blocks
 * User-placed leaf blocks no longer decay.


 * Mossy cobblestone.
 * Now has a new texture.


 * Stone pressure plates & wooden pressure plates
 * Now can be placed on fences


 * Torches
 * Improved model for when the torch is placed on walls.

Items

 * Food
 * Eating any raw food or rotten flesh has a chance to give the player food poisoning which makes the hunger bar decrease three times as fast.


 * Shears
 * Can now collect grass and vines.

Mobs

 * General
 * Animals no longer despawn which makes it possible to capture them.
 * Arrows that hit a mob visually "stick" into the mob rather than just disappear.
 * Passive mobs will randomly flee if attacked by the player or other mobs (such as wolves).
 * Player-to-mob damage decreased by half a heart.


 * Humans
 * Removed the mob as an entity.
 * Its AI is the only thing that remains of the mob.


 * Pigs
 * The snout now protrudes from their head.


 * Skeletons
 * Now hold full size bows.
 * Skeleton arrows originate from about their eyes to the bow, instead of above the head.


 * Zombies
 * Now drop rotten flesh instead of feathers.

World generation

 * Far Lands
 * Removed the biome.


 * Terrain
 * Removed the old terrain.

Gameplay

 * Clouds
 * Height raised to the top of the map.
 * Can no longer phase through blocks.
 * Movement now syncs with the game's time.


 * Damage
 * Unarmed damage was decreased from to  (reverting to the behavior from before Beta 1.5).


 * Day/night cycle
 * No longer requires chunk updates and is a smooth transition.
 * The lighting on a block is given a tint based on the most prominent source of light
 * Reddish from artificial light sources.
 * Artificial light now gives a very subtle 'flicker'.
 * Blue from moonlight.
 * Total darkness keeps the same black tint.
 * Sunlight gives the same white tint.


 * Farming
 * Changed to be less volatile.
 * HUD
 * Armor bar moved to above hearts, due to hunger bar.


 * Lighting
 * Improved lighting system.


 * Multiplayer
 * The 'Multiplayer join screen' has been improved, mainly with a server list.


 * Sunrise & sunset
 * Clouds change color during sunrise and sunset to match the sky color.
 * Horizon, specifically haze changes color more vividly during sunset and sunrise.


 * Weather
 * Rain and snow now render faster.

General

 * Controls
 * Holding the left mouse button with a weapon will now only swing once.
 * Holding the right mouse button to place blocks is slightly slower than before.
 * +Clicking the output item in a crafting square will craft all the items at once, and automatically places them in the inventory.
 * Player list in multiplayer, defaults to.


 * Debug screen
 * Mobs are no longer visibly labeled with their entity ID
 * The world's numeric seed is displayed in a field below player position.
 * Changing fog by hotkey now requires debug-view to be open in addition with pressing.
 * The version tag appears in-game again.


 * Mods
 * The game's coding now allows for mods to more easily change the (map) height.


 * Options
 * The main menu's background is now an animated scene.
 * The version tag is now displayed on the bottom-left rather than the top-left.
 * New sliders for Field of View and Brightness.
 * 4 new entries in control list
 * "Attack", "Use Item", and "Pick Block" can now be remapped.
 * Operators can switch back and forth between survival and creative mode.

Release changes
These changes occurred between the last development version for Beta 1.8, Prerelease 2, and the full release of Beta 1.8.


 * Status effects
 * Added regeneration, which increases health slowly.
 * Damage
 * Fist damage is decreased from to.
 * Enderman
 * Changed eye color to purple. Now emit portal particles, rather than smoke.

Fixes
9 bugs fixed


 * The + Click crash bug from 1.8 Prerelease 2 is fixed.
 * Fixed Redstone circuits not working after glitch is now fixed in multiplayer.
 * Destroying boats and minecarts now creates particles.
 * Ghast attack sounds are fixed multiplayer.
 * The Far Lands have been removed; there is now only void.
 * Fixed cactus and trapdoor items being too big.
 * Fixed the "smart farms" glitch where the hitbox of a fence would extend past the hitbox of tilled soil and prevent it from reverting to dirt when walked on.
 * Fixed several crash bugs relating to pistons.
 * Increased the z-buffer from 8-bit to 24-bit, fixing graphical issues with AMD graphics cards.