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.


 * Status effects
 * Added regeneration, which increases health slowly.


 * 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.


 * Endermen
 * As a placeholder, endermen used zombie sounds.
 * Are able to teleport and pick up blocks.


 * 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 bug.


 * 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.

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.