The most recent Minecraft developments have mostly focused on the ‘caves’ side of the Caves and Cliffs update, but now we’re finally getting some more cliff action – or rather, a big revamp to how mountains get generated, with the addition of five new sub biomes to spice up your tall, rocky terrain.
The latest Bedrock Edition beta introduces five new mountain sub biomes, called lofty peaks, snow capped peaks, snowy slopes, mountain grove, and mountain meadow. These will work alongside the existing mountain types to create a more varied selection of alpine locations to explore. The new peaks look impressive in the official image above, but scroll down a bit to see a fan-made comparison of new and old mountains. It’s a massive change.
While this is a Bedrock beta, these changes should come to Java as well – as the Java snapshots have given us early looks at features like deepslate, glow squids, and the new ore textures, it looks like Bedrock beta players are getting their own early looks at some new features, too. (This update, incidentally, also adds glow squids and the ore textures to the Bedrock beta.)
You can get full patch notes on Reddit, and a better look at the new mountains on the official site.
Old Extreme Hills vs New 1.17 Mountains (Bedrock Edition Beta) from Minecraft
The Minecraft 1.17 release date is coming this summer. You can find a lot more detail on what to expect at that link.