“Minecraft” Update 1.20: Trails and Tales is Kicking Up a Storm

Ever since 2009, the world has changed. “Minecraft” was released in Nov. of 2009 and has been growing since then. Villager updates, the Nether update, the Aquatic update, and many more have helped “Minecraft” grow into a game that millions of people enjoy. The most recent update, 1.20, has caused controversy among the “Minecraft” community. Many people believe that this new update is lackluster and useless while others think this update is just what “Minecraft” needed. With archeology features, 2 new mobs, a new biome, and new armor features, I would have to agree with the latter.

The “Minecraft” 1.20 update was branded the “Trails and Tales” update for good reason. The new archeology features affect your whole “Minecraft” world! In naturally spawning structures, you can find two new blocks: suspicious sand and suspicious gravel. These blocks can only be mined with a brush, a new tool crafted with copper, feathers, and sticks. 

When you mine these blocks, you can get loot such as emeralds and diamonds, pottery shards, gunpowder, TNT, and many more. Suspicious sand and gravel bring a cool, mysterious aspect to “Minecraft” that wasn’t there before. It also gives players a reason to look at things like drowned cities and desert wells.

Two new building features were added with this update. The chiseled bookshelf and hanging signs. The chiseled bookshelf is like a normal bookshelf except it’s empty. Instead of being crafted with books already in it, you put books of your choosing on yourself. You can put both enchanted books and regular books. This not only serves as a storage spot for loose books, but it also makes your bookshelf more diverse. 

The other building feature, hanging signs, is long overdue. Before hanging signs were added to the game, you only had the option of signs that stuck to the ground or stuck like a sticker to your builds. Now, with hanging signs, you can hang them from your builds and it can face all directions with the option to put words on both sides!

Another feature added with the 1.20 update is pottery shards. You can find these shards by digging up suspicious sand and gravel, as well as in treasure chests. Pottery shards can be used to give new blocks, decorated pots, and art on the sides of it. Depending on how you craft it, the drawings can be on different sides of the pot, and if you wreck them, you get all of your crafting items back! The only thing I would have to say about these pots is that you can’t put plants in them. You have to place a regular flower pot on top of them to give it the illusion of putting a plant in it. 

One huge thing that the “Minecraft” 1.20 update has added is bamboo wood. Bamboo has been in the game for a while, but you couldn’t use it as a wood type. You could only use it to put it in flower pots and to breed pandas. Now, “Minecraft” has another light wood other than birch, and the builder in me is in love. Bamboo boats look amazing, as well. They look more like rafts. 

My favorite part of the 1.20 update is the new animals that were added. First, by the vote of “Minecraft” fans, the Sniffer was added. The Sniffer is an ancient mob that comes from eggs that sniff out flower seeds from the ground. Yes, the Sniffers are very big, but they are also very cute!

The other mob added was the camel. Many people, including myself, love the camel not only because it can stand in two-tall water but because it can fit two players on it at a time! Gone are the days where you are lost looking for your traveling partner because you had to take two separate horses. Now, you can take just one animal. The camel can be found in desert biomes usually near villages. They are pretty rare, so finding them is definitely a treat. Instead of being able to jump high like horses and mules, camels can jump long distances – no more falling in pesky desert ravines. One thing you do need to look out for with camels is their enclosures. Camels can walk over fences, so you need to make sure to reinforce their pens.

Catering to the fashion divas out there – armor trims. Armor trims have no other purpose than to make your armor look more colorful. You can finally wear netherite armor and also feel like you’re not the dark of the night. To add an armor trim to your armor, you have to first find an armor template. You can find these in almost all of the biomes in chests and digging through suspicious blocks. Once you find a template, you choose what type of ore you want your trim to be made out of. Yes, you can only use ores for color, but they counted amethyst as an ore for all the scarily obsessive purple lovers out there. Put your armor template and ore of your choice in a smithing table, and you’re good to go. I will warn you that you can only use armor templates once. They’re not like banner designs, but you can duplicate the ones you find. It costs diamonds, though, so if you’re not that rich, I suggest trying to find multiple before you use them. 

Another cosmetology feature for your armor is you can add banners to your shields. This was already a thing in Java edition, but it is new to Bedrock.

Many people who play “Minecraft” are introverts, like me. Sometimes even dealing with other intelligent species in-game is draining. Especially when you have to deal with villagers. No, villagers weren’t added. They’ve been in the game for a pretty long time, but the way they trade has changed. Villagers used to have a chance of giving you all different types of blocks if you gave them the right job and shuffled through the options enough, but this is no longer a thing. Villagers give you certain things based on the biome they spawned or were born in. I don’t like this feature because it means you might have to travel far and wide to find a villager trading something specific. And once you do find this villager, most people want to take it back to their base, and if you’ve ever moved a villager before, you know it’s not fun at all. Hopefully, “Minecraft” gets enough backlash that they retract this feature because it is unnecessary and unwanted.

The last thing this update has is a new biome with another new wood type. This biome is one people were very excited about: the cherry blossom biome. It’s a beautiful biome with pink-petaled trees, pink wood, and floor flowers. A lot of players love to settle down and build houses in this biome, but I just like to loot them. The pink is too much for me, but it can be an accent in a spruce biome. Unlike other trees, cherry blossom trees emit a particle effect of falling petals. It really is cute before your game starts to lag. 

That’s about it for the “Minecraft” 1.20 update. There were smaller things that were added or changed like the color of some potions, but things that affect gameplay were all mentioned. The newer updates for “Minecraft” aren’t necessary, but they add cool elements to the game. Ever since 1.20 was released, I make sure to carry a brush in my inventory at all times. You never know when you could come across anything suspicious. I also have more of a reason to go in the desert so I can look for camels. Yes, there are some things in this update that I hope will change, but overall it’s an amazing addition to the forever-expanding game of “Minecraft.”