AntVenom – I’ve Fallen in Love w/ Minecraft 1.18…

I, have been gone, for a long, long, time. The last time that I covered a Minecraft update of any sort was on June 8th, 2021, the day of Minecraft 1.17’s release. In that video, I praised 1.17 as being the best kind of update. An update full of blocks and items that make

You think differently about the game. Now, nearly 4 months later, only days after Minecraft Live 2021, Minecraft 1.18 has really taken on the true meaning of being the “Caves and Cliffs” update. Minecraft 1.18 also makes you think differently about the game… again.

Now, as I said, I’ve been gone for a long time. I have the unique perspective of mostly missing out on 1.17, because I rarely played it after my initial video. However, within the past month or so, in ways that aren’t obvious to you yet, I’ve fallen in love with

Minecraft again. I’ve been really enjoying video making, and, knock on wood, I’ve never felt this good about it in my entire career. I’m going to share with all of you today why that change has occurred. First off, I’ll cover the features of the update itself, as

It currently stands, followed about the specifics of how I feel about 1.18, and then, for those of you who are willing to hear me out… the other reasons why I’ve fallen in love with Minecraft… again. In order to give Minecraft 1.18 the respect I feel it deserves, I can’t start by naming

Off it’s new blocks and items. Which is good because Minecraft 1.18 doesn’t have any. They all arrived in 1.17. 1.18 is all about the experience. Experiencing the update in it’s most complete form. The original promise of the “Caves and Cliffs” update. If you missed

Out on 1.17’s features like I did, and happen to favor survival mode gameplay, Minecraft 1.18 is one of the most absolutely earth shattering updates that the game has ever had. Leading the conversation is Minecraft’s new terrain generation. Many people, myself included,

Fawn over the days of Minecraft Alpha and Beta’s terrain. It defines the word nostalgic for me. After Beta 1.8 was released, and until recently, I had felt that terrain generation was never quite as good. Release 1.7 may have helped out those issues a lot, but for an

Update titled “the update that changed the world”, 1.7 looks like child’s play in comparison to 1.18. It’s ability to create terrain that can form such natural wonders is incredible. If you’ve been ignoring the snapshots, seriously, give it a try. If you do give it a try, what

Features and additions CAN you expect if not any blocks or items? Well, first off, the entirety of the worlds terrain, both above and below ground, have experienced a fundamentally, tectonic, shift. Above ground, the same basic biomes that you know so well still inhabit

The environment, but the way in which they take shape is anything but familiar. On paper, Minecraft’s height limit has been extended from 256 blocks, to 384, ranging from 319 blocks up, to -64 blocks down. Because of this, Minecraft terrain is now easily capable

Of stretching to heights previously unseen outside of amplified terrain, and to depths never before seen in the vanilla game. While the arrangement of Minecraft’s pre-existing biomes looks entirely different from before, it’s also important to acknowledge 1.18’s 6 brand new biomes, the unique attributes for which will be on screen, courtesy of the

MinecraftWiki. The Meadow… The Grove… The Snowy Slopes… The Jagged Peaks, The Frozen Peaks, and finally… The Stony Peaks. All six of these biomes offer differing mob spawn behaviors, with all 3 Peak variations being the same. Without explaining every single

Detail about how every single biome takes shape, all I can say is that, for an update called “The Caves and Cliffs” update, Mojang certainly nailed the Cliffs portion. But, what about the caves? There is a lot to say about Minecraft 1.18’s all new cave generation, both good, and bad.

While many of these features existed in 1.17, most of what was initially promised has now been fully implemented into 1.18’s vanilla survival worlds. Given Minecraft’s new depth limit, caves in 1.18 generate from the worlds surface, all the way to negative -59 blocks,

And are interconnected with the overworld in really fascinating ways. Finding caves in 1.18 will be easier than ever. All caves above 0 blocks will generate with a base layer of stone, and below 0 blocks, will transition into using deepslate. Throughout your underground

Mining adventure, you might be lucky enough to stumble across the new, and absolutely enormous copper and ore veins that spawn, which respectively generate above and below a y level of 0, are mixed in amongst granite and tuff blocks, and can provide 100’s or

Even thousands of ores, if you’re lucky enough to find them. As you start adventuring though, you may become curious how Mojang has handled ore distribution as a whole in 1.18. While their exact distribution is subject to change, since 1.18 hasn’t been released yet, ores

Generate in a manner that doesn’t feel too unfamiliar, but is definitely different from before. On screen is the ore distribution chart that Mojang has provided. Again, subject to change. The thicker the bar, the more frequently that ore will spawn at the bar’s respective

Y level. All of the colors correspond to the ore that you would most associate with that color in-game, so it’s pretty simple to read. There’s no doubt that, on average, you’ll have to dig deeper than you may be used to doing in order to get the rarest ores. But

Honestly, it’s kind of worth it for the adventure that is exploring 1.18’s all new caves. These caves are separated into a two distinct categories. Noise caves, which govern all cave shapes, and cave biomes, which are biomes that can inhabit the noise caves, but often do not.

The three types of cave shapes are spaghetti caves, which are close to the caves you know; noodle caves, which are a more claustrophobic version of spaghetti caves, and then, there are the absolutely enormous cheese caves, making up the caves that open to absolutely

Enormous sized spaces. To suggest that there are only three types of cave shapes would be grossly underselling the level of variation that Mojang has put into all of them. Not only does the shape of caves vary wildly, but now, there are cave biomes. Cave biomes

Are not unique cave shapes unto themselves, but rather, a decorator that populates the already generated caves to provide a further level of granularity to Minecraft’s new underground. As of right now, there are two distinct cave biomes. One. The lush caves, which typically

Generate below forested areas, or below an azalea tree. The lush caves are adorned with a trove of interesting foresty blocks, such as dripleafs, hanging roots, glow berries, vines, moss, spore blossoms, and more. And lastly, the dripstone caves, which are filled

With pointed dripstone and dripstone blocks. No matter how you feel about the release schedule of The Caves and Cliffs update, there’s no doubting that Mojang took their time and really knocked it out of the park, for the most part. Before getting too deep into my opinion though,

Here’s a few smaller, but still key additions to 1.18. First up is a pending feature will allow for new 1.18 chunks to blend with 1.17 chunks, according to the “Looking Forward” video on Minecraft’s official YouTube channel. I couldn’t

Not mention it. And then there are the 4 new advancements. Caves & Cliffs, which you get from falling from the top of the world all the way to the bottom. Then “Feels Like Home”, which you get for riding on a strider for 50 blocks, but in the overworld. Third is

“Star Trader”, which involves trading with a villager at the build height limit. Good luck with that, and finally, the “Sound of Music”, which you get for playing a record disc in a meadow biome. And lastly, the new in-game options. For video options, you can

Change how the chunks around you update with the priority updates option, then, there’s simulation distance, which allows you to alter how many chunks away that entities will be updates, including mobs, and last of all, you can now change what sound device you want

The game to use from within the game itself. As far as updates that are currently in Minecraft 1.18, somewhere under 2 1/2 months before release… it feels like something is missing. It feels like something that’s been promised for a long time, is absent.

So, yeah. The Warden. Introduced during last years Minecraft Live event, the Warden is still lacking from the latest 1.18 snapshots, and because of Minecraft Live 2021, we now know why. The Warden, alongside the third cave biome with which it’ll inhabit, have been delayed until Minecraft 1.19’s Wild update. While it’s definitely disappointing news,

I was certainly a lot more excited to see the Warden’s re-envisioned implementation for 1.19 than I was to initially see it in 1.18. For a mob as deadly as the Warden is, seeing it get it’s unique type of cave-biome, complete with all unique challenges, is nice

To see. My only worry is being able to entirely mitigate this mob’s mechanics by making noise, and then walking into a safe-spot where you can deal a ton of damage to it without it being able to reach you at. Think about endermen. An absolutely safe way to kill them is to

Get them to chase you, and then walk underneath a structure with a roof right above your head. The Warden getting it’s own, specialty biome brings up another gripe that I have with 1.18. The lack of cave biome variety. Right now, we have the Lush Caves, and the Dripstone

Caves. Given that 1.18’s cave biomes more or less just inhabit the noise caves that generate, I feel like there was a lot more opportunity to implement some more cave biome varieties, without needing to add too many more. Think, frozen glacier caves within colder

Biomes, or magma rich caves within hotter biomes like the badlands. But given the scale of 1.18 as a whole, it’s certainly only a small complaint. The last opinion that I’ll give is more of a statement. I need to make something clear. Throughout this video, I’ve

Put a heavy emphasis on the game’s more monumental and unique looking terrain. But there is plenty of terrain that isn’t like this at all. You may have to explore around for a good 10 to 20 minutes before encountering something truly awe inspiring above ground, and even longer

Under-ground. But in my opinion, that only serves to make the update better. I’ve spent hours and hours just, flying around and exploring the terrain, and really getting lost in it’s new found variety. While some of the terrain looks kinda… rough, as if someone new with

The world-edit smoothing tool just kinda went to town on it, I think that’s okay. That’s not a dominant problem, and from the ground, where you’ll spend most of your time, it all really comes together. All things considered however, there’s no doubting that Minecraft

1.18 is one of Minecraft’s very best yet. The only other gripe I really have is the game’s performance. No matter what computer you’re running this on, the sheer scale of Minecraft’s overworld terrain is tough for any computer to handle. Thankfully, these

Frame-rate issues don’t plague the underground, due to pretty well handled chunk loading. One thing I am happy to see is, despite the lower-frame rate, and slower chunk loading, the game at least feels consistent. Teleporting anywhere feels reasonably responsive. There aren’t constant lag spikes that make playing too difficult. All things considered, I’m

Happy that the full Caves & Cliffs experience is mostly complete, and we can look forward for what’s to come in Minecraft 1.19’s Wild Update. So, here we are. If you’ve stuck around this long, or you skipped to this point to hear

What I had to say, thank you. It means a lot. And I’m gonna keep this quick. And there are two items. First off, I’m starting a YouTube Shorts channel and a TikTok, both of which will house identical content. If you like the content I currently make, but also like

The idea of it being shorter, more concise, and faster, please consider checking them out. The Shorts channel will be in the description, and you can find me on TikTok with the handle “antvenomyt”. Secondly, reflecting on World Mental Health day, which just passed on October

10th. I want to let you in on a new development in my life. There is no doubting that I have become one of the most inconsistently scheduled creators making Minecraft content today. Not only have I not had the drive to make content at a consistent rate, I’ve been uploading

Progressively less. At one point, I went 49 days between uploads. That’s terrible. These issues have extended well beyond YouTube for me at this point. My drive to do much of anything has been abysmally low for far longer than I’d like to admit. I wasn’t able to focus

On much, and especially not my work. But a couple of months ago… I actually saught professional help. I consulted my lifelong doctor about the issues that I was having, and he told me I have ADHD, and suspected that I always did. And now, I’m actively treating

It. Knowing how hit or miss treatments can be, I decided to not speak up about it until I began feeling some of the more long-term effects. For me, right now, those long-term effects have been a re-kindled spirit for learning new things. It’s made me want to

Kick it into high gear with YouTube again, and it’s rekindled a lot of my love for Minecraft itself. My only hope is that I never lose my drive again. I wanted talk about these developments with you because I know just how difficult it can be to seek help, even

If you already feel you need it. I spent over 2 years not having the drive that I wanted or needed. But now, I’m getting back to it, with real reason to believe it might be different this time. Fingers crossed. I feel extraordinarily fortunate to have the support that I do, both

In private, and in public. And you have a lot to do with that. So thank you. I hope all enjoyed this video, my name is AntVenom, and I bid you all farewell. Thanks so much for watching.