Summary
Minecraft’snext content update, in the form of the smaller “drop,” comes withThe Garden Awakens. Initially shown off atMinecraftLive 2024,this eerie biome and its strange details are now found in the Overworld, after only roughly two months of community feedback.
Featuring the Creaking mob, Eyeblossoms, and more oddities inthe Pale Garden biome,the latest drop contains far more focused content than the wider and larger update formats. While the Garden Awakens drop is smaller in scope than typical updates of the past, having it released in slightly over 2 months is a fair trade-off. With plenty of fascinating new mechanics found within the depths of the Pale Garden, there arefive key things players should know before exploring the pallid place.
5The Pale Garden
The Titular Garden
The main focus of the drop, and the biome hinted at with the drop name,the Pale Gardenis an unnerving and slightly spooky new forested biome in the Overworld. While initially seeming identical to the neighboring dark forest beyond its obviously paler look, the details within this eerie new location truly set it apart from the standard forest biome.
What players might first notice about the Pale Garden is that passive mobs do not spawn there and that all music fades away once players set foot in the biome. Covering the entire landscape is a mix of pale moss andpale oak trees,which are only found reliably within the forest, with leaves from the oaks floating straight down, unlike the cherry petal particles blowing in the wind, adding to the strange stillness of this location.
4Eyeblossoms
A Deadly New Flower
One of the later additions to the experimental phase of the Pale Garden,Eyeblossomflowers add another eerie detail to the forest, with eyes on the lookout at night along with working as a fake-out scare for the Creaking. The Eyeblossom, when open, shares a trait with the rare Wither Rose as a hazardous trap forbees looking to pollinate,suggesting the dangerous nature of this strange flower, even if it doesn’t harm players outright.
The opened and closed states of the Eyeblossom count as separate flowers when picked up, meaning players can do even more with this new flora. For multiplayer servers, either type of Eyeblossom creates a suspicious stew with negative effects, causing blindness from the opened flower and nausea from the closed one. Outside any additional use, the confusion and doubt the Eyeblossoms will give players looking out for the Creaking are more than enough for the flower to be a welcome new addition.
3Resin
Brilliant New Building Blocks
A new, vibrant block palette, theResinfamily offers a renewable source for bright orange stone-like blocks.Resinhas a wide array of designs and textures to use, ranging from bricks to uneven clumps, including a transparent overlay with orange Resin spots that can be used for details like oranges in trees and lava spots on smooth stone. Even beyond the building focus of the Resin blocks, the options for Resin use expand even further.
Somewhat teased in the April Fools snapshot for 2024, the orange smithing template color from amber, now used for Resin, added another color for players to better decorate their armor with. A true orange compared to the brown tones of copper in smithing, the rainbow for the bonus cosmetic option is now closer to completion.
2Technical Additions
The Inner-Workings Of The Game
For players interested in the nitty-gritty details of updates outside the often flashier content additions, the Garden Awakens drop does not disappoint. One of the more compelling details about new blocks to the Pale Garden revolves around sound and the clear potential for future updates.
Now that certain blocks produce ambient sound, to better suggest the feel of the biome, the potential to see this translated across several other blocks found throughoutMinecraftis obvious. Wind through leaves, rustling grass in drier biomes, crashing waves near oceans and more are clear candidates for such treatment. One of the bigger issuesMinecrafthas is a lack of ambiance, a detail whichfireflies would have helped immensely,and this step forward could greatly improve the feel of the game world.
1The Creaking
Minecraft’s Newest Mob
The star of the Pale Garden,the Creakingmob, and its controlling Creaking Heart block, have captured the attention and creativity of the community already. This is a unique mobthat cannot be directly harmed by the playerin any capacity except to slow it, though hitting the puppet causes Resin clumps to appear nearby. The Creaking can only move when the player looks away from it, further pushing the design choices for hostile mobs.
With the Creaking Heart block being the only way to kill a Creaking puppet, players have to tear apart the Pale Garden to try and minimize the enemies on the prowl. Beyond that, breaking and picking up the Creaking Heart with Silk Touch allows players to spawn Creaking puppets wherever they like, which is the only way to farm Resin reliably.
