There's been no shortage of news for both the PC and Xbox 360 editions of Minecraft lately, with snapshot updates and console edition catch-ups on the horizon. Nathan Adams of Mojang and Paddy Burns of 4J Studios (in charge of the console version of the game) recently both let loose some major update news for fans, which will bring huge updates to both editions of Minecraft.
Adams, known affectionately as 'Dinnerbone' by the staff at Mojang, revealed over Twitter almost nonchalantly that he has been working on texturing and shaping witches for the upcoming Minecraft 1.4 update. The tweet came out yesterday, but the latest Snapshot Update reportedly includes the mob, though it doesn't spawn naturally yet. Nathan never stated it, but Mojang has also been working on bats - meaning the company is back on track for their infamous Halloween Updates. It goes without saying that gamers should expect the update to come out some time in October.
How do you even draw a witch anyway? Pointy nose? In a blocky world it'd look like Pinocchio!
— Nathan Adams (@Dinnerbone) September 18, 2012
Gamers should expect the witch mobs to be hostile, but bats behave as a neutral mob. We're not sure what exactly the mobs will drop, if anything, but witches are a prime target for some new enchantment ingredients (a flyable broom wouldn't be a bad thing, either). Down the road, there might even be naturally spawning witch huts containing enchantment tables and cauldrons. We'll keep you posted as news comes out - Jeb and Dinnerbone certainly love to tweet.
On the console side of things, 4J Studios is hard at work playing catch-up with the PC edition of the game. The studio seems to be working overtime to implement most of the updates from their computer-run brethren, aside of experience and enchanting. When asked about the concept of allowing console gamers to have some modding fun - something virtually never seen on consoles - Paddy had this to say on the issue:
"This isn’t something that will be coming with 1.8.2, but will be further down the line. The Xbox 360 won’t be able to have the mod system that gives such a variety of community additions to the game on PC, but we’re looking at the elements of these that people seem to be enjoying the most, and deciding how we could tailor those elements into something for Xbox. The audience for the game on the Xbox is different from the PC version, mainly due to the console being in the living room and using controllers rather than a mouse and keyboard, so we need to ensure that whatever we do is right for that audience."
To cater to the aforementioned 'different audiences', Paddy confirmed that the studio has been in talks with Mojang about potentially having some separate exclusive content for the Xbox 360 edition of the game. While we have no idea what content that could possibly be, we're all for the idea of some unique 360 items. If console gamers can't get anything on the modification front, they can at least get some unique content.
What do you think about the new Minecraft mobs? Would you be happy with Xbox 360 exclusive content for the game?
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Sources: PCGamesN, HookShotInc