Minecraft: Java Edition/Version Differences/1.2

This is a sub-page of Minecraft: Java Edition/Version Differences.

1.2 is a major update to Minecraft: Java Edition. The update launched officially on March 1, 2012. It added ocelots, jungles, and desert wells, among other new things and changes.

12w03a

12w03a is the first snapshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on January 19, 2012.

Additions

Blocks

Jungle Leaves

Jungle leaves generate in jungle trees.

Jungle Log

Jungle logs have a slightly-mossy brown textured with horizontal bark. They generate in jungle trees.

World Generation

Biomes

The jungle biome has been added. It is a thick canopy including jungle trees, vines, fern, and brightly-colored grass.

Changes

Blocks

Ladders

Ladders have regained their collision box.

Vines

Vines are now climbable if the player is pushed into a solid block while next to them.

Items

Spawn Eggs

Dispensers can now spawn mobs when dispensing spawn eggs. Spawn eggs are also now stackable to 64.

Mobs

Wolves

Wolves now have new AI. They can be bred by using any type of meat (chicken, porkchops, steak/beef, and rotten flesh) when tamed.

Zombies

Zombies now have new path-finding AI.

General

Languages

The language files have been updated.

12w04a

12w04a is the second snapshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on January 26, 2012.

Additions

Blocks

Jungle Sapling

Jungle saplings can be grown into the new jungle trees. Growing a 4×4 square of jungle saplings creates large jungle trees.

Items

Bottle o' Enchanting

Bottles o' Enchanting can be thrown similarly to splash potions and they spawn experience orbs upon breaking. They are currently only available in creative mode.

Fire Charge

Fire charges can be shot out of dispensers to launch fireballs and can be placed to create fire.

Ocelot Spawn Egg

Ocelot spawn eggs spawn the newly-added ocelot mob.

Mobs

Ocelots

Ocelots are a new jungle-specific mob that can be tamed with raw fish. Tamed ocelots will scare off creepers, can be told to sit, and will teleport to their owner similarly to wolves.

World Generation

Desert Wells

Desert wells have been added, which are newly generated structures which are exclusive to desert biomes.

Changes

Blocks

Dispensers

The texture for dispensers has been changed.

Beta 1.2	12w04a to 18w43a

Oak Saplings

The texture for oak saplings has been changed.

Indev	12w04a to 18w43a

Vines

Players are slowed when going through vines due to their nature of being a collisionless ladder.

Items

Spawn Eggs

Eggs set to spawn arbitrary data IDs (such as giants, ender dragons, ender crystals) no longer spawn those entities. They also now only spawn mobs also available in the creative inventory.

Mobs

• Mobs have a new AI with new and improved behaviors.
• Skeletons and zombies burning from sunlight will flee to darkness or jump in water.
• Mobs no longer attempt to jump over wooden fences.

General

Languages

The language files have been updated.

12w05a

12w05a is the third snapshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on February 2, 2012.

Changes

Blocks

Dead Bushes

Dead bushes can now be obtained by breaking them using shears.

Mobs

Creepers

Creepers now stalk the player as part of their new AI.

Ghasts

Ghasts' hit box has been updated to incorporate their whole body. Prior to this, ghasts could only be injured by hitting their tentacles and lower body.

Ocelots

Ocelots are now easier to tame, and tamed ocelots can now be told to sit.

Villagers

Villagers will now try to detect village houses and live in them.

World Generation

Abandoned Mineshafts

Mineshafts now have a bridge whenever they're spawned floating.

General

Enchanting

Enchanting no longer requires experience in creative mode.

Languages

One new language has been added.

• Esperanto

Sounds

Lava sounds now function properly. Now a faint rumbling sound effect can be heard, and large particles that hop out of the lava produce a popping sound.

Reupload

12w05a was reuploaded later on February 2, 2012, to fix a bug where the game would crash when right-clicking a sitting cat empty-handed, as well as fixing racist translation griefings.

12w05b

12w05b is the fourth snapshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on February 3, 2012.

Changes

Mobs

Creepers

Creepers now have a slightly improved AI, and will now run away from tamed cats and ocelots.

Villagers

Villagers now have the ability to open and close doors.

General

Death Screen

Death screen has a slight delay before buttons become active, to avoid accidentally clicking buttons when killed.

Bug Fixes

2 bugs have been fixed.

• Shift-clicking the result from crafting only giving half the items and consuming all leftover materials has been fixed.
• Cats being unable to sit when right-clicked with an empty hand has been fixed.

12w06a

12w06a is the fifth screenshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on February 9, 2012.

Additions

General

Sounds

• Cats now meow, cry, howl, purr and hiss.
• Doors now make banging sounds when zombies hit them.

Changes

Blocks

Doors

• Doors have been changed to properly detect if they are open or closed. Double doors in existing maps are not affected.
• Placing two pressure plates directly in front of doors and stepping on them will now open them correctly.
  • When stepping on a single pressure plate, only the door on that side will open.
  • When stepping on both pressure plates, both doors will open.

Redstone

Redstone can now be placed on glowstone.

Mobs

General

• Rare item drops for mobs has been added.
• Movement when mobs are in water has been improved.
• Most mobs now move slower.
• When a player is targeted by a hostile mob, it will continue to track the player despite being attacked by other mobs.

Cave Spiders

Cave spiders now swim extremely fast with the water stream towards the player, but seem to be almost not moving against the water stream.

Skeletons

Skeletons now have a rare chance to drop a bow, which may be enchanted.

Snow Golems

Snow Golems now take damage from rain and water.

Villagers

Villagers' AI has been improved.

• They now socialize with each other and other passive mobs.
• They will now go inside shelter when it is raining.
• They will now run away from zombies.

Zombies

Zombies' AI has been improved.

• On hard difficulty and Hardcore, zombies now break down wooden doors.
• On normal and easy difficulty, zombies attack but will not break down wood doors.
• Zombies will now chase and attack villagers.
• They will now attack doors when attempting to escape sunlight.
• They now have a rare chance to drop an iron ingot, iron helmet, iron shovel, or iron sword.

Zombie Pigmen

• Zombie pigmen now have a rare chance to drop golden armor, a gold ingot, or a golden sword which may be enchanted.
• Zombie pigmen now swim faster when in water.

General

Debug Keys

Pressing F1 to hide the HUD additionally disables hitbox outlines on blocks and the block breaking animation.

Bug Fixes

5 bugs fixed:

• Creepers no longer explode after death.
• Villagers can no longer open iron doors.
• Ocelots, zombies, wolves, and skeletons no longer spin in circles on non-full-height blocks.
• Cobwebs will prevent the player from receiving fall damage.
• Monster spawners now show correct mobs in multiplayer.

12w07a

12w07a is the sixth snapshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on February 15, 2012.

Additions

Blocks

Redstone Lamp

Redstone lamps can be crafted using glowstone and redstone. If powered by redstone, the lamp will turn on.

Off	On

General

World File Format

• Worlds now use the new Anvil file format instead of Region.
• World files now save with .mca suffixes instead of .mcr.
• World height is now 256 blocks high instead of 128 blocks.
• Up to 4096 block IDs can now be used.

Maltese Language

Maltese has been re-added after being removed in 12w01a.

Changes

Items

Hoe

No longer tills dirt or grass blocks when they have another block on top of them.

Mobs

Drops

The chance for rare mob drops has been decreased, making the drops even more rare than before.

AI

• All animals now use the new AI system.
• Animals can now move their heads when walking.
• Baby animals will now follow wheat.

World Generation

Villages

• Villagers will now repopulate villages based on how many houses there are available.
• The player may add houses to villages, provided they are enclosed with a roof and wooden door.
• Zombie sieges, in-game events that occur when many zombies spawn in a village, regardless of how well lit or walled off a village is, have been added.

General

Multiplayer

Multiplayer light calculations no longer cause affected blocks to be transmitted to clients; instead the clients will recalculate the light on their own. This means that chunk errors cannot be fixed by updating blocks anymore.

Bug Fixes

3 bugs have been fixed.

• Wolf AI has been fixed: they no longer teleport huge distances when the player is hit.
• A bug where zombies can break iron doors has been fixed.
• A bug where regular cows could breed with mooshrooms has been fixed.

12w07b

12w07b is the seventh snapshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on February 15, 2012.

Bug Fixes

3 bugs have been fixed.

• A bug where blocks can be destroyed when a block on fire is hit has been fixed.
• A crash when mobs were spawned above y=255 has been fixed.
• Sheep animation in multiplayer has been fixed.

12w08a

12w08a is the eighth and the final snapshot for Java Edition 1.2.1, released on February 23, 2012.

Additions

Mobs

Iron Golems

Iron golems are a new utility mob.

• Iron golems occasionally spawn in large villages as a defense.
• They can also be spawned by arranging 4 iron blocks and a pumpkin.

General

Controls

Camera controls have been added.

• These were accidentally added. Jeb noted them as "deadmau5 camera" controls and would likely be removed again in an upcoming snapshot.
• Pressing F6 causes the player to get "stuck" to the camera until F6 is pressed again. This allows players to appear to phase into blocks.
• Pressing F9 causes the camera to freeze in its position, allowing to see the player model rotating in third person view.
• Scrolling the mouse wheel (which also scrolls the inventory) rotates the forward, left, right, and back directions.
• Pressing Y, H, U, O, I, K, J, L, N and M change the camera positioning in a variety of ways. While pressing two functionally connected keys at the same time the camera may be reset (example: Y + H) will revert that view back to normal, but U + O will not).

Changes

Blocks

Redstone Torches

Redstone torches can now be placed on top of glass.

Stairs

Stairs will now be placed upside-down when placed against the bottom of a block.

World Generation

General

Lava ponds and flat stone areas now generate on the surface more frequently.

General

Languages

Some Canadian English stereotypes have been removed.

Bug Fixes

One bug has been fixed.

• The End and caverns generation has been fixed.

1.2

Version 1.2 is a strange case; the preview version for this update was 1.2, while 1.2.1 was the launch update for 1.2. It released on February 29, 2012.

Additions

Blocks

Chiseled Stone Bricks

Chiseled stone bricks are a new type of stone bricks. They are a creative-exclusive block.

Sandstone

Two new textures have been added to the terrain.png file. They look similar to sandstone, but instead they contain hieroglyphics. These blocks have not been added to the game yet.

However, these blocks do look similar to chiseled sandstone, which was added in 1.2.4; these were perhaps an early version of that block.

Mobs

Iron Golems

Iron golems now have sounds.

Changes

Blocks

Ladders

When crafting ladders, the player will now get 3 instead of 2.

Slabs

When crafting slabs, the player will now get 6 instead of 3. Slabs can also now be placed upside-down when placed against the bottom of a block.

General

Controls

The camera controls accidentally added in 12w08a have been removed.

F3 Debug Screen

Pressing F3 now displays what biome the player are currently in, along with raw, sky & block brightness values (called rl, sl & bl respectively).

Bug Fixes

21 bugs have been fixed.

• The iron golem spawn rate has been nerfed.
• A bug involving updating powered rail when placing redstone has been fixed.
• A bug involving stairs being placed upside down when placed on snow has been fixed.
• A bug involving not being able to put torches on upside-down stairs and normal stairs has been fixed.
• A bug involving jukeboxes not playing above level 128 has been fixed.
• A bug involving not being able to grow huge mushrooms above level 128 has been fixed.
• A bug involving growing trees above level 128 with bone meal has been fixed.
• A crash bug with iron golem building has been fixed.
• When building an iron golem, the block above them is no longer destroyed.
• A bug involving tamed wolves still attacking sheep has been fixed.
• Some language bugs have been fixed.
• Some Anvil bugs have been fixed.
• Fixed the client not properly handling biome values greater than 22.
• A bug involving mobs spawning half as quick due to the code checking in invalid spawning places half of the time due to the new world height has been fixed.
• A bug involving lava lakes generating over bedrock has been fixed.
• A bug involving the iron golem's texture being white or invisible has been fixed.
• A bug involving the iron golem model has been fixed.
• A bug involving villagers being restless at night has been fixed.
• A bug involving nether wart dropping from soul sand has been fixed.
• A bug involving lag from iron golems has been fixed.
• Iron golems no longer drown.

1.2.1

1.2.1 was the first full and official update for 1.2, releasing on March 1, 2012.

Changes

Blocks

Grass

Placing blocks on grass will now replace the grass.

Mobs

Creepers

Creepers no longer strafe to the player's left but now simply stop in front of the player when they are about to explode.

Wolf

Tamed wolves can be bred using bones.

Snow Golems

Snow golems will now melt and die in the Nether.

Gameplay

Multiplayer

Now that biome data saves to chunks, multiplayer servers no longer send clients the world seed, instead the seed will display as "0" to the client.

Third Person View

The third person view now has a slight delay on the speed at which the head moves on the player. This makes it possible to see the sides of the player's head.

Bug Fixes

Cave sounds now work in multiplayer.

1.2.2

1.2.2 was a minor update to Minecraft: Java Edition released on March 1, 2012.

Bug Fixes

3 bugs have been fixed.

• A bug involving generation of birch, spruce, tall oak and swamp trees has been fixed.
• A bug involving generation of giant mushrooms has been fixed.
• Snow now appears on maps again.

1.2.3

1.2.3 is a minor update to Minecraft: Java Edition released on March 2, 2012.

Bug Fixes

4 bugs have been fixed.

• A light bug causing a crash at y=255 has been fixed.
• A bug involving zombies and skeletons not burning in sunlight has been corrected.
• A bug involving all natural light being 1 light level darker than it should be, except at world creation, has been fixed.
• A bug involving birch and spruce saplings not growing at a height above y=127 has been fixed.

1.2.4

1.2.4 is a not-so-minor update to Minecraft: Java Edition released on March 22, 2012.

Additions

Blocks

Wood Planks

Wood planks have been split into four blocks corresponding to each type of wood.

Oak Wood Planks	Birch Wood Planks	Spruce Wood Planks	Jungle Wood Planks

Chiseled Sandstone and Cut Sandstone

These two blocks use the unused textures from 1.2, but they're modified. Both of these blocks share the same name as regular sandstone in-game.

Sandstone (1.2.4)	Chiseled Sandstone	Cut Sandstone

Changes

Blocks

Wool

Slightly removed saturation out of every color.

Beta 1.2	1.2.4

Sandstone

Sandstone's texture has been changed.

Beta 1.2	1.2.4

Mobs

Cats

When in a standing position, cats will now purposely go and sit on nearby chests, active furnaces, and beds. This prevents players from using them.

Pigs

Baby pigs can no longer be ridden.

Gameplay

Chat

• Chat history has been added and chat editing has been improved.
• Links are now clickable in chat.
  • When clicked, a warning screen appears that asks players if they want to continue.
• Players can copy and paste links in chat.
• The mouse wheel can be used to scroll up/down for history.
  • PAGEUP and PAGEDOWN keys can also be used to scroll.
• The up and down keys scroll through recently sent messages.
• When typing a player's name, pressing Tab will automatically fill in the rest of the username.
• Text can now be copied and pasted.
• Similar to how the formatting code §k displays random characters in chat, §l, §m, §n and §o creates bold, striked, underlined and italic text respectively, while §r resets any set states.
  • These cannot be typed using vanilla clients.
• Pressing / acts as a command key: it opens the chat with a / in place.
• Pressing ← or → will move the insertion point (text pointer) in the respective direction, allowing text to be modified.

Out of Memory Screen

"Back" and "Quit" buttons have been added to the Out of Memory screen.

Debug Screen

A "minimal" debug menu has been added. It is the same as the regular F3 menu, except without the graph/profiler. It's accessible by pressing Shift and F3 simultaneously.

Inventory

Armor outlines in the armor slots in the inventory have been re-added.

Bug Fixes

25 bugs have been fixed.

• Placing half blocks on existing half blocks (to make a full block) has been made easier.
• There is now a limited framerate on menu screens; this no longer uses 100% CPU.
• A fatal crash for converting worlds to anvil, when there’s blocks at max height, has been fixed.
• A bug involving signs clearing text while being edited in multiplayer has been fixed.
• A crash when logging in while there are blocks at the maximum height level at spawn has been fixed.
• A bug involving TNT ghost blocks in multiplayer has been fixed.
• A bug involving chest minecarts dropping enchanted items has been fixed.
• A bug involving crashes on invalid server addresses when joining a server has been fixed.
• A bug involving entities not being interactable if they existed at login in multiplayer has been fixed.
• A duplication exploit with paintings has been fixed.
• A bug involving furnaces and dispensers dropping enchanted items has been fixed.
• A bug involving the "flickering" of chat as it vanishes off the screen has been fixed.
• A bug involving text rendering over items in the container screens has been fixed.
• An exploit with jungle saplings (turns other saplings into jungle ones) has been fixed.
• A bug involving the launcher opening Minecraft's directory if the path contains a space has been fixed.
• An off-by-one lighting bug has been fixed.
• A bug involving block transmuting (turning one block into another via pistons) has been fixed.
• A bug involving placing mushrooms in daylight, where they cannot survive, has been fixed.
• A bug involving redstone lamps dropping powered block items when destroyed while on has been fixed.
• /save-all now works even when /save-off has been used.
• A bug involving turning half-blocks into full-blocks while you’re standing on them has been fixed.
• A bug involving the seed displaying in F3 debug when the seed is unknown in multiplayer has been fixed.
• A bug involving villager texture changing client-side per profession has been fixed.
• A bug involving falling off ledge corners while holding Shift has been fixed.
• Glass blocks can be picked up using Silk Touch enchanted tools again.

1.2.5

1.2.5 is a minor update to Minecraft: Java Edition, released on April 4, 2012.

Additions

Blocks

Furnace

Shift-clicking items in the player's inventory now places the item in its respective furnace slot.

Changes

=Tamed Ocelots

Tamed ocelots are now less eager to sit on things, but are now less patient.

Gameplay

Controls

When the hotbar is full, using pick block (which defaults to the middle mouse button) replaces the held item.

General

Direct Connect Dialog

The direct connect dialog now remembers the last IP for the current session.

Game Files

Inside the META-INF folder in minecraft.jar, the digital signature files (MOJANG_C.DSA, MOJANG_C.SF) have been renamed to CODESIGN.RSA and CODESIGN.SF. However, the function of the folder remains the same.

Bug Fixes

14 bugs have been fixed.

• A bug involving issues when detecting certain links in chat has been fixed.
• A bug involving wild ocelots behaving like tamed ocelots has been fixed.
• A bug involving various chat crashes has been fixed.
• A bug involving world generation failing under certain circumstances has been fixed.
• A bug involving issues turning off sound under certain circumstances has been fixed.
• All ghost entities have been removed.
• A crash when pasting certain characters in chat has been fixed.
• A bug involving the slash key not behaving correctly in certain environments has been fixed.
• A bug involving command matching not being strict enough (for example: typing /stopppp no longer stops a server) has been fixed.
• A bug involving not being able to click colored links has been fixed.
• A bug involving a potential issue with village door detection (which could cause too many villagers to spawn) has been fixed.
• Using a stack of bowls on mooshrooms no longer consumes the whole stack of bowls.
• Made punching a TNT block with flint and steel in hand destroy and drop the TNT block (right-clicking will activate the TNT).
• A bug involving the ⌘+Q shortcut not quitting the app on macOS has been fixed.