Bedrock Preview 26.60.29 is the first playable frost for Drop 4: ice caves under cold biomes, Frostbite zombies with ice balls, Freezing as a real status effect, and a pile of Realms/UI polish that would be headline news on a quieter week. Treat it like a winter lab — sandbox Realm or Preview profile, leather ready, feedback form bookmarked.
Ice caves — what you will actually see
- New cave biome under colder Overworld temperatures — Packed Ice + Calcite primary terrain
- Icicles hang from packed-ice ceilings; large packed-ice icicles on floor and ceiling
- Ice Crystals generate on packed ice as the cave’s light source (no glow lichen here)
- Strays and Frostbites spawn alongside normal cave mobs; snow patches on the ground
- Ores sit in stone/deepslate pockets; dirt and granite stay out of this biome
Frostbite, Freezing, and ice-ball etiquette
Frostbite is the named frozen zombie: melee applies Freezing, ranged throws Ice Balls (about 4 damage with knockback, breaks on impact). It stands on powder snow, ignores Freezing slowdown, and turns into a regular zombie if it stays underwater too long. Zombies and husks can transform into Frostbites inside powder snow — cold biomes just got a conversion story. Freezing makes you shake, cuts jump height, then damages; leather stops the freeze-out the way it does in powder snow but does not strip the effect. Brew Freezing potions from Ice Balls; tip arrows in a Freezing cauldron for Arrow of Freezing.
Icicles are not decoration
They grow like dripstone/sulfur cousins — up to five blocks down in dark, non-Nether spaces — and they fall when light gets too friendly, dealing damage on the way down and extra pain if you land on them. Chaos is allowed. Armor is recommended.
Not just ice — Realms and menu week
- Realms world download speed/reliability improved; Hub help guide for owners/admins
- Main menu refresh rolling out incrementally — rebuilt Ore UI, better first-time accessibility setup
- Cushions no longer vanish when chunks unload/reload
- Creator World Clocks experiment removed; /time pause/resume/query and /time of… land for clock control
- Marketplace Wishlist updates live; new Marketplace audio category support
- Enable Preview/beta on a throwaway profile
- Creative ice-cave tourism first — crystals, icicles, one Frostbite kite test
- Brew one Freezing potion so you understand the leather rules
- File feedback at the winter drop form; bugs to the tracker with seed + coords
- Leave legacy Realms on stable until you like the freeze feel
Preview frost is for learning the verbs — freeze, crystal, flee — before Drop 4 asks your main world to shiver.
PixelCraft
