Minecraft Reveals Dappled Forest Biome and “A Minecraft Movie Squared” at TwitchCon Rotterdam

Minecraft just had a packed Minecraft Live presentation at TwitchCon Rotterdam, and if you’re a fan of cozy autumn vibes or blockbuster movie sequels, this one was for you. Mojang pulled back the curtain on the third game drop of 2026, featuring a stunning new biome called the Dappled Forest, and then capped it all off with the official title and cast reveal for the follow-up to the smash-hit 2025 film. It’s a big day to be a Minecraft fan.

The Dappled Forest — Minecraft’s First Autumn Biome

The headline game content reveal is the Dappled Forest biome, and just from the visuals alone, it’s already turning heads in the community. This is Minecraft’s first genuinely autumn-themed biome — rustic oranges, warm tones, and the kind of visual identity that makes you want to build a cozy cabin and never leave.

The biome is defined by a brand new tree type: the poplar tree, rendered in warm brown-and-orange with a distinctive silhouette that stands out from every other wood type in the game. Alongside the poplars are red shrubs scattered across the forest floor, which persist and stay vibrantly colored — no risk of them fading or matching the surrounding palette like some other plants do. The developers noted “persistently red shrubs” as a feature during the live presentation, which suggests they’ve been specifically designed to hold their color regardless of biome lighting.

The new poplar trees introduce a full warm gray poplar wood block set, expanding the builder palette significantly. Mojang’s own team was enthusiastic about the herringbone pattern potential in poplar wood during the livestream, suggesting the texture and block design was developed with creative builders specifically in mind.

Abandoned Camps — New Structures to Discover

The exploration hook for the Dappled Forest comes in the form of mysterious abandoned camps nestled among the trees. Mojang kept the specifics tight — this is still very early in development — but the implication is a new type of generated structure that tells a story and potentially offers loot, context clues, or some kind of gameplay reward for players who find them. The third game drop’s stated focus is on “exploration, adventure, and playing together with friends,” and abandoned camps sit squarely in that wheelhouse.

Wool Stairs and Slabs Are Also Coming

Alongside the biome, the third drop confirms the long-requested addition of wool stairs and slabs. This sounds like a small thing but it’s a builder community win that’s been sitting on the wishlist for ages — finally being able to properly stair and slab in any wool color opens up a ton of soft furnishing and interior design options that weren’t cleanly executable before.

There are also rumors floating around about a new type of bed that won’t reset the player’s spawn point when used. Nothing official yet, but given the drop’s adventure focus, a portable rest option that doesn’t lock your respawn would be a meaningful quality-of-life change for long exploration sessions.

When Is the Third Game Drop Coming?

Mojang acknowledged during the presentation that the Dappled Forest drop is still in its “very early days.” The update is expected to arrive in Fall 2026 — fitting for an autumn-themed biome — which puts it in the Q3-Q4 window. Before it arrives, players still have the Chaos Cubed update to look forward to, which launches June 16 and brings the new sulfur caves biome and the playful Sulfur Cube mob that feeds on and absorbs block properties.

A Minecraft Movie: Squared — Everything Revealed

The movie portion of the Minecraft Live broadcast closed out with a proper mic-drop moment. The sequel to the 2025 blockbuster now has an official title: A Minecraft Movie: Squared. And yes, it’s exactly as clever as it sounds — mathematical pun fully intended.

For context on how big the original film was: A Minecraft Movie opened to a record $163 million domestically in April 2025 and went on to earn nearly $960 million worldwide. That kind of performance doesn’t just guarantee a sequel — it accelerates one. Warner Bros. and Legendary formally announced the sequel was happening back in October 2025, and development has been moving fast since.

The Full Cast

The returning roster is stacked. Coming back from the first film:

• Jason Momoa as Garrett “The Garbage Man” Garrison
• Jack Black as Steve
• Danielle Brooks as Dawn
• Jennifer Coolidge in her role from the first film
• Matt Berry — returning, though in a different role this time. He played Nitwit in the original, but his new character in Squared is currently undisclosed. Some fans are speculating based on his appearance in the teaser that he could be playing Herobrine, the legendary Minecraft creepypasta character — though that’s unconfirmed

The major new addition is Kirsten Dunst, joining as Alex — Steve’s female counterpart in the game. Dunst’s casting had been confirmed back in March 2026 after early reports in 2025, and she reportedly expressed interest in the role in part because of her children being fans of both the game and the first film. She replaces Kate McKinnon, who had a brief appearance as Alex in the first movie’s post-credits scene. Alex hasn’t been prominent in the theatrical Minecraft universe until now, and bringing Dunst into that role is a genuinely interesting choice — her range is wide, and playing the game’s female protagonist in a family blockbuster is a different kind of project than anything she’s done recently.

The Creative Team

Director Jared Hess is back behind the camera, reuniting with co-writer Chris Galletta for the screenplay. The same director-writer partnership that shaped the original’s tone, humor, and surprisingly sincere emotional beats is intact for the sequel. The film is currently in production in New Zealand with Weta handling visual effects — the same Wellington studio that built the visual language for the first film.

Release Date and Fan Contest

A Minecraft Movie: Squared is confirmed for July 23, 2027 in theaters. Alongside the title reveal, Mojang announced a build contest tied to the film — winners will be featured in the movie itself, with private screenings offered as part of the prize. The build submission period runs from May 30 through June 8, with community voting happening July 2-5. If you’ve ever wanted your Minecraft builds to appear in a Warner Bros. blockbuster, this is your shot.

Minecraft Dungeons II Also Got a New Look

While not the main focus of the game content reveals, Minecraft Dungeons II also got some spotlight during the live event with the reveal of a new enemy: the Twisted Warden. The developers teased visits to both familiar and fresh biomes, a deep dark portal as a central narrative element, and confirmed the sequel is coming to consoles, PC, and Game Pass later in 2026. A physical LEGO Dungeons II set was also unveiled at the event alongside LEGO Minecraft Chicken Mounts as a Marketplace add-on — which may be the most chaotic sentence to ever come out of a gaming event, and yet very on-brand for Minecraft.

2026 Is Stacking Up for Minecraft

Between Chaos Cubed landing June 16, the Dappled Forest drop coming in fall, a Dungeons sequel in the pipeline, and a movie sequel already confirmed for 2027, Minecraft is in an exceptionally strong position heading into the back half of 2026. The franchise is clearly running on the momentum of the first film’s near-billion dollar global haul, and Mojang seems to be pacing content drops in a way that keeps the game feeling fresh without burning out the community.

For other big gaming news this weekend, Diablo 4 Season 14’s Mythics 3.0 overhaul and Solo Self Found mode hit the PTR on June 2, Valve’s Steam Machine just got a welcome tour in the backend hinting at imminent launch, Street Fighter 6 confirmed the end of World Tour support after Ingrid, and Nintendo issued an urgent warning about a game-breaking bug in Yoshi and the Mysterious Book that players need to know about before Chapter 4.