Fans hopes for a next-gen upgrade for Minecraft were briefly rekindled when the game recently got a fresh ESRB rating for the Xbox Series X|S platform. This in addition to an earlier classification by Germanys USK ratings board for the same platform.
Those hopes have now been squashed by Microsoft, which has gone on record (via Eurogamer) saying that no such version of Minecraft is forthcoming.
Given the number of platforms and geographies in which Minecraft is available, we periodically go through rating reviews and updates with different regional boards…This recent rating is not indicative of any new versions or platform support for Minecraft in the near future.”
The speculative next-gen Minecraft was expected to feature graphics enhancements like ray tracing. This was “accidentally” teased a while back and is now available on the Windows version of Minecraft. See here for a glimpse of what Minecraft could look like.
Before that, a “Super Duper Graphics Pack” for Xbox One was canceled two years after its announcement. It looks like an enhanced Minecraft on console isn’t meant to be, at least for the time being.
Via Windows Central.