In this tutorial we will go through how to install and play the Beta version of Minecraft Caves & Cliffs using the official launcher. Here are the steps to download and play it with pictures.

Step One: You will need to download and install Minecraft Java Edition from minecraft.net. Once you’ve installed it you will see the Minecraft Launcher icon. Launch Minecraft and log in using your Microsoft account or Mojang account:

Step Two: After the launcher opens, navigate to the settings menu via the settings button in the lower left corner then find this “Show historical versions…” checkbox and click it:

Now navigate to the “Installations” tab within the launcher:

Step Three: 3A) – Within the “Installations” menu, click on the checkbox next the the “Snapshots” option. It is found to the top far right of this screen.

3B) – Make note of the pop-up which reads “Run snapshot versions in a separate game directory to avoid corrupting your worlds”. You will need to create a separate folder/directory in an upcoming step.

Step Four: Once you click the snapshots button then a game installation record and icon row will appear immediately/automatically as shown here

Step Five: If you want to follow the advice to create a separate directory you will need to click on the edit ellipsis

Step Six: 6A) Once you’ve completed all sub-steps in Step 5, before you click the “Create” button, you should click the “BROWSE” button in the “GAME DIRECTORY” field, otherwise this new installation will use your default minecraft directory and as noted before there was a pop-up that told you “Run snapshot versions in a separate game directory to avoid corrupting your worlds”. So now you are following that wise advice from the Sages at Mojang.

6B) Once you click the “BROWSE” button, a “Browser for Folder” Windows dialog will pop-up where you can create a new folder. If all goes correctly, you should be able to scroll down in this “Browse For Folder” window and you will notice that Mojang/Microsoft have done you a favor here in conveniently locating you in the default location of the .minecraft folder, i.e.: C:\Users\<yourusername>\AppData\Roaming\.minecraft

6B) continued I highly recommend, based upon my experience messing around with Minecraft installations for the past few years, that you create a new minecraft folder for this installation in this same Roaming directory, yet you can really create it anywhere you please, that is convenient for you to find it later. For example you could name it .minecraft-1-17-snapshot-21w08b. In my case, I created a folder with the follow directory structure and name:

C:\Users\jared\AppData\Roaming\minecraft-v1-17-21w08b

6C) – Make the new folder, name it as you please, locate it where you please

6D) – Verify your folder was made and that you have selected it as your game directory

6E) – Hit OK. The image below should give a visual summary of all the base sub-steps, in case you lost track. 🙂

Step Seven: Now its time to play the new version of the game!

Press the play button.

“From free range developers!”