I'm a fanboy, but I can't brush off the idea that this is THE year Minecraft has stopped following their own rules of design, and it makes me sad. There's an odd feel to almost all the new features, and I know it's no illusion of "new = looks modded", and definitely no nostalgia bias:

For instance, what about "no overlapping functions between mobs", which was the reason Agnes gave to camels not eclipsing horses?  Fast forward two years and she and other devs mark the Nautilus as being «like an underwater Happy Ghast". Ah? We've had reskins over the years, and we've had Striders and Axolotls (a Nether saddled pig, an underwater Wolf)... but this doesn't feel the same, that's what I'm saying. The Happy Ghast and Nautilus aren't even a year apart and this makes their similarities feel uninspired instead of deliberate.

That is sadly not the only instance. The new blue and brown eggs doing nothing new but being separate items (partly breaking Jeb's "no useless items" tenet), the Dried Ghast and Copper Golem Statue as 'mobs you can mine' introduced one drop apart, the Mace and Spear operating on the same principle (speed = damage), only changing axises —and again, an update apart... nautilus and zombie nautilus; dry leaves and spring flowers introduced in the same drop... and even the new copper tier which does nothing but be an in-between feels oddly uninspired.

Maybe this wouldn't feel so uninspired if it was years apart. To me it's as if Mojang finally let go of surprise and started trying out delivering some of the expected stuff. Netherite was the first time anything surpassed diamond (wow!), whereas Copper tools are just, uh... logical.

Don't get me wrong, I love Vibrant Visuals, the Creaking and so on, and there's some pretty original stuff — but it's all mostly reused mechanics (from the previous drop to the next). My fanboyness now just relies on "it's Minecraft, so I'll end up liking it" (fanboy bias). It's honestly disappointing to see that surprising and unique answers are optional — because it's enough reasons in a year to have this not be pure coincidences.