I don't know whether these are bugs (perhaps it's expected behavior because things changed in the new snapshot) or whether they are related so I am putting them all here. Let me know whether I need to open separate tickets for them when you close this one.

1. Beacons no longer cast their ray that goes to the sky although they seem to function.
2. The end portal works but is not rendered. This might also be true for nether portals; haven't tried and can't test right now.
3. Signs either disappeared or are no longer rendered. It only occured to me that I should test which case it is now but I can't test at this moment.

Cheers,
Bogdan