Minecraft Mounts of Mayhem is finally ready to be unleashed, so here's when you can ride a zombie horse into battle

Mojang has been steadily drip-feeding new Minecraft Mounts of Mayhem additions over the past few weeks, testing out new weapons, mobs, and mechanics to ensure everything is shipshape. After plenty of tweaks, the huge new update is ready to fully drop in Java and Bedrock, and you don't have long to wait. The Minecraft Mounts of Mayhem release date has been locked in, and it's just around the corner.

What a year it's been for Minecraft, eh? The movie was a hit, spawning more memes and cinema hijinks than I've seen any film manage in a very long while. But it's been just as poignant a year within Minecraft itself. Fireflies returned, copper golems were let loose, and the Vibrant Visuals update made one of the best sandbox games ever made even more beautiful to look at. Plus, creating and updating Minecraft mods has been made easier than ever.

Rounding out the year is Mounts of Mayhem, and we've been keeping a very close eye on all the new features and changes that have been put through their paces in snapshots and previews. If you've been too busy building and exploring in the full game to notice, here's a quick rundown of what Mounts of Mayhem is adding.

The spear is an all-new weapon type in Minecraft, and it's pretty lethal. A tiered weapon that you can craft from wood, netherite, and everything in between, it has two main attacks. There's a short and swift jab attack, which will deal a small chunk of damage, or the more powerful charge attack, which has scaling damage depending on how fast you're moving at the time. This encourages you to wield it while riding on speedy mobs. A bespoke enchantment called Lunge can also be applied to the spear, which "gives players an extra burst of speed, and can be strong enough to knock a rider from its mount," according to Mojang.

A bunch of new rideable mobs are being introduced. There's the all-new nautilus, which is the number one option if you want to explore underwater. It's got a zombie variant too, which you can find roaming beneath the waves - but be warned, a hostile drowned mob will be riding them, equipped with a trident.

A staple of Minecraft, the trusty horse has also undergone some changes. You can now craft netherite-tier armor for them, and their zombified forms will now spawn as overworld mobs.

A new camel form also debuts in Mounts of Mayhem. The camel husk is Minecraft's tallest mob ever, and they'll always spawn with not one, but two hostile mobs riding them. One husk and one parched (another new mob type that uses a bow and arrow to deal ranged damage) will always be atop a camel husk's humps, so make sure you're prepared for a scrap.

This is an extremely cool update to cap off what's been a mega year for the game. Mounts of Mayhem will hit Minecraft in just under two weeks' time on December 9, so pop that date in your diary if you're keen to tame these new mobs and impale your enemies with the spear.