2D moba Awesomenauts goes free-to-play next month

The long-lasting 2D incarnation of the MOBA known as Awesomenauts [official site] is going free-to-play, developers Ronimo have announced. They’ve been working up to this over the past year, they say, bringing other features to the shooty multiplayer platformer such as a new matchmaking system, a spectator mode, and a level editor. But now it is taking the final plunge into the deep F2P abyss.

Here’s the important changes, which I’ve cut down for brevity.

• A completely overhauled tutorial and beginner experience
• A new progression system
• A new currency called Awesomepoints… used to unlock playable characters, profile portraits, and the new droppods
• Medals
• Real money will still be the only way to buy character skins, but can now also be used to buy individual playable characters and droppods
• Players will also be able to buy all current and future characters through the 'Awesomenauts All Nauts Pack'

The F2P-ness will begin May 24, but existing players will notice the changes from today. If you are one of those players and you’re wondering what you get out of all this (aside from some new pals to play with), Ronimo seek to reassure you. “Nobody will lose content during this transition,” they say. “Existing players will automatically have all the content they previously owned unlocked.” If you own the game and all of its previous expansions, you’ll also be auto-upgraded, like a victim of the cybermen, to that “All Nauts Pack” which unlocks all the characters for you, if you haven’t done that already.

I haven't had a go at Awesomenauts, and it looks like none of us have written about it apart to report on previous updates and expansions, so we can't tell you what we think about it. But we have often admired its name from afar.