Awesomenauts going free to play in May

Ronimo has bitten the bullet and announced that their 3v3 MOBA platformer Awesomenauts is going free to play on 24 May.

Starting today, a transition phase will start for current players with a beta update going live this evening. The new Awesomenauts will include:

• A reworked tutorial and “beginner experience.”
• A new progression system that tracks your profile and individual characters to award unlocks like currency bonuses, portraits, and character items.
• A new form of currency, “Awesomepoints,” that’s earned in-game through PvP matches or the new co-op vs. bots mode. You can use these points to buy characters, profile portraits, and drop pods.
• Medals for reaching specific milestones.
• The ability to buy playable characters and drop pods with real money, including an “All Nauts” pack that grants access to every current and future character. As before, cosmetic skins will only ever be purchasable with real-world currency.

Existing players need not worry about losing content as the studio states, “Nobody will lose any content during this transition. Existing players will automatically have all the content they previously owned unlocked. And as an additional thank-you, all players who have registered a copy of Awesomenauts on Steam before of April 26th will be granted ‘Founder’ status, with a unique medal. Players who own Awesomenauts and both the Starstorm and Overdrive expansions by May 24th will automatically be upgraded to the new ‘Awesomenauts All Nauts Pack,’ which will grant them all playable characters for free, forever.”

The game has proved quite popular since its launch back in 2012 and it’s still available on Steam, although the Steam page has yet to reflect the busines model changes.