Awesomenauts gets even more MOBAy with its latest beta patch

Sidescrolling MOBA-like Awesomenauts gets a little less like and a little more MOBA with an upcoming patch, which is now in beta if you want to try it out. 2.6 ditches the loadout system and replaces it with a full-on shop. Sorry, a "big ass shop" that will allow you to buy whatever you want during a match. Well, anything Awesomenauts-related anyway. You won't be able to buy a Faberge egg or anything like that. The update also adds new bots, nifty graphs during replays, and a profile screen— this forum post will inform you of the whole kaboodle.

"From a design perspective the loadout system was meant to increase item build options, but what we found was that it actually works quite the opposite. With the ever increasing size of the Awesomenauts team, new gameplay, situations, added mechanics and with no information on enemy team composition or selected level players were forced to pick the best items for every situation before the battle. This limited options, effective builds and created frustration when the situation in game was not optimal for your chosen build and reduced overall fun."

"With a completely new interface and expanded shelves, you now have 6 options in the shop per skill row. You still can buy 3 items per row, but you will have all the items available to you to choose from during the game. This will give you more control over your build, allows for situational items to become a lot more interesting and hopefully we'll see more items being picked..*cough*baby kuri mammoth*cough*! We are certain you are going to enjoy this major overhaul!"

This is only the first beta version of patch 2.6: here's a list of everything that will be included when it becomes official, like, minus a few features that haven't been revealed yet. If you're wondering what we thought of Awesomenauts way back when it was first released for PC, you only have to read our review .

Tom loves exploring in games, whether it’s going the wrong way in a platformer or burgling an apartment in Deus Ex. His favourite game worlds—Stalker, Dark Souls, Thief—have an atmosphere you could wallop with a blackjack. He enjoys horror, adventure, puzzle games and RPGs, and played the Japanese version of Final Fantasy VIII with a translated script he printed off from the internet. Tom has been writing about free games for PC Gamer since 2012. If he were packing for a desert island, he’d take his giant Columbo boxset and a laptop stuffed with PuzzleScript games.