Almost a year after ending its open beta, MultiVersus will return on May 28th
Holy crossover, Batman!
The crossover throwdown of MultiVersus will return to officially launch on the 28th of May, Warner Bros. announced today. The return will come almost a year after they closed its open beta, which ran for a striking 11 months. The platform fighting game sees Batman, Bugs Bunny, Arya Stark, Steven Universe, and other characters from across different WB shows and movies coming together for a Smash Bros.-style square go.
Following a closed beta, in July 2022, MultiVersus started an open beta which ran (and felt) much like a full launch. It launched content seasons, it had a battle pass, it sold cosmetics, it had a premium microtransaction currency, and then in June 2023 they turned off the servers and said it would return in "early 2024". People who had already downloaded could still play offline, at least, and WB have said stuff earned or bought in beta will carry over to the full game.
So what have developers Player First Games been up to? According to today's announcement, "MultiVersus will release with a new PVE mode, more heroes and personalities added to the roster, additional stages based on reimagined universes and environments, first-class online play, improved visuals, and much more."
In its initial open beta state, our Ed thought maybe it wasn't Smash Bros. but it's "huge" that it was on PC and free-to-play to boot. "And despite my misgivings, it still has a level of polish that surpasses any free-to-play Smash-likes," he said. After that, mind, other folks in the RPS treehouse did come to call it one of the best multiplayer games and the best free games.
MultiVersus is due to hit Steam and the Epic Games Store on the 28th of May, as well as the PlayStations 4 and 5 and Xboxes One and Xeries XS. It will boast "full cross-play and cross-progression support," WB say. And yup, it'll be free-to-play again.
While Warner Bros. are bringing MultiVersus back, they're also taking away a great many other games. Several developers who made games with Adult Swim Games (a publisher nested several levels deep inside WB) are finding WB are now removing their games from sale without good explanation nor much warning. One of the affected developers responded by releasing their game for free, while some are trying—with limited luck—to get control of Steam pages from WB. Many other developers haven't heard anything and don't know if their games will be affected.