Awesomenauts

Gameplay

Awesomenauts is a multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) incorporating elements from 2D platformer and Fighting games. At the start of a match, a player selects from one of the available characters known as "Awesomenauts". In addition to unique looks and voice-over work, each Awesomenaut has a vastly different set of base attributes such as health, movement speed, and attack strength, and regular and special attack moves.

In the game's primary match mode, two teams of 3 characters, selected before the match, are pitted against each other, with the goal to destroy the other's team's Solar Collector within the enemy's team base before the others do the same. Both teams have to fight their way through enemy players, automatic drones, and turrets that block the path until destroyed. Some maps contain other obstacles, such as a giant pit monster that consumes anything immediately above it that can be summoned by standing on a button. Upon death, the player may respawn back at their base after a short delay that gets longer as the game progresses. Maps include health pickups and Solar units, the game's currency. When a player kills an enemy or a turret, every member of the team earns Solar. When a team destroys a turret, a super-drone is generated that can take and deal more damage as it heads towards the enemy base.

As the player earns Solar, they can return to their base (either by moving there or through a short teleportation sequence) to heal and spend the Solar on various upgrades to these skill sets or character attributes. For each of four areas - the two special skills, the regular attack, and general attributes - the player can buy up to three of six available improvements, with some improvements which can be bought multiple times with benefits stacked. With the release of the "Starstorm" expansion, each match also features team experience and levels. The game starts both teams at level 1, and experience is collectively earned through killing enemy drones or Awesomenauts or taking out turrets. Each level slight improves base attribute values for all characters on that team, such as attack strength and healing rates, up to a maximum level of 20.

The default game mode is ranked play, which puts players into 9 different ranks and attempts to match players within these ranks; Romino Games subsequently will reward players that finish at the top ranks on the completion of a season before resetting all rankings. The game's servers will adjust the player's ranking depending on their performance. Within ranked play, no team can have two or more players using the same Awesomenaut character. If necessary, computer-controlled opponents will be used to fill out a team, and if a player drops out of a match, they will be replaced by a computer opponent. Players may also join matches in progress, replacing a computer-controlled character. Other modes allow for more variations but do not contribute towards ranking. Such modes include skimmishes where the singular character limit is removed, and round-robin modes where every time a player is killed, they are randomly assigned to a new Awesomenaut. Single and local players can also engage in practice matches against computer-controlled teams.

Awesomenauts features a meta-game tied to the player's profile. Each player has an experience level, with experience being granted for completing matches, with experience points based on number of enemy kills and whether their team won the match. The experience level will determine what character improvements will be available to purchase at their base during matches, with generally more effective improvements being available at higher experience levels. The game includes a prestige system, allowing players to reset their level once they have reached the maximum level, returning it lowest in exchange for having a badge shown by their name in matches to indicate their prestige.

Development

Awesomenauts was announced for Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network on May 19, 2011 in a press release from publisher dtp entertainment. The first playable build of the game was revealed and playable for the attending press at E3 2011. A release date of May 2, 2012 was later announced by developer Ronimo Games on March 3, 2012. The game was ported to Windows and Steam on August 1, 2012 with an OSX version arriving on December 7, 2012 and a Linux version on May 29, 2013. Ronimo Games announced a PlayStation 4 release, co-developed with Abstraction Games with improvements and updates from the PC version as well as DLC, on August 14, 2013, intended for release with the console’s launch. The PlayStation 4 version, entitled Awesomenauts Assemble!, was released on March 4, 2014 following a delay to the console’s launch window. On June 2, 2014, Ronimo Games announced an Xbox One version of the game, originally slated for Summer 2015 but later delayed to Fall of the same year.

Built on the second version of in-house 2D engine Ronitech, originally developed for Swords & Soldiers, Awesomenauts was described by Ronimo Games’ Joost van Dongen as a MOBA combined with platforming elements, similar to but significantly different from other games in the same genre such as League of Legends and Defense of the Ancients. Ronimo Games specifically created for the upgraded engine a number of real-time editing tools for levels, animations, and effects, largely non-existent in the development of previous titles, for use in developing the game. The game’s art style and direction were stated by Ronimo Games as inspired by colorful, over-the-top animated series from the 1980s. Music for the game was produced in partnership with award-winning Dutch recording studio SonicPicnic.

Expansion

In August 2013, Ronimo games started Kickstarter campaign for additional content entitled Awesomenauts: Starstorm. The goal of the project was $125,000. By the end of the Kickstarter campaign, over $345,000 had been donated on via Kickstarter, with PayPal bringing the total to over $400,000. Several stretch goals were reached, including the extra map, replays and spectator mode. Donations are still ongoing through PayPal on awesomenauts.com. In addition to the three new characters planned for the expansion: Ted McPain, Skree and Sentry X-58, two extra characters will be included as stretch goals for them were met. Ronimo Games' studio head Jasper Koning said the company opted to go to Kickstarter for further development due to their bad experiences with their console publisher DTP Entertainment, who had gone bankrupt after Awesomenauts release on console, but whom they still must pay from every sale of the game.

Reception

Upon release, Awesomenauts received fairly positive reviews, earning a Metacritic score of 78/100. The PlayStation 4 version of the game, Awesomenauts Assemble!, earned a Metacritic score of 74/100 following its release on March 4, 2014. Most critics have praised the game’s utilization of streamlined elements of the MOBA genre and their accessibility to newcomers, especially those on consoles. GameSpot’s Austin Light noted that Awesomenauts “serves as an excellent introduction to the genre for the uninitiated and is a fun spin on familiar tropes for MOBA veterans.” In his review, IGN’s Mitch Dyer stated that the game “distills a complicated, largely PC-only genre down to its essence, and it does so mostly successfully.”