MultiVersus changes, from options to progression, frustrate fans

The strange story of MultiVersus continues. The game was strange enough from the start: a free-to-play Smash Bros.-inspired fighter using the diverse intellectual properties of Warner Bros. Discovery Corporation, pitting Looney Tunes icons against DC heroes and characters from the world of Adventure Time And Game of Thrones – there’s even LeBron James.

A successful open beta launched in 2022, but in June 2023 it was taken offline for almost a full year to undergo a complete overhaul – an unprecedented move for a live service game that was disproportionate to the amount of work required. Now it’s back, and fans are confused, to say the least, by how much it’s changed.

Some changes are a matter of taste. Many players on the MultiVersus Subreddit and elsewhere say the game has been slowed down dramatically – which is also Polygon’s impression after a short playtest – and while this change unpopular with manynot everyone agrees.

What has really worried fans of the game, however, is the fact that this new “starter” version of MultiVersus returned missing features and settings that were present in the open beta – and made radical changes to progression and the way characters are unlocked.

So far, the developer Player First Games has only responded to feedback about the missing features. Game Director Tony Huynh posted on X to reassure fans that features like team colors, end-of-match stats, customizable input buffer settings, and the ability to switch side and neutral attacks will be available “soon.” Huynh explained that the extensive rebuild required the team to move the game from Unreal Engine 4 to Unreal Engine 5, meaning the developers didn’t have time to implement all of the features before the relaunch date.

“Many of these features are currently implemented and being tested. We had planned to do them but left them out due to time constraints as we had to rebuild every screen and feature to support our new netcode and the move to Unreal Engine 5,” he said. In response to questions from players, Huynh said the next patch would fix performance issues and that a spectator mode was also in development.

But Player First Games hasn’t addressed perhaps the most common criticism from players, which is that progression – both unlocking new characters and leveling up existing ones – is painfully tedious. The main way to unlock new characters (aside from purchasing them) is to earn fighter currency by playing the new PvE Rifts mode, while character XP is awarded for completing dailies and quests, but not for participating in matches. PvP match play is MultiVersus‘ is the core and most popular mode, so its exclusion from both forms of progression has greatly slowed the rate at which most players can obtain new characters and improve them.

The last point that frustrates players is perhaps the least surprising. In its open beta, Player First Games has generously MultiVersus‘ Fighters in the game’s offline local play mode. This is no longer the case, so players without the opportunity to try out fighters before buying – and fighting game tournament organizers face high costs if they want to make the full game available to participants.

Looking for ways to generate more revenue from this free-to-play game is one of the more easily understood (if still disappointing) decisions WB Games has made in recent memory. Taking a popular game offline for a year to change engines (among other things) is not a good decision, on the other hand. Polygon has reached out to Player First Games and WB Games for comment.