Orcs Must Die! Unchained open beta begins next week

Orcs Must Die Unchained 2

Last May, we offered you the chance to win access to the closed beta for Orcs Must Die! Unchained, the free-to-play tower defense-MOBA hybrid first announced back in mid-2014. You probably didn't get in—fortune is fickle, and we only had 5000 codes to give away—but soon it won't matter, because on March 29 the open beta will begin.

Developer Robot Entertainment said the pending open beta means the closed beta servers will not be brought online tomorrow for their usual Thursday-Sunday run. Closed beta accounts will be wiped, which is sad, but “all in-game gold purchases made during the closed beta period will be honored and adjusted to the new open beta gold rates,” which is not sad. Founder Pack content will be applied to accounts after they transition to the open beta, but it sounds like you'll have to wait awhile for Bloodspike and Temper to be added, as Robot noted that they'll be awarded “when they're released back into the game.”

Orcs Must Die! Unchained will be downloadable beginning March 29 from either orcsmustdie.com (which was undergoing maintenance when this post went up) or Steam.

Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.