Later this year or early next year, Uber Entertainment's going to try and thread a fairly dangerous needle. The studio, which saw success with its very first product, the XBLA and PC shooter Monday Night Combat, is trying to branch the franchise out into the increasingly populated free-to-play space. To do so successfully, it'll need to maintain its community's good will with some substantial -- but not too substantial -- changes.

"Super Monday Night Combat is going to be the same basic world," Uber Entertainment creative director John Comes explained to us at PAX last week. "We still have the same kind of lightheartedness, with the announcer and the mascot -- that same happy, fast, punchy game." The development team won't leave the formula entirely untouched, however. "Some of the balance has changed," Comes added. "Mainly, the lethality has been lowered a bit, which we've found makes for more frantic fights."