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Everything that changed in PitchMates, newest first.

Keeping it friendly

  • Swear words, slurs and rude words in chat now show up as stars for everyone, like ****. The rest of the message still gets through.
  • Names of casual matches, clans, clan tags, leagues, tournaments and teams can't contain them either. If yours does, you'll be asked to pick another one.
  • Spelling a word with gaps, numbers, accents or extra letters doesn't get it past the filter, and ordinary words that happen to contain one, like Scunthorpe, are fine.

A new look for every match

  • Before every match, a theme is drawn at random: the night stadium or one of 35 others, from a pirate galleon and a castle tournament to a coral reef, a land of sweets and a space station in orbit.
  • Everyone in the match sees the same theme, and anyone who joins later sees it too. In a casual room, the next theme is drawn as soon as a match ends, so the warm-up already shows it.
  • Every theme plays exactly the same: the same pitch, goals, ball and players. Only the look changes.
  • Making a casual match? Press Choose… next to Theme and pick one for every match in your room, or leave it on Random. The lobby shows which theme each room plays.
  • Prefer one look? In Settings, under Match theme, tick Favourite and pick it. You'll always see your favourite, whatever was drawn; everyone else still sees what they picked.

Livelier jungle monkeys

  • The monkeys hanging from the lianas in the jungle keep swinging gently all match, instead of slowly going still.
  • When a goal goes in they still swing harder, and then settle back into their lazy sway.

Smarter bots at kickoff

  • Bots no longer stand still before a kickoff. They get into position: the taker lines up behind the ball, the other team waits at the edge of the centre circle, and the rest spread out.
  • Kickoffs are harder to read. A bot might shoot, play it out wide, pass to a teammate (sometimes backwards) or run with the ball.
  • Bot teammates no longer stand on top of each other. If a teammate is already on their spot, they move over and cover more of the pitch.

Rank badges you can tell apart

  • Every rank now has a badge shape of its own, so you can tell them apart even when they're small, or if you're colour-blind.
  • Semi-Pro has long flat blades, Professional a tall point, Elite wings swept up in a V, International a ring around it, World Class an X, and Legend wears a crown.
  • Sunday League and Amateur look as they did, and the I, II and III marks on top haven't changed.
  • Profiles now show the goal explosion too, and "Not played yet" sits level with its badge.

Cleaner menus, and a colour-blind mode

  • New in Settings: Colour-blind mode. The red team turns orange, on every pitch, and items show their rarity with a shape as well as a colour.
  • Settings now has tabs: Game, Display, Sound and Controls. The crowd and the match sounds have their own volume sliders.
  • Home fits every screen, Steam Deck included. Your next matches come first, and the right side scrolls when there's a lot on it.
  • The Locker fits the Steam Deck too: your look moves under your items when the screen is narrow.
  • With a controller, a clear green ring shows what you've picked, the same on every button and tile.
  • Ranked shows each mode's own picture and colour, and while you search, a ring grows as the search widens.
  • The ranks guide is now a ladder from Sunday League up to Legend, with three short points about how MMR works.
  • In the ranked statistics, your own row is lit up and says YOU.
  • Your profile says Unranked until you've played ranked, and rank names are never cut short.
  • Leagues show one green Play button for your next match. The tournament final is bigger, framed in gold, and winners get a tick.
  • Organizer tools (co-organizer, removed players, delete) now sit together behind one Organizer button.
  • The match lobby has a Quick join button, shows each match's free spots, and says Watch when the pitch is full.
  • Casual matches end with a summary of the score and who scored.
  • An item you don't have yet says where to find it.
  • Numbers look the same everywhere (1,712 MMR), small print is a little bigger, and faint text is easier to read.
  • On very wide screens the menus stay in the middle.

Easier to follow in a match

  • Names now sit right under their own puck, on a dark tag with a border in the team's colour, so you can read them on every pitch, even sand and ice.
  • When another puck gets in the way, a name moves above its puck or slides aside, so two names never overlap. A name fades while the ball passes under it.
  • The red team's pucks have a dashed ring round them, so you can tell the sides apart by shape as well as colour.
  • The ball has a thin dark edge and a soft shadow under it, so it stands out better on light and dark pitches.
  • The kickoff countdown has moved up out of the way, and a ring closes in on the ball each second so your eyes are on it at GO.
  • After a goal, the screen dips for a moment while everyone goes back for the kickoff, instead of the players jumping into place.
  • The goal banner is bigger and always shows the scorer's first name, or YOU when it's you.
  • Ranked matches end with a clear Victory or Defeat and the score. A bar shows your MMR going up or down, and how far it is to the next rank. You can now reach the buttons with a controller.
  • Leaving a match while it's being played now takes a short hold on the leave button, so a stray click can't drop you out of a game.
  • Cup winners' names are big and easy to read at the ceremony, and the camera ends close on the champions. You can head back after 3 seconds.
  • In Retro Future, the blimp now flies behind the far stand, so it no longer hides any of the pitch.

A crowd that comes alive

  • The fans don't just sit there any more. Every match, something different happens in the stands, at random.
  • Choreographies: Mexican waves round the stadium, card mosaics and scarves in the home ends, a whole end bouncing together, the thunder-clap, a sea of phone torches, a giant banner pulled up over the main stand, and bengal flares lit up across a block of fans or a whole stand.
  • Little moments too: paper planes, balloons, bengal flares, a beach ball knocked about over the main stand, and fans heading up the steps for a drink and coming back with two cups.
  • Stewards walk over to pick up whatever lands next to the pitch. Sometimes they throw the beach ball back in.
  • The crowd follows the game: nobody goes for a drink while the ball is near a goal, a near miss gets hands on heads, and a goal sets off flares and scarves in the scorers' end.
  • It's all just for show. A paper plane that lands on the pitch lies flat, and the pucks and the ball push it aside.

See what you won

  • When a crate lands, your prize comes alive, so you see exactly how it looks in a match.
  • Accessories and skins sit on a puck that slowly turns. Drag it to turn it all the way round and to look from higher or lower. On a controller, use the right stick.
  • Boosts play as a short clip of a puck sprinting, turning and stopping. Goal explosions play as a shot going in at the stadium. Both play over and over, in red and then in blue.
  • Click any item in the Locker to see it the same way.

Goal explosions

  • New cosmetic: goal explosions. When you score, yours goes off in the net. There are 40 of them, from a party popper to a supernova, each with its own sound.
  • Find them in crates like skins and boosts, and wear one in the Locker's new Goal Explosion slot.
  • Every goal is different: the explosion goes off where the ball went in, and it carries the shot. Things burst out through the back of the net along the ball's path, and what flies back out flies towards the shooter.
  • The biggest ones take over the stadium: the floodlights go down, the picture flashes, the camera shakes and shockwaves roll across the pitch.
  • Explosions are only for show. Nothing in them gets in the way of the ball or the players.

A night match under the floodlights

  • Every match is now played at night. Four floodlights in the corners light the pitch, and every puck and the ball cast soft crossed shadows.
  • The pitch is a deeper green, with mown stripes that shimmer as the camera moves, worn goalmouths and chalk lines.
  • Pucks have a glossy rim, a satin top with a glowing ring, and a band round the bottom that glows in your team's colour and lights the grass around you. Skins keep the glow. Red and blue are stronger, so the teams stand out more.
  • The goals have padded posts with a band in their team's colour, and the net bulges when a goal goes in.
  • The running track is gone: the stands now come right up to the boards. The home ends behind each goal are packed with that team's fans, with flags and flare smoke.
  • The crowd comes alive. Fans get restless when the ball is near a goal. When your team scores, your fans jump and throw their arms up, pyro goes off behind the goal, the floodlights flicker and the boards turn gold.
  • The boards change sponsors every few seconds. A kick sends a ring across the grass, and a hard shot leaves a short streak behind the ball.
  • None of this changes how the game plays: the pitch, the pucks, the ball and the goals are exactly the same size as before.
  • On a laptop or a slower graphics card, set Graphics to Low in Settings: it leaves out the haze, the soft shading and most of the shadows. High is the default.

Player profiles

  • Click your name at the top of the home screen to see your profile. Click anyone in the home leaderboard, the ranked statistics, your friends list or your party to see theirs.
  • In a match room, click a player's name and pick View profile. It's there while you're watching or waiting, not while you're playing.
  • A profile shows your career, your ranks in King of the Pitch and ENDGAME with your place on each table, your trophies, your season badges and the look you wear.
  • Your career counts ranked matches only, in every queue and both modes. Hover the little i next to it to see what counts.
  • Click a trophy to open the league or tournament it was won in. Hover a season badge to see its rank and when that season ran.
  • Click a player's name on their profile to open their Steam profile in the Steam overlay.

Smoother menus

  • Menus have a softer look: panels, buttons, boxes and the mode tiles now have rounded corners instead of cut ones. Everything is in the same place as before.

Two ranked modes: King of the Pitch and ENDGAME

  • Ranked now has two modes. Press Ranked on the home screen and pick one. Each has its own 1v1, 2v2 and 3v3 ranks.
  • King of the Pitch runs in seasons of three months. Season 1 starts today and ends on 1 January.
  • When a season ends, the rank you finished on is kept as a season badge on your Ranked screen. The next season starts with a soft reset: ranks above Semi-Pro I come down a little, the highest the most.
  • Your first 10 King of the Pitch matches in each queue every season are placement matches. Your rank stays hidden until they're done, then it shows.
  • ENDGAME never resets: your rank there is for good. The ranks you had before today are your ENDGAME ranks.
  • Both modes pay the same gold and share one leaver ban. You search one mode at a time, and the two never meet.
  • The home leaderboard, the ranked statistics and the Discord bot's /pitchmates rankstats show both modes, and the bot shows past season badges too.

Practice against bots

  • New Practice mode: play 1v1, 2v2 or 3v3 against bots, straight from the home screen. In 2v2 and 3v3 you get bot teammates too.
  • Pick Easy, Normal or Hard bots. Easy bots are slow and miss a lot, Hard ones react at once and rarely waste a shot.
  • Practice runs on your own PC, so it works even when the server is down, never lags, and doesn't count towards your stats.
  • Press Esc (or Menu on a controller) to pause. At full time, play again or change the setup in one click.

Hats and the crossbar

  • Hats start squashing down a little sooner as you run up to the crossbar, so a tall hat never pokes into it, even right beside the post.

150 new things to win from crates

  • 50 new accessories: cowboy hats, a sombrero, samurai and diving helmets, bunny ears and a unicorn horn, a rubber duck, a frog, a parrot, a sleepy cat, a donut, pizza, a birthday cake, the Golden Boot, referee cards, a sword in the stone, a rainbow and plenty more.
  • Some of them move: googly eyes wobble and their pupils rattle about as you run, and the Storm Cloud rains on you, splashing on your puck.
  • 50 new puck skins, from checkered flags, tartan and hot rod flames to chrome, a real cut gemstone, a turning galaxy, a radar sweep and lightning. Every skin keeps your team's colour easy to see.
  • 50 new boosts: confetti and autumn leaves that land on the grass, hearts, bats, sky lanterns and fireworks, coins that bounce, a rainbow ribbon, a light wall, magic circles, an afterburner, a chalk line and more.
  • They all come from the same crates, with the same odds, shown on the crate as before.

Fairer matches, safer servers, lots of fixes

  • Nobody can freeze a match any more: if the kickoff isn't taken within 10 seconds, the clock starts and the ball is free for both sides. The status counts down the last 5 seconds.
  • A goal in the very last second now ends the match straight after the celebration.
  • No more super shots: after a kick, the next one connects a moment later, faster than anyone can press, so kicks can't be stacked.
  • Hard shots can no longer slip through the walls, and the gap behind the goals is no longer a goal.
  • The score only changes when the server confirms a goal, so a goal your screen guessed never flashes up and disappears. On a shaky connection your key presses are no longer thrown away, so your player stops jumping back.
  • Ranked drop-outs are fairer. If the last player on the pitch leaves a paused match, the side that dropped out forfeits and the one who waited keeps the win. Everyone who drops out gets the full two minutes, watchers can't take a dropped player's place, and starting the game again after a crash puts you straight back in.
  • If a matched player never turns up, everyone else goes straight back into the queue with the time they'd already waited, and the no-show counts as leaving a match.
  • Ranked: tick several queues and you go into the biggest match that's ready; after a minute of searching, your own match goes first. The search still widens the longer you wait, but stops at 600 MMR either side, so Legends and Sunday League players never meet.
  • Accepting a party invite stops your own search: your party leader searches for all of you. Asking a friend again while your invite is still open doesn't send them a second one.
  • Casual rooms: drop out of a match and you get your side back if you return within two minutes. Shuffle only mixes the players on the pitch, so watchers stay watching. Start, Stop, Shuffle and team switches can't be spammed, and a match with nobody left on the pitch stops by itself.
  • Typing a room's password no longer gets wiped when something changes in another room, and rooms with a password show a padlock.
  • Names can't hide or pose as someone else with invisible or back-to-front characters, and chat can't fake extra lines. Clan names that only look like another clan's are refused.
  • Controllers: press Start (Menu) in a room for a menu with everything the room's buttons do: pick a side, start, get ready, answer the "wait one more minute?" vote, or leave. Settings shows controller buttons as "Pad A" and so on.
  • Invites to parties, clans and teams only reach you from your friends, and a new team invite gets its own pop-up with the right team's name.
  • Pop-ups never pile up over the top bar: the ones that don't fit wait behind a "+2 more" card and show up as others close.
  • The home screen fits a full party and long names at any menu size: party members show as pictures (hover to see who), and long names end in "…". The greeting uses your whole name, says "Welcome" on your very first start, and shows names with accents properly.
  • Leagues and tournaments: the final's winner always lifts the cup, a tournament of three with a third-place match now finishes, and a co-organizer who leaves or is taken out no longer runs it.
  • Organizers can let a player they took out back in, and removing a team or player, awarding or voiding a match all ask first. A refused organizer action no longer ends a match being played.
  • League and tournament matches: if nobody from one side is back within 2 minutes, the side that stayed wins 3–0. Leagues can have a time limit too, 24 or 48 hours per matchday, and take up to 20 teams or players.
  • Tournament prizes now depend on how many entries played at least one match on the pitch, so a tournament full of walkovers pays little or nothing.
  • Your next match shows the time left even when your opponent is already waiting, round names read "Semi-final 1" instead of codes, and "Watch" shows on matches you're not in. Big leagues' pages always load.
  • The camera never lets a floodlight tower hide the pitch, stops zooming in and out while you stand still, and the movement keys take the direction that looks closest on screen. Your name floats clear of the ball you're dribbling.
  • The ranked result says when the daily limit has halved your gold, and a long leaver ban reads "23 h 58 min".
  • Settings: emptying your name keeps your old one, removing every key from a control lasts, a hand-edited settings file can't sign you out, volume 0 is really silent, and F11 or Alt+Enter work during the intro too.
  • The ranked statistics table keeps a steady order, shows which column it's sorted by, and lines its numbers up with their headings. MMR is explained in the Ranks & MMR guide.
  • Crates: double-clicking "Open for 200 gold" opens one crate, not two, and a crate you open is always shown, even if you leave the Locker before it arrives. With a controller, A skips the intro, "Keep it" is ready as soon as your prize shows, and B never takes you out halfway through.
  • Skipping a Golden Crate's intro no longer hides it: it still flashes gold and says "GOLDEN CRATE!". Dusting a brand-new prize straight from the crate asks first, and the reel ticks for every item, even on a slow computer.
  • Hats squash down to fit under the crossbar and the net when you walk into a goal, and pop back up when you leave. Viking Helmet horns no longer poke into the ball.
  • The champions' ceremony: confetti lands on the winners, their hats and the cup instead of falling through them, the title no longer covers the cup, and long names don't run into each other. "x3" and "IN USE" on Locker tiles are easy to read on boosts too.
  • Cleaner edges on four items: the Traffic Cone's base is all black, the Gold Tooth Grin's teeth lose their dark rims, the Wizard Hat's stars are gold all over and the Propeller Cap's yellow blade has no red edge.
  • Behind the scenes: the server keeps a backup of its data and recovers it if a save is ever interrupted, drops connections that never join a match, and shrugs off malformed messages.

PitchMates kicks off

  • The first playable PitchMates build: top-down football with your mates, in a floodlit 3D stadium.
  • A short intro when you start the game: a ball bounces somewhere in the stadium, then someone smashes it straight through the PitchMates logo. Press any key to skip it. The same logo now tops the menus.
  • A new look for the menus, built in Blender: chunky buttons that sink when you press them, panels with a lit corner, and a floodlit 3D scene on every mode tile on the home screen. Headings and buttons use our own lettering, drawn from the PitchMates logo.
  • Physics tuned to the classic feel: same disc sizes, weight, kick strength and pitch as the original browser game.
  • Casual rooms: browse or create a room, set an optional password, pick Red or Blue, chat, and play. Up to 6 on the pitch, the rest watch. Anyone on a team can shuffle the sides.
  • Whoever creates a room is its host and can remove players who spoil the fun. Anyone can mute a player's chat — click their name.
  • Matches run 3 minutes. A level score goes to golden-goal extra time, so there is always a winner (league matches can end level).
  • Fair kickoffs: both teams stay in their own half until the ball is played, and the kicking team may only cross inside the centre circle.
  • One kick per press, and goals go to the last player of the scoring team to touch the ball — no own goals.
  • Ranked: separate 1v1, 2v2 and 3v3 ladders with brand-new ranks from Sunday League to Legend. Every rank has its own badge: a glowing crystal ball in a frame that gets bolder as you climb. Everyone starts at 1000 MMR. The result screen shows exactly how many points you won or lost.
  • Ranked matchmaking: tick 1v1, 2v2 or 3v3 (or all three) and press Find match. We look for players close to your MMR first and widen the search the longer you wait, so games are close when lots of people are on and you still get a game when only a few are. Teams are balanced by MMR, and the match kicks off by itself. You can watch live ranked matches from the Ranked screen, and "Find another match" on the result screen puts you straight back in the queue.
  • Drop out of a ranked match and it pauses for two minutes so you can rejoin — reconnect and you're put straight back in. If time runs out, everyone still on the pitch can vote to wait one more minute, up to ten times. It takes a yes from all of them: one no and the match ends, and the side that lost a player forfeits. The chat keeps working while you wait.
  • Leave a ranked match for good and you can't search for another one for 5 minutes. It gets longer each time it happens again, and is forgiven bit by bit if you stay for your matches.
  • Parties: invite up to two friends and search for ranked matches together. The party leader starts the search, and you always play on the same side. A party is matched on an MMR that leans towards its best player, so teaming up with lower-ranked friends is no shortcut up the ladder. Invites only ever go to your friends, never to strangers.
  • Steam: with Steam running, you play under your Steam account and Steam name, and your Steam friends are who you can invite. Friends who aren't in PitchMates yet get a Steam invite; accepting it starts the game and puts them straight into your party.
  • Clans: start a clan with a name and a tag of 2 to 4 letters, and it shows in front of every member's name — above your player on the pitch, in the team list, in chat, on player cards, results and leaderboards. The founder picks a co-founder, and the two of them can invite friends and remove members. Clans are just for show for now.
  • Leagues: anyone can start one, 1v1, 2v2 or 3v3. Form teams (in 1v1 everyone enters on their own), generate a home-and-away schedule, and play fixtures in-app. Everyone clicks Ready and the match starts on its own. Table, top scorers and match details update live.
  • Tournaments: anyone can start a 1v1, 2v2 or 3v3 knockout cup for 4, 8 or 16 entries (in 1v1 everyone enters on their own), with a random or sign-up-order draw, byes for the top seeds and an optional third-place match. The final ends with a champions' ceremony: the cup rises out of the centre spot, the winners roll in to stand in front of it, and confetti rains down.
  • League and tournament pages fit any window: the bracket always shows every round from the first to the final, with lines joining them, and long lists show a scrollbar. Match rows and cards are more compact, and the organizer's walkover and void options sit behind a Settle button.
  • The home screen shows all-time players, games and goals, the ranked leaderboard, every rank badge and a full ranked statistics table.
  • The stadium behind the menus is never empty: four computer players play a real 2v2 there, with the same physics as your matches. It runs on your own device, so every match is different, and a new one kicks off after full time.
  • Real match sounds: the thud of a leather ball, a referee's whistle, the countdown and a real stadium crowd that roars when you score. Every goal gets one of eight different cheers, and full time is the classic peep, peep, peeeep.
  • Your own player responds instantly, even on a slower connection. Press F9 to see your connection.
  • Controllers work out of the box, and every key can be rebound in Settings.
  • Pick your own view of the pitch: right-drag to tilt the camera and turn it all the way round, scroll to zoom in up to 200%, or use the Camera button in a match. The movement keys turn with the view, and the camera moves in by itself rather than let a stand or roof hide the pitch. Your view is saved to your profile and waiting in your next match, and Reset brings the classic view back.
  • Crates and accessories, just for fun: earn gold by playing Ranked (+25 for a win, +15 for a loss, half after 20 ranked matches in a day) and by finishing in the top three of a league or cup. The bigger the competition, the bigger the prize. 200 gold opens a crate in your new Locker: the items slide past, slow down and stop on your prize, and the crate shows the odds of every rarity. Gold can never be bought, and items can't be traded.
  • 20 accessories in four rarities, from sunglasses and a baseball cap to a wizard hat and a golden crown. Wear one in the middle of your puck: it turns to face where you're going, glasses sit on it like on a table, and hats wobble when you speed up or stop. Everyone in the match sees it. Don't want an item? Turn it into dust (rarer items give more), and 300 dust opens a crate too.
  • Pucks no longer show your initials: your name floats above your puck, and the middle is for your accessory.
  • Opening a crate is a moment now: the crate jumps as something inside kicks harder and harder, the lid bursts open in a flood of light and sparks, and then the items slide past. The crate never hints at what's inside. Click to skip straight to the reel.
  • Golden Crates: 1 crate in about 67 turns out to be a Golden Crate. It has no Commons, far better odds, and six items you can only find in one: a Traffic Cone, a Propeller Cap, a Top Hat, a Pirate Hat, a Mini Trophy and a glowing Halo that hovers above your puck. You'll know when it happens: gold light seeps out of your crate, and in a flash it becomes solid gold. The Locker shows the chance and the Golden Crate's own odds.
  • The champions' ceremony: the winners now come in across the pitch the way players move, wearing their accessories, and stop in front of the cup. Their prize gold is shown under their names, and a finished league or cup lists the gold for 1st, 2nd and 3rd.
  • Puck skins: Racing Stripes, Camo, Tiger, Neon Grooves and Magma. A skin changes how your puck looks, never its size or shape, and always keeps your team's colour, so you can tell the teams apart at a glance. Your puck now turns to face where you're going, so racing stripes point the way you run.
  • Boosts, like in Rocket League: Smoke, Bubbles, Sparks, Flames and Comet stream out behind your puck while you run, more the faster you go. They behave like the real thing: sparks skip off the grass, smoke billows up, bubbles pop on whatever they touch and stardust settles on the pitch. None of it ever goes through a player, the ball or a goal.
  • Your look is now an accessory, a skin and a boost, all at once. Skins and boosts come out of the same crates, with the same odds. The Locker shows all three and can list your items by kind. Items from Golden Crates now show in the Locker too.
  • The champions' ceremony shows the winners in their full look, boosts streaming behind them as they come in.
  • Never miss a league or cup match: the home screen and the Match Lobby now show your next match in each of your leagues and tournaments, who it's against and how many more you have to play. When someone is already waiting in the match's room, it says who, and one click takes you straight in. Through to the next round of a cup before you know your opponent? It tells you which match decides it.
  • Tournament time limits: when you start a cup, you can give every match 24 or 48 hours to be played (or no limit, as before). Turning up means being in the match room with your whole side and clicking Ready. If the other side hasn't turned up when time runs out, you go through and they're out. If neither side turns up, or both do but never at the same time, the organizers decide. The bracket, the match room and your match reminders all show how long is left.
  • Co-organizers: the organizer of a league or tournament can pick one of its players to help run it. A co-organizer can make the schedule or the draw, settle matches and remove players. Only the organizer can delete it or change who helps.
  • The organizers can now remove a player from a league that's already running. In 1v1, or when a team loses its last player, all of their matches are wiped from the table, as if they'd never entered. A team that loses one player keeps its results, and its players invite a friend to the free place before its next match.
  • Every league and tournament now has a log that anyone can open: who started it, made the schedule or the draw, settled a match, chose a co-organizer, or took a player out, and when. Players who are taken out get a message right away saying who did it. When a time limit decides a match, the log says so too.
  • When someone walks into the room of one of your league or cup matches while you're in the menus, a pop-up in the bottom-right corner tells you who and which match, with a Join button that takes you straight there. It goes away by itself if they leave again. Every invite (party, clan and team) now pops up there too, and if two pop-ups arrive together, the newest sits at the bottom with the others stacked above it, never on top of each other. In a match you only see them while you're watching: on a side, playing or waiting for kickoff, they're held back and come back when you're in the menus again, if they still apply.
  • Teams are friends only now: nobody can join your team uninvited. Invite a friend to a free place from your team card, before the season or during it, and they join by accepting. The invite waits if they're offline, and pops up in the bottom-right corner and on their home screen when they come on. The organizers can fill a free place with one of their friends too, and only they can bring back a player they removed.
  • PitchMates fits any screen, from a small laptop to 1080p, 1440p, 4K and ultrawide. The first time you start the game it fills your screen, and when you play in a window it opens at a size that suits your screen. Menus, buttons and the crate in your Locker are sharper on 4K screens too.
  • New in Settings: Menu size makes the menus, and the scoreboard and chat in matches, bigger or smaller. 3D resolution sets how many pixels the pitch is drawn with: on Auto it's your screen's resolution up to 1440p, so a 4K screen draws the pitch at 1440p and sharpens it up, while menus and text stay perfectly sharp. Pick 100% for the full 4K, or lower for a smoother game on a slower graphics card. You can also turn VSync off and set a frame limit.
  • Alt+Enter or F11 switches between fullscreen and a window, anywhere in the game.
  • Play on a Steam Deck: the game starts with bigger menus for its 7-inch screen, its help shows the Deck's buttons, and Steam's on-screen keyboard comes up when you type in a text box. Menus now work with any controller: the D-pad or stick picks a button, A presses it, and B goes back or closes a pop-up (Esc does too). In a match, press Y to chat and B to leave the chat box. Settings names controller buttons the way they're printed on them.
  • Matches now run on their own game servers, apart from the menus, so PitchMates can host far more players at once. If your connection to the menus drops for a moment, your match simply carries on. And if a ranked player can't get into the match at all, it's called off after 15 seconds, with no penalty for anyone.
  • Discord: while Discord is open, your profile shows you're playing PitchMates, and what you're up to: in the menus, looking for a ranked match, or in a match with the mode, the score and the time left, such as "Ranked 2v2, Winning 2–1". It never shows room names or who you play with, and you can switch it off in Settings. In a casual room without a password, your Discord friends get a Join button on your profile that takes them straight into your room, and starts PitchMates for them if it isn't running. If you're in a ranked, league or cup match when you press Join on a friend's profile, you go to their room once you've left your match.
  • The PitchMates bot for Discord: add it to your community's Discord server, type /pitchmates follow in a channel and pick a tournament or league. The bot then posts everything about it there: new entries, the draw or the schedule, every match live (the kickoff, every goal, the last 30 seconds and extra time, called by a commentator who is ON FIRE), full time with the goalscorers and the updated table or who's next, walkovers, and the champions with their prizes. /pitchmates list shows what a channel follows, /pitchmates unfollow stops it, and /pitchmates help explains it all. /pitchmates rankstats shows the top of the ranked ladders, or anyone's record, ranks and trophies and how far they are from their next rank. /pitchmates leaguestats shows a league's table, top scorers, records and next matchday. When you add the bot, it says hello and points you to /pitchmates help.