As promised earlier this month, Electronic Arts has now launched an open beta for Darkspore, the upcoming sci-fi action-RPG that's based loosely on 2009's alien evolution sim Spore. The open beta is available for anyone to download and play for free via Steam and will run through this Friday, April 1. The beta will include support for four player co-op along with 1v1 and 2v2 Player vs Player matches

People can also pre-order the game via Steam as well as a Darkspore four-pack that includes four downloadable copies of the game you can give to friends for the price of three copies. While the game was previously announced as being released this week, Darkspore is now scheduled to be released on April 26.