​

News has dropped for Blizzard's sequel to Overwatch. A new hero called Junker Queen was revealed in a cinematic trailer, and then announcing that Overwatch 2 will be free to play. There's going to be an event on June 16th that shows more information about the game on Blizzard's official Twitch and YouTube channels. In addition, Overwatch 2 will be entering playable early access on October 4, 2022, where it'll be available on Nintendo Switch, Xbox One and Series X|S, PlayStation 4 and 5, and PC.

 

[Rahkeesh]

I wouldn't be surprised if Overwatch 2 is DOA at launch considering the lack of anything really new in it.

That's why they are going F2P, it will bring in a larger audience who never bought into the first game.

 

[thekarter104]

Nice it is becoming free.
But will it introduce 'seasons' where you start at player level 1 again?

Never played this game, but some free games do seasons and your player level returns to 1. Such a bummer...

 

[Foxi4]

Free to play without Nintendo switch online, or..? Because if not, then it's not really free to play it.

Yeah, you also have to pay your electric bill and your internet bill, oh bother. I guess nothing’s really free. Thanks, Blizzard.

 

[Jayro]

Yeah, you also have to pay your electric bill and your internet bill, oh bother. I guess nothing’s really free. Thanks, Blizzard.

Well I mean it's up to the devs if they want to require it or not, and they should state whether it is required or not to play. But ultimately, they should do the right thing and keep it not a requirement.

 

[Xzi]

So it sounds like the campaign is gonna be short and not very good then. Par for the course where modern Blizzard is concerned.

 

[anhminh]

How much gacha do I need to roll to max someone? 10,000$? 100,000$?

 

[KitChan]

I wouldn't be surprised if Overwatch 2 is DOA at launch considering the lack of anything really new in it.

They're changing up a lot of hero movesets and switching it to a 5v5 game with fixed teamroles.

TBH, it sounds a lot less fun than OW1, and unfortunately these changes will be forced on OW1 players.

 

[Unia4L]

F2P isn't a bad idea for competitive games IMO. Also as long as the micro transactions aren't P2W everyone wins IMO.

 

[Robika]

I wonder how many microtransactions are gonna be shoved into it?

As of today there perfectly good f2p games that involve no other than cosmetic micro transactions, I am more worried about the player base becoming even more toxic. I prefer to pay money for online games. Having a money barrier ensures that not that many idiots, cheaters and above all smurfs are present in the game. This will make the game extremely toxic.

Don't get me wrong it is already pretty toxic but now it will be up there with LoL and other F2P games full of toxic players who only enjoy a game if they win and if they lose will make your experience a living hell.

As a game designer myself I understand that F2P is really beneficial and that Fortnite, Rocket League, Fall Guys and other online game benefited from this direction but as a player I am not happy about this.

 

[lordelan]

Who cares for Overwatch. Why is there no news on this amazing new Diablo 4 video?

 

[Xzi]

Who cares for Overwatch. Why is there no news on this amazing new Diablo 4 video?

That does look a lot more like the sequel that Diablo 2 deserved. Which also makes it look a lot more like Path of Exile, right down to the massive skill tree. I'm not necessarily opposed to borrowing good ideas and implementing them in different ways, though, so we'll see how it turns out.

Edit: scratch that, it's going to be a live service game with microtransactions. Probably a hard pass for me.

 

[RichardTheKing]

Who gives a crap; Overwatch is old news.
I also hate the first game because it helped kickstart the whole loathsome loot box gouge, so...fuck right off, Overwatch 2.

 

[LoggerMan]

Season one was the best. Teleporting across the entire map, rezzing your whole team at once, they were the most exciting moments the game ever had.

 

[Lumince]

F2P isn't a bad idea for competitive games IMO. Also as long as the micro transactions aren't P2W everyone wins IMO.

Actually, I didnt think about it until now, but competitive will just be even more toxic with this being F2P.... Anyone can just make a smurf without having to pay for a second copy then.

 

[Bladexdsl]

free to play than make you PAY later otherwise get raped by the little rich boyz buying the power items/gear etc is what they should call these games

 

[Dr_Faustus]

They're changing up a lot of hero movesets and switching it to a 5v5 game with fixed teamroles.

TBH, it sounds a lot less fun than OW1, and unfortunately these changes will be forced on OW1 players.

This 1000%

The change to movesets alone will piss a lot of long time people off as it will basically rework their preferred heroes into the ground. Some might benefit from these changes but even from OW1's reworks show that most instances of reworks just make useful heroes useless as their kit gets changed up and nerfed just so that gameplay per match goes faster.

Also yeah, the 5v5 concept is probably not going to fix any balancing issues. Its probably just going to introduce more queuing issues if anything. Just give us something fun like a map maker already.

 

[boombox]

Makes sense for it to be F2P, because just looking at that footage makes me wonder what is new to it...

 

[ZeroFX]

Worthless game might as well be free.

 

[TehCupcakes]

But they said OW1 owners were gonna ge tthe PVP for OW2 for free before this... Are they going to get anything?

Yes. They're calling it the "Founder's Pack", with 2 epic skins, a special icon, and "a surprise gift"

Blizzard has said OW2 will be "free to play" but haven't really clarified what that means... It's a given that it applies to the PVP, but I still have a feeling that the PVE will be a paid add-on. Maybe they have some freemium plans for that where you can unlock individual missions with in-game currency as an alternative or something.

Also it's clear that some of you have never played Overwatch and haven't taken 2 minutes to look up accurate information. It's NOT going to be pay-to-win; that would be suicidal for an eSport such as Overwatch. The microtransactions will certainly remain cosmetic, and/or apply to PVE content. While they haven't exactly talked about their monetization strategy, I'm sure they won't be sticking with loot boxes. There is way too much stigma (and impending legislation) at this point in time for that to be a good business move. It will probably be a battle pass style system, where playing levels you up to unlock more cosmetics, like other multiplayer games have implemented over the past few years.

And for the record... Overwatch did not start or popularize the idea of loot boxes. (Nor is it a particularly egregious example.) It's been a thing for ~20 years at this point. Releasing in 2016, Overwatch is actually on the late end of the loot box's life as a popular monetization strategy.

In case it wasn't clear, there is a lot more in OW2 than what was shown in the recent beta. That was clearly focused on prepping players for the 5v5 change and getting some initial feedback on push. The bulk of the content (heroes, maps, and of course PVE) are all waiting for a future beta or the release. You have to understand that dropping too many changes at once causes an influx of very disjointed feedback and it's extra hard to make any sense out of player feedback. Not to mention they want the release to have a big splash of excitement, so obviously they are holding back a lot. I don't think it's fair to say that "OW2 doesn't add anything new" when it's quite clear that they deliberately are limiting what we see right now.

I understand criticism of these systems and the various changes they are making to PVP in Overwatch 2... I just want people to get their facts straight and stop spitting nonsense out of naivety.

 

[Mayo1990]

It's a very healthy move for the game tbh. The queue times for almost any role but tank aren't that good, so focussing on gathering more players is always great. Hoping they'll improve their cheat detection though.