Overwatch: All the news about Blizzard’s hit hero shooter – The Verge

Overwatch 2 is adding a CS:GO-style mode and bringing back loot boxes

2025-02-12T11:22:24-05:00

Overwatch 2 is getting quite the shakeup in 2025 as it faces growing competition from other online shooters. It starts with the season 15 update that's coming on February 18th that'll tease a new hero and introduce an in-game Perks system for existing ones, plus the return of the 6v6 competitive queues Blizzard tested late last year. There's also the return of loot boxes and then, in April, a Counterstrike-like mode, two new characters, and a revamped ranked queue that lets you ban heroes and vote on maps.

Reintroducing loot boxes may be a polarizing move, as games that implement them have received backlash over the years for their predator …

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Overwatch 2 opens the door to a return for 6v6

2024-07-25T15:02:57-04:00

Soldier 76 and Reinhardt in Overwatch 1. | Image: Activision Blizzard

A couple of years into the Overwatch 2 experience, player angst has reached a point where the people making the game are considering bringing the old 12-person matches back. Today's blog post from the developers at Blizzard says that, finally, "we're exploring how we can test different forms of 6v6 in the game to gauge the results."

Game director Aaron Keller also notes that issues like hero balancing, game performance, and what might happen to queue times if players have a choice between the two formats are questions the team needs to answer but is at least ready to start considering.

Other than making a full-priced game free to play and …

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Overwatch 2 unlocks all of its heroes

2024-03-19T16:55:40-04:00

Some of the heroes added to Overwatch | Image: Blizzard

Overwatch 2 heroes will no longer need to be unlocked through Battle Pass or via purchase, taking some of the grind out of the now free-to-play team FPS. Starting in Season 10, players will be able to unlock all existing and future heroes for free. This will include Venture, the latest hero joining Overwatch's roster next season.

New players to the game will still need to complete the first-time user experience. Only when novice players have unlocked the heroes from the first Overwatch roster will all Overwatch 2 heroes then be at their disposal, , as game director Aaron Keller explains in the latest Developer's Update video.

Free heroes a …

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Competitive Overwatch won’t end with the League

2023-11-09T15:57:27-05:00

The day Overwatch League fans have braced for has finally come. Yesterday, OverActive Media, parent company for the Toronto Defiant, confirmed its exit from the Overwatch League. The company announced that as a part of its agreement with Activision Blizzard, it would receive a $6 million termination fee, thereby ending all its commitments to the League. This confirms that a majority of teams have met and voted to terminate their agreements with the League, with each team owner receiving a termination fee. The result is that the Overwatch League is finally ending after six seasons.

"We are transitioning from the Overwatch League and evolving …

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Blizzard says it’s building ‘revitalized’ Overwatch esports after OWL season ends

2023-10-02T14:10:03-04:00

Hours after the Florida Mayhem were crowned the 2023 Overwatch League Grand Champions, the Overwatch League itself has likely come to its end. In a post on X (formerly Twitter) this morning, Blizzard said that it's working on "building our vision of a revitalized esports program."

pic.twitter.com/PoV2NaI5fg
- Overwatch Esports (@OW_Esports) October 2, 2023

It is no secret that the league has been in dire straits. Over the last few years, there were numerous reports that the league was struggling financially. Advertisers had pulled out after stories of sexual harassment and abuse at Blizzard broke in 2021. Team organizations were struggling …

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Overwatch 2 needs a win — the Invasion event, at best, is a draw

2023-08-10T14:00:00-04:00

Overwatch 2's Invasion event, which goes live today, is the game's biggest update since penciling in the "2" in October of last year. The event, which coincides with season 6 of the battle pass, offers a new hero, a new game mode, and, perhaps most importantly, new story missions that, for the first time, advance Overwatch's story. And while I appreciate and enjoy all the new coming to Overwatch 2, I can't shake the feeling that this all feels too little and too late.

Flashpoint is Overwatch 2's newest game mode. Teams fight to control one of five points spread out equally on maps that are the largest in the game. Each point unlocks sequent …

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Overwatch 2’s newest cinematic is the next big step in the game’s journey

2023-08-04T15:54:42-04:00

From the first reveal of her character in a small thumbnail portrait in 2016 to her official debut in Overwatch 2 some six years later, Vivian Chase, call sign Sojourn, has been on a journey. Today, that long journey takes a new direction as Blizzard reveals her first animated short, bringing newfound depth to her character and to the Overwatch franchise overall.

In an exclusive interview with The Verge, Sojourn's creators talk about her new cinematic and her place at the center of Overwatch 2's story.

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Sojourn occupies a peculiar place in Overwatch's canon. She is an important figure in the game's lore as a leader in t …

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Overwatch 2’s new story missions will be paywalled

2023-06-13T12:06:54-04:00

You're gonna have to pay to play Overwatch 2's new story missions.

During Xbox's Summer Game Fest presentation, we got a tease of Overwatch 2's story missions. Though the content won't be arriving until August 6th, a Game Informer story and a developer blog shared details about the new story missions, including one big, unexpected twist: that unlike any new game mode or seasonal event that's launched after Overwatch 2 went free-to-play, these story missions would not be free.

For $15, you'll get access to three story missions, a legendary skin for Sojourn, and $10 in Overwatch premium currency. There's also a premium bundle for $40, which …

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Overwatch 2 celebrates its first in-game Pride event

2023-05-30T16:35:03-04:00

Overwatch 2 will celebrate its first-ever Pride event. Starting June 1st, the Midtown map will be festooned with Pride flags, the lesbian hero Tracer will have a picture of her and her partner added to the barracks in the Watchpoint: Gibraltar map, and players will get a host of icons and name cards reflect the breadth of queer identities and the Overwatch heroes who share them. The Verge had the opportunity to speak with the developers about this new event, gaining insight into what went into creating this event and what this means for Overwatch's LGBTQ+ fans and characters.

"We want it to feel like the game is reflecting what's happening …

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Overwatch 2’s director explains why its big PvE mode was canceled

2023-05-19T17:28:14-04:00

Game director Aaron Keller published a blog in which he apologized for the seemingly sudden cancellation of a portion of Overwatch 2's PvE content. The blog also shared some detail about the origins of Overwatch PvE, the shifting vision for the content, and why the team decided to axe it.

Earlier this week, in a developer livestream that shared the rest of Overwatch 2's 2023 roadmap, Keller and executive producer Jared Neuss made the shocking announcement that highly anticipated Hero Mode - one part of the game's PvE content - had been scrapped.

Hero Mode was essentially a single-player version of Overwatch. Keller described it as a "game …

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