Since Overwatch 2After Blizzard’s controversial launch, Blizzard made many massive changes to its hero shooter formula. First, it changed the composition of the core team 6v6 to 5v5then it gutted its promised PvE mode, revamped heroesadded new game modesAnd Granted every character passive healing abilities. As these big, sweeping changes pile up, it becomes clear that what was once a team-oriented, strategic hero shooter is, like almost every other popular multiplayer shooter, moving ever closer to deathmatch combat. Overwatch 2 It seems like it doesn’t want to be the game people fell in love with, and that trend will continue into Season 10, which will see several game modes changed to emphasize speed over everything else.
The news of this comes from February 23rd Director’s Take Post on the official Overwatch Website where the team talks about changes in the current season and the upcoming season, which starts in April. There are some good things here, including the removal of group restrictions for competitors, which meant that friends who were too far apart in rank couldn’t team up and play the mode together. Overwatch 2The matchmaker will just be a little more picky when it comes to which groups they put you against. “Large Groups,” whose team has larger ranking differences, will only compete against other teams with similar differences. That’s a fair compromise, I would say, and it will be implemented in Season 10.
Things get more difficult with the other changes that are being made to make the modes even faster. The post states that these changes occurred after the experiment “Quick Play: Hacked” mode which ran in January, in which respawn, payload movement, targeting and Thrust speed of the robot were increased across the board. The idea was to “explore new and fun ways to change up Quick Play’s core gameplay,” but they were originally conceived as a limited-time deal. Now it looks like some of these changes will actually be implemented in Season 10.
“We will increase the speed of the push bot when it crosses the barrier,” the blog says. “We are implementing a speed boost during spawning for Flashpoint maps, as well as during setup for Defenders in Hybrid and Escort modes. We will also reduce the playing time of Push from 10 minutes to eight minutes in Quick Play and are discussing whether we can do the same in Competitive.”
The prevailing ideology seems to be to get players into the action as quickly as possible. But when you combine this with shifts in respawn times, deadlier weapons, larger hitboxes, and passive healing, it’s clear Overwatch 2 makes changes to maintain momentum and promote a fast-paced, kill-focused playstyle like a standard deathmatch shooter. Matches are also becoming shorter, be it by shortening entire minutes in a push match or by speeding up objective capture. You may play more games in a day, but the tactical substance of those games changes dramatically when speed becomes a priority.
Overwatch 2 has gradually made the transition from a team game to one that feels like it rewards independence, and that has become increasingly clear in recent months. The game removed a tank from its lineup, prioritized defense and fighting from a stationary position, and retooled once defense-oriented characters like Orisa to be more aggressive and disruptive. Giving every character a passive heal that activates when they don’t take damage for a few seconds puts some support heroes in a strange position, as a significant portion of their equipment has become less important. Damage takes precedence over everything else and changes in the pace of the game are felt Overwatch Now rewards quick, deadly plays instead of strategic ones. Fortunately, Blizzard can always refine these ideas and perhaps find a happy medium between deathmatch and strategic play. I just wish Overwatch 2 I didn’t feel like it was constantly straying away from what made everyone fall in love with the game in the first place: its tactical hero shooter roots.
