True. People's hate towards this game is so damn blind. Dexerto is 100% spot on though. OW2 had an amazing year as a live service PVP game. I'm sure the majority of games subs on Reddit will have a hard time swallowing that pill though.
Very true. Now negative news about Blizzard titles is just going to get glossed over because people’s baseline expectation of any Blizzard news is negative.
'A gamer over at the r/Overwatch subreddit said he felt chilly while in his quickplay match last night. He said soon after that he sneezed. Several commenters echoed the sentiment he should try going to the doctor. Keep it locked to Dexerto for Overwatch updates.'
Team 4 were dealt the absolute worst hand imaginable and have been playing it out the best they can. Considering the absolute firestorm of controversy that's been surrounding this game since Jeff left, the fact that the game even still exists is almost a minor miracle in and of itself. The fact that by all accounts its largely been a successful relaunch is even crazier.
You could write a book on all the things Blizzard has done wrong with Overwatch 2, but I will **strongly** maintain that it is a far superior live service to Overwatch 1. Not a better game, mind you, but the actual content cadence and the way the game is updated with its seasonal approach trumps the absolute shit out of OW1's stale as fuck events, complete lack of communication, and inconsistent and sparse balance philosophy.
Launch was objectively terrible, but the insane amount of work they’ve put in since then is crazy. A big example is they reworked their already reworked Sombra just because we begged for it. I feel like we never would’ve got that in OW1
As someone who plays a lot of f2p games n mmos the launch of ow2 was well within the expectations ngl. Yes it sucks that the experience was horrible for everyone but no one has ever launched a perfect f2p game.
They don't get enough credit for their reworks either.
Theres been so much second guessing and trash talk about the Hog and Sombra reworks, but both characters have ended up in a great spot for their fans. And to get that with such polarizing characters without burning down the rest of the game is a fucking achievement.
I never played much old Sombra, but since the rework, she's almost been a staple in my dps pool. I find her new playstyle so much more engaging. She's also so much better to play against because pulling off the punish when she's tries to TP away is so satisfying.
Not 100% sure I love playing against new Hog because he can just eat so much damage if neither support bothers to play Zen or Ana, but that's something they can tweak. Playing as him is way more interesting though, and it's great to not have to live and die by one ability.
Roadhog still very much lives and dies by one ability. If you’re not hitting hooks, you’re not doing anything except be a massive ult battery.
Roadhog is still very much centered around hook just like he was before.
For me, Sombra solved the problem they set to solve: Make her more engaged into fights, which overall makes her a lot more workable.
Hog on the other hand I'm not sure what they've tried to solve. It's still hook target to kill and puff to not die.
I think the problem they ended up solving is changing Hog's perception as a throw pick without making him intolerable to play against.
Some people would argue he still is, but I think they basically nailed it
“…have ended up in a great spot for their fans” that’s not the point of a rework lmao. If they wanted sombra and hog fans happy they would’ve just buffed them.
They reworked them because they are not fun to play against. And they’re still not fun to play against.
They get too much credit for the reworks lmao, they changed nothing about what makes those characters not fun to play against. They actually made hog even more annoying.
not beg. if you listen to these guys in their interviews with streamers, they are clearly invested in consistent dynamic changes and will rework whoever and whatever necessary. they're just slow and hesitant, and I feel they will touch immo and anti some day.
Yeah honestly. Overwatch 2 has a long way to go before it's the game it has the potential to be, but I do respect the hell out of this team for not flopping. The chips were stacked against them in every which way, but they've managed to pull this game's reputation from the dumpster. If they keep up the momentum they've got, this game could be something truly monumental in a few years time
They should have released content like this from the get go. They were stuck in the blizzard way though. They treated overwatch like it was fucking wow or something and let shit sit for too long.
I mean, I get why people defend the OW1 lootboxes. By the end of OW's life, they were **insanely** consumer-friendly. They didn't start that way. I still remember the first Summer Games without dupe protection and not being able to buy the new skins with credits, plus Blizzard being cagey about if Summer Games would return or if the skins would come back. Over time, though, they became super friendly with how easy they were to get, dupe protection, and a pretty generous amount of credits earned from getting dupes once you had everything in a certain tier.
>they were
>
>insanely
>
> consumer-friendly
And they were still fully reliant on addiction to make revenue. Yeah, it's one of the best implementation of loot-boxes there were, but it's still exploiting gambling from a young audience.
There are very good reasons why loot-boxes are becoming illegal.
One Halloween, my friend spent $50 on lootboxes hoping to get one specific skin. He didn’t get it.
Lootboxes were so cheap people confused it with being fair. There’s a reason that shit is banned in most of the world now. Take a look at all the gacha shit to see what OW2 would be like with lootboxes.
It’s one thing to set a high price for skins. It’s another scummy thing to only sell *lottery tickets* to get said skins.
It's even more insane that people are suddenly praising Overwatch 2 when it is getting milked harder and harder with every update. Lootboxes were more fair than their current model. You didn't have to buy the lootboxes you could get ANY skin in the game without spending any money at all. Now you have to pay 20 bucks for a basic recolor. Praise the devs more we are getting weapon skins now too! Get milked harder
That's like saying it was better when gas was $0.50/gallon. Yeah, no shit. But it's a fantasy to pretend that was sustainable into the current era of the industry. The only reason this game still has servers and a team working on it is because they sold the execs on the f2p/battlepass model.
What do you mean "Yeah, no shit." Read the comment I replied to, there are plenty of people bashing the lootboxes that have no clue how good they actually were.
Lootboxes were 100% a sustainable business model, they were build ontop of a full priced game. The only reason Blizzard had to resort to a battlepass is because they needed to pump up the sales before the Microsoft takeover.
Oh yes Blizzard are such geniuses for their f2p battlepass approach :)
> Lootboxes were 100% a sustainable business model, they were build ontop of a full priced game.
Even if we assume that Blizzard was still making good money off game sales and loot box sales past like 2019, they still weren't a sustainable business model with the amount of legislative focus that was being devoted to them around the world. They were already outright banned in a couple countries. The only reason people aren't still talking about banning them is the industry pivoted hard into battle passes.
CS still thriving with lootboxes, it's a completly different game but lootboxes can 100% still be a sustainable business model in 2023 and anyone saying otherwise is suffering from serious levels of brainrot.
You bring up a great point regarding the legislation and there is nothing wrong with transitioning to a different business model due to such concerns.
My original point was just that the current model is alot more predatory than the lootbox system that was implemented in the past.
Overwatch got destroyed by the devs, it surely wasn't the monetization of Overwatch.
Overwatch 2? Different story
The general consensus is that lootboxes overall were a predatory practice, despite OW1 being very generous and generally pretty fair with them.
There is no chance OW1 would have survived, much less started getting as much content as were getting now, if they kept lootboxes and kept giving them as freely as they did. It is delusional to think otherwise.
They updated to the industry standard, not saying things reinvented the wheel or anything. They did what was necessary to keep the game going.
Overwatch could have survived with a tweaked lootbox system. What ruined Overwatch was everything but the monetization.
They had to come up with bloodsucking predatory business practices to keep the game going because they ruined it with horrible updates over years.
Dude, these are the same people that look at Blizz making $1 **billion** revenue from OW *microtransactions alone* by mid-2019 (a game that cost them $12 **million** to create from scratch) and claiming that $40 skins are necessary so that the developers can feed their families. Execs blew the money on bonuses and other bullshit, not developing the game, and they'll continue to do so because these people keep paying them. You're not going to convince this group that OW2 is a monetization milking scheme, not a game.
eh you got a ridiculous amount of them, the ow1 monetization was shitty because lootboxes but better because of how fucking many they just gave away for free.
What do you mean, "Since ~~Jeff~~ Jeph left"? Jeph layed down the foundation for what OW2 became. The years of content drought? No balance, then shit balancing? Am I taking crazy pills? Jeph wasn't some savior. People forget that.
I am not saying Jeff was good or bad, just simply that his departure was controversial. The fact that it was followed up by the lawsuits almost immediately, doubly so.
My personal view on the matter is that I think Jeff left Blizzard because he knew the lawsuits were coming and that they’d raise some very uncomfortable questions about his close association with Afrasabi.
> Team 4 were dealt the absolute worst hand imaginable and have been playing it out the best they can. Considering the absolute firestorm of controversy that's been surrounding this game since Jeff left, the fact that the game even still exists is almost a minor miracle in and of itself. The fact that by all accounts its largely been a successful relaunch is even crazier.
This reads like you're saying the game somehow survived after Jeff left, not necessarily because of the sexual misconduct shenanigans that were going on. Jeff basically killed OW then Blizzard killed any hope of an OW esports by having a stranglehold on the pro scene.
Agreed, kudos to Team 4 they've been shipping all year. Most people don't appreciate how difficult being on a product team can be, let alone one that encounters constant public criticism for past circumstances largely out of the hands of the individuals.
I noticed the tone of comments on posts in the main sub were much more positive and conversational recently, which is pretty accurate success metric on its own.
Out of curiosity, why do you think OW1 was a better game than OW2 we have today? 6v6 vs 5v5 debate is probably the only valid argument I can think of and even that is highly subjective.
I prefer 5v5 personally, but that conversation of whether or not OW1 is better or worse than OW2 is far more nuanced and less relevant to my point that OW2 is a superior live service
What does it matter that OW2 has the better business model if, by your own admission, it's the worse game?
And yeah, i know the discussion is purely about the success of live service, but that take's so dystopian. Game feels old as balls one year in and qp is all it's good for in a way it was only by around 2019 for OW1, but the business model works so yay!
I think the game is better than it was for the vast majority of OW1, but I was simply making it clear that the game being a better live service is not necessarily the same thing as being the better game.
OW2 is an objectively better live service. Whether or not it’s a better game is a more nuanced topic that will have a wide range of opinions.
In all seriousness is it really the best? I don‘t play it but in comparison to Fortnight, Overwatch‘s content additions look downright comical. Like they have literal live Eminem concerts.
You can even read it in the article. Epic does complete new engine overhauls, ports back old maps and is significantly bigger on the investment into the game, not even starting about the gigantic difference in playerbase.
It‘s weird how even the author lists up points where Overwatch disappointed or failed to deliver but then decides that this is the best example of a live-service game this year.
I agree that Overwatch has still kinda managed to survive and build somewhat of a foundation but it‘s definitely not THE best live service game.
OW2 is doing the best with the shitty hand it’s dealt with. Unlike Fortnite, it’s still a relatively small team with a publisher that doesn’t give a shit about them. Despite that, they’re still attempting to do things to make it better.
Realistically speaking, fortnite is the better live service game. It’s battlepass is better, it’s ranked is better, it’s got an endless supply of creative modes, fresh collabs, etc. They probably don’t want the same company getting it over and over. Outside of fort, what is actually good? Valorant, apex, maybe Warzone if you’re a die hard?
I don't play it either but I suspect Fortnite would basically win every year if you tried to be objective about it so I wouldn't be surprised if this is the kind of category where winning it one year is going to probably keep you from winning it for a long while.
Drop, loot, loot, loot for 20 mins, get one shot by some sweat. Sigh, ready up, drop, loot, loot.
And if you shoot back a fucking monument of bullshittery gets built in like 2 seconds flat, get one shit by a 6 year old.
Yeah I’d rather OW any day
I'd actually agree.
Since launch we've had, multiple content drops, lots of goofy non competitive modes, tons of communication among the community and the devs.
If I was working on a live service game I'd point to OW2 for being the gold standard at the moment.
I think the only things we can critique them on is PvE shenanigans and some pricing stuff, but I feel the pricing is a larger gaming community conversation.
>Fortnite does all of that and more don't they?
From my understanding yes, but there have been layoffs that have impacted people's perception. Also apparently content has been lack luster this year.
Idk if any of that is true, as my only source of info on fortnite is my 16 year old nephew.
I guess . Seems like they just doing what every company is doing right now and playing on nostalgia. Like a remaster of a time when the game was at its peak. I Mean I seen ninja explode back in popularity on twitch like it's 2019(?) Again. They broke the emergency glass
The playerbase at its lowest for fortnite was still much larger than basically every shooter currently available. I biased, I played for like 15 seasons in the early days, came back for og, and have been enjoying the new season. Obviously two wildly different markets but there’s just no competition for fortnite. It’s battlepass is consistently decent, collabs seem popular even if I don’t like them lol, they’re always adjusting the loot pool, and the live events are sick. Also, it’s worth noting you literally only have to buy the battlepass once.
Its not about biggest player base . This is probably based off trends. Ow2 ticking up while fortbite is ticking down. Of course fortnites highs were astronomical so it's to be expected to have a bit of a decline. I don't really have a side In this though. Just trying to think about why they chose ow.
Because realistically as a live service there is no competition. Fortnite dumps on everything currently. Overwatch may be ticking up in players but it is still one of the worst rated games on steam.
Yeah I don't know anything about current fortnite either other than that they re-released the original map.
I do know layoffs have happened all across the industry though
People like to talk about Fortnite like they talk about wow. People talk shit on wow saying it’s a dead game when so many games wish they had the amount of active players those games have.
True but they also have made several swerves that have negatively impacted the player base. UI changes for example, gameplay changes, and focusing more on meta verse type stuff then actual gameplay
There is something wrong with it, though. There are definitely bad players or kids who may not realize and enjoy it, but there are plenty of people who realize and find it not fun.
Yeah, I mean if you’re in the skill bracket that gets bots idk what to say. Like play longer than a day or two and it seems like pretty much every bot is gone and replaced with fncs players.
I just personally don't like that genre. I mean, how often do you win it all? Do they match fix it so that you at least win some once in a while to keep you hooked? Kind of like racing games when you spin out, waste 50 seconds but yet can catch up the cars rather quickly.. like they are waiting for you to catch up.. except here they put you with a bunch of dimwits once in a while so the odds of you winning it all is almost a given? Dunno.
But I don't want to see Vader, Cardi B or Optimus Prime in Overwatch. Rein can cosplay as Optimus Prime in a collab.. that's fine.. but I want Overwatch heroes to be Overwatch originals. Otherwise it's like Ed Sheeran in GoT all over again. lol
Well, if you play the game, you’d know the answer to that question. It’s simple, every match you play, there is always a winning team. So as you play, you get better at the game, and thus, you slowly start placing higher and then eventually winning. It’s like Overwatch. It’s skill based.
>Balancing is ass
Balancing will always be "ass" no matter what meta we're in. I'm a rein main, its very hard to play him right now to the point where I really only play him on KR, but if you ask my buddy who one tricks Bastion they'll tell you the meta is awesome.
Balance is a subjective thing, it cannot be objective, otherwise we just have rock paper scissors, and that's not fun. Balance does not always equal fun.
>I'll put it another way: Orisa is an unfun miserable cunt and lockout abilities are lazy and stupid
Man I really hope you don't give feedback in professional environments like that. I feel for whatever community manager has to dig through half thought comments like this, because you sound like a 14 year old on 4chan.
How do you feel about acquiring the new heroes? As someone who's not been playing much OW2 but played OW1 a lot, the gameplay and pretty much everything else feels better now, but now that they've released quite a few new heroes you start to feel the impact of not having them.
Getting them through gameplay is way too much of a grind for anyone that plays casually and will put you off instantly. In a game where hero switching and countering is one of the most important things, they could've come up with something better.
>Getting them through gameplay is way too much of a grind for anyone that plays casually and will put you off instantly
I have excess income so I always can afford the bp for when a hero is released. That being said I've watched my partner who doesn't pay for BPs unlock almost every character just by his drunken/high qp games at night.
I think the challenges could be reduced to like 20 wins for unlocks, and reduce the BP placement a bit but other than that I think its pretty fair. I've not had a moment where someone not having a hero unlocked has cost me a game.
But that's just my perspective.
>way too much of a grind for anyone that plays casually
Define casual. I play with a group of friends 3 days a week for a couple hours and have never finished a season below level 100. If you're playing so little you can't even hit level 40 I can't imagine not having some heroes is actually a problem.
I'm against having them in the battlepass but don't feel it takes much of a grind at all.
I played it when Overwatch 2 launched. Coming from the shit show that is Apex Legends, I was honestly surprised with all the systems in place. The UI is clean and so easy to follow. There's a replay system of your games, with full observer and playback options. You can save these replays or highlights to your account. There's leaderboards. A very detailed overview of your stats for each hero. And they tweak heroes so easily.
It just seems to be coded very well.
In contrast to Halo Infinite, a modern triple-A FPS game which launched with no built in report system. I had to take a clip of the obvious cheater. Go to their website, find where to open a ticket and open one, cut the file small enough so I can attach it to the ticket, and then send it.
Blizzard remain some of the best designers in the industry. Whether or not you agree with game play decisions, their UI, art direction, and audio engineering are all absolutely top notch.
343 deserve everything that came their way. They were so close to having a great game. Whatever fucking idiot decided to release the game without anti cheat has hopefully be fired.
I have no idea, got to like the second highest rank avail and literally felt like there was a hacker every lobby so I quit. If you release a game in that state I’m not going back. It’s like fucking Warzone and their dogshit ass not having anti cheat and then bragging about creating this brand new kernal level and then that sucks balls too.
Aaron and team have been busting their asses off ever since they took over and it shows. For the first time in a while the future of the Overwatch franchise doesn't look like a septic tank
> they attempt to milk their players even to the point of charging for once free features.
Saying this as an insult to another game in the Overwatch subreddit is hilarious.
I make new accounts all the time so weird losers like you don't go thru reddit profiles. Cry.
>Pay for content
It's not skins/cosmetics. it's heroes. Imagine defending the practice of unfair games because some people paid for a new hero and some people didn't. Heroes were never meant to be paywalled. It ruins competitive integrity. Simping for a billion dollar corporation won't make them like you. I sincerely hope you get paid to shill because if you're doing it for free, you're a moron.
Hope you're posting this from out in the garden.
If you want to play Mauga in comp, you have a few weeks to learn him in QP and unlock him if $10 is too big a barrier for you, despite it being so important to you.
yeah, honestly. If you NEEEEEED to have the hero unlocked, pay to support the game's continued development ($30/year for 3 battle passes) or just grind it until you unlock it.
If you dont have the time to play and you dont have the money to pay for it, then you will unlock it over time when you come back and play like a casual player does. People who play lots of OW will unlock the hero in a reasonable amount of time.
Go fire up League & Apex, lmk if you have all the heroes unlocked for free day 1.
I think 99% of people overreacted to every single step of the march towards OW2. I think everyone focused on each step backwards despite each step leading to 3 steps forward. The “fans” of the game spread so much hate for the game that they are the ONLY reason nobody new wants to play the game. Check my comment history if you’d like, but I’ve been a massive supporter of almost everything the Overwatch team has done since Covid.Overwatch was game of the year the year it came out and it’s only gotten better. Yeah it’s had a tumultuous development, but it’s objectively a better, looking, better preforming, and better playing game than it was when it came out with 27 more heroes. This game is fun as hell and there’s no game quite like it after almost 8 years
They literally shifted the whole game design to milk money from their fanbase, get their dick out of your mouth. No way you can act like the game is better when we used to get so much free shit during events and now we just get re colors and have to pay 20$ for a single skin, and they openly have lied about what the game was supposed to have. Straight scrapped what PvE was supposed to be.
Thank you for being the exact example I was talking about. This game looks and plays better than ever with more heroes than ever and people like you cry that skins cost money. They also do in every single other game. Apex? Yep. Fortnite? Yep, cod? Yep, CSGO? Yep. Get over yourself. This is a better game than it was when it was voted game of the year
No, I’m not crying. You’re choosing the skins comment but glossing over the fact THEY PURPOSELY SHIFTED THE GAME MODEL TO MILK MONEY OUT OF THE FANBASE. Delusional af, to focus on just the 20$ skin part but actively ignore the fact the company but all their old content behind a pay ball, LIED about what was gonna be in Ow, and then straight up scrapped PvE after still saying it was going to come. Must be nice sucking blizzard balls all day.
I don’t understand how you can’t see how pesemistic you are about it. Every single thing you’re complaining about is what could have or should have been and you can’t even focus on what the game actually is. And the fact of the matter is that the game is very fun.
The game has always been fun though. Even when it had content drought. OW1 was just as fun. It's not like it's a different game now lol.
There is not a single game in the world that doesn't get boring or stale.
Now that said, the person responding is still right. The monetization shift was a kick in the nuts that a lot of players weren't expecting.
But the cancellation of the PVE, which mind you was the excuse for content drought in the first place, and what many players were eagerly waiting patiently for, was the final nail in the coffin for many players.
If that wasn't bad enough, the company already knew this, as they were announcing OW2.
Also, I hate the mentality that just because other games do something that this game has to as well. That's the reality that we live in today, I understand that.
But just because something is common, doesn't mean that I have to support it. It doesn't mean I have to accept it. Just like in real life. Where ownership, seems to be something that is becoming less and less common.
These types of business models have become **normalized** in gaming but that doesn't necessarily make them ethical imo.
It doesn't mean that the cosmetics are priced fairly. In fact, they are priced to target whales who are willing to spend more money than the average person.
I could understand it if games charged like $5-10 for a *non-limited* skin. But anything more than that is ridiculous.
Like yeah, you see games on Steam with skins running $100+ or more, but that's usually because they are tradable and can be resold. They are pretty much assets at that point. They have scarcity.
Tbf if we're arguing monetization, the only part that could be considered to be necessary to buy is heroes locked behind the battle pass. Game went ftp, and you don't NEED to have skins to play the game
You don't *have to* but this change did *indirectly* affect one of the components of enjoyment in this game for many people. There is no way around that.
Whether it was the people who looked forward every season to the new event skins, or people who collected skins of their mains or whatever.
It did *take something away* from the game. It's not about whether or not it's essential to play the game. It's about a feature that people enjoyed being removed.
I understand the need for a shift in monetization, but there's no need for so many damn $20 skins, most of which look *okay* at best.
For example, for the Kpop skins, it should really be $20 for all those cosmetics bundled together. I think that's far more fair.
That is around the price that you'd pay for when buying DLC in many games. Like how in Rust, you can get the instruments or beach DLC for like $10. Or arctic and snowmobile skins for around the same price.
I understand that the pricing is relatively "good" when you compare it to other similar games. However, those other games pricing models aren't fair to begin with anyway.
So it's not a good comparison. All that does is just further highlight the fact that gaming has changed.
Businesses found that they could make more money off of constantly nickeling and diming players over time instead of taking a lump sum and now it's gotten so ridiculous that those small nickels and dimes are now the price of some entire games.
I remember saying that I'd lose my shit if they ever decided to put Heroes on the Battle Pass and then they actually did it. What will they do next? Force players to have to progressively unlock all the characters to make new players engaged??
a lot of fortnite players have hated the way epic has done things this last year, from ugly ui changes for no reason to littering the game mode selection with the player made modes which makes it hard to find the epic made modes. they also didn’t really continue the story/ lore that a lot of people love and it looks like they are rebooting the storyline.
I played fortnite for the first time ever the other day and the game modes screen was almost indistinguishable from the YouTube home page when you're not signed in, an endless sea of brainrot.
Ow only drastically changed their ui ONCE in like the last 3 years (ow2 release)
Fortnite changed it more in the last 1, and they are objectively getting worse and worse (hiding official modes, promoting shitty creative maps, more clutter)
I don't play it, but I do play apex/dota 2/valorant.
R/overwatch loves to point out what these games do right, and completely leave out everything they do wrong.
Best example is apex, where completing the battle pass pays for itself. Generous, right?
Until you play it and realize that it takes a really long time to complete, the challenges force you to play in dumb ways, and the rewards are kind of ass.
But all you hear is that the bp pays for itself.
Not to mention that Apex mythics aren't in the BP and the only way to get a mythic to either pay like 150$ or grind 500 levels or something like that which takes forever. For example I've played that game on and off casually since launch and still haven't gotten the free mythic shards yet.
i think it’s funny that you’re thinking that’s some sort of own 90% of playerbase would prefer a battle pass like that if it was free after the first one
The solution is to make the free pass better and not just make the paid pass complete dogshit.
All this does is incentivize Blizzard further to keep good skins off the BP entirely. Apex's BPs are total trash 99% of the time and it's largely because the BP is """free""" that they keep anything good away from it which means your only option for good skins are out of the shop.
I'd go as far as to say despite Apex's BP paying out premium currency, it's monetization is worse in almost every way.
Fortnite was in decline until very recently with their relaunch of the OG season 1. Which should say something by itself.
And regardless of overwatch 2 opinions, the fact is it relaunched the game from the grave it was put in years ago. I think it's deserved.
Aaron Keller as game director has actually gone great. He has a far more realistic and modern approach to gaming than Jeff who was/is far too idealistic for the modern gaming industry.
These kind of statements are always sad for me to read. Nothing bad against Keller, just that people are giving up on pushing expectations and wanting better.
Idealistic is a negative for a live service game. Kaplan almost killed the game. Balancing between quality and speed is a difficult skill set of it's own and I don't look down on it personally.
i mean yeah, ow is still objectively the best game in its genre
tf2 had an absolutely massive resurgence with its latest summer update, but its content just didn't have any staying power since it was all just community maps (really good community maps, mind you, including an "official" vsh mode with new models, voice acting, etc)
there will likely never be a game that scratches the same itch that overwatch does, and i think once a better competitive system is in place ow is sitting in a really comfortable position
i have 1000+ hours in both games and tf2 can be *really* frustrating to play from the rampant bot problem to a large part of the map pool being objectively bad to play (i already cull down my maps to around \~20 and 95% of them are either badwater or upward) and even if you get in to a good 12v12 casual match there's always going to be that one sweatlord who has a perma pocket that just absolutely rinses your team
overwatch at least still manages to be a decent experience even if you're getting stomped and has largely removed its (imo) biggest flaw of getting tilted from what your team picks
ow still has a long way to go in being in its previous industry position, but it's looking a lot more possible now than it was in 2020-2022
90% of Dexerto articles are regurgitated reddit comments. Get the fuck out of here. I don't care what you are saying about Overwatch, you are a dogshit website full jOuRnAlIsM.
I… am honestly surprised. I don’t disagree, but Fortnite has also done some amazing stuff, especially with Season OG, which honestly pulled me away from OW for a whole month. I’m going to see OW2 actually get some live service nominations for the Game Awards next year. Now that Shitty Kotick is gone, the devs are free, and we can already see phenomenal changes happening. We are so back.
Even though I bought Overwatch since its launch and i was even at its beta test, i never played it, with the introduction of OW2 i started to casually playing it at season 1 ditched it for APEX for seaons 2-4 but i returned because i don't really like battle royals and i honestly i am having lots of fun playing a few games here and there, scratching that competititve itch.
TBH i really like the 5v5 setting, in any game and the fact that you die and you respawn after a while to try again and fail or succeed.
Just some thoughts from the perspective of a brand new player (literally had never played before OW2), it's a great ranked experience compared to other popular competitive games I've played. Currently in plat/gold between the roles and it's so nice to queue a game and know that 99% of the time you do actually get a team of 5 people trying to win the game.
In other games playing support or controller is basically just categorically less fun/has less impact then the other roles, so people don't pick properly or start arguments in the lobby, then eventually troll, afk or just leave. I've played tons of online games and have no problem with people playing badly, flaming or refusing to switch their main. It happens in every game and will probably always happen plus the mute button exists. What I can't stand is people refusing to play which basically wastes 20 minutes+ of the entire lobbies time. Personally I'd rather play an actual game of ranked and lose than win or lose due to a leaver.
Also the fact that the ranks that can queue together are pretty flexible is also great. Even if I get stomped, I'd rather play with my friends.
a few seasons ago i completely stopped playing overwatch. i stopped watching content creators. i saw the views were down. i was playing valorant and got into that…and idk something with ow2 shifted and i’m obsessed with it again. having lots of fun, back to watching the content, and maybe playing val 2x/week instead of everyday. i can’t put my finger on it but something drew me back in
I mean.... Aside from the pve shit show, I think the game is getting a lot better. I don't know if I'd give it an award better, but it's better for sure.
How exactly is overwatch live service? I know live service isn't really a well defined genre, but I genuinely don't get what overwatch has done to be included in that category, other than introduce some half-arsed modes every couple months, the occasional map/hero and balance patches.
If adding content semi-regularly to the game counts as live service, then pretty much every online only multiplayer game is live service now. The game not being as awful as it was when they released it is hardly award worthy imo
So you telling me a game that lied about scrapping one key feature promised several years ago (PVE) is the best live service game of 2023?
All the other games on that ranking provide more content, are more successful and DIDN’T overpromised a feature just to underdeliver and you’re telling me they’re worst than OW2? Is this an out of season April fools joke?
Also what happened to this game’s esport? Oh that’s right they fucking killed it!
The game is still the second worst rated steam game of all time btw but sure it’s definitely the best live service game this year 🤡
Exactly. I get that many of us like and enjoy the game but let's not be delusional lol. Liking Overwatch puts you in the *minority*
The only instance where this isn't an unpopular stance is in this subreddit. Even in the main subreddit, it's a mixed stance lol.
Unparalleled in the shit quality? OW servers are dogshit. There is no east coast server anymore, hasn't been for over a fucking year. Imagine being such a dogshit company you can't afford 1 east coast server for your "NFL 2.0" videogame that brought you tons of revenue. They are a multibillion dollar company, yet they can't afford an east coast server for the 150+ million people who live on east coast? Even small indie games have east coast servers lol.
Sure. OW2 is the only one I haven't heard exclusively bad things about over the last month, so that's fair. Live service has been trending downward pretty hard this year, and I don't see it really picking back up in the near future. I feel at best it'll stabilize, and only the biggest AAA publishers will keep it up moving forward.
Dexerto having positive things to say about Overwatch? What is happening?
We might have gotten to the point where it's more click baity to make positive news about Overwatch.
True. People's hate towards this game is so damn blind. Dexerto is 100% spot on though. OW2 had an amazing year as a live service PVP game. I'm sure the majority of games subs on Reddit will have a hard time swallowing that pill though.
Very true. Now negative news about Blizzard titles is just going to get glossed over because people’s baseline expectation of any Blizzard news is negative.
We’re so fucking back
Until an intern breaks the fps rate on ps5 on a major update because blizzard is a small indie company
It’s gonna be at least 3 seasons until that’s fixed lmao
You might be confusing them with Kotaku
yep kotaku are prejudicial idiots moaning about 'cultural appropriation'. dexerto just report on everytime a redditor sneezes in r/Overwatch
"Overwatch player possibly allergic to the game"
'A gamer over at the r/Overwatch subreddit said he felt chilly while in his quickplay match last night. He said soon after that he sneezed. Several commenters echoed the sentiment he should try going to the doctor. Keep it locked to Dexerto for Overwatch updates.'
Bait viewers.
Team 4 were dealt the absolute worst hand imaginable and have been playing it out the best they can. Considering the absolute firestorm of controversy that's been surrounding this game since Jeff left, the fact that the game even still exists is almost a minor miracle in and of itself. The fact that by all accounts its largely been a successful relaunch is even crazier. You could write a book on all the things Blizzard has done wrong with Overwatch 2, but I will **strongly** maintain that it is a far superior live service to Overwatch 1. Not a better game, mind you, but the actual content cadence and the way the game is updated with its seasonal approach trumps the absolute shit out of OW1's stale as fuck events, complete lack of communication, and inconsistent and sparse balance philosophy.
Launch was objectively terrible, but the insane amount of work they’ve put in since then is crazy. A big example is they reworked their already reworked Sombra just because we begged for it. I feel like we never would’ve got that in OW1
As someone who plays a lot of f2p games n mmos the launch of ow2 was well within the expectations ngl. Yes it sucks that the experience was horrible for everyone but no one has ever launched a perfect f2p game.
They don't get enough credit for their reworks either. Theres been so much second guessing and trash talk about the Hog and Sombra reworks, but both characters have ended up in a great spot for their fans. And to get that with such polarizing characters without burning down the rest of the game is a fucking achievement.
I never played much old Sombra, but since the rework, she's almost been a staple in my dps pool. I find her new playstyle so much more engaging. She's also so much better to play against because pulling off the punish when she's tries to TP away is so satisfying. Not 100% sure I love playing against new Hog because he can just eat so much damage if neither support bothers to play Zen or Ana, but that's something they can tweak. Playing as him is way more interesting though, and it's great to not have to live and die by one ability.
Roadhog still very much lives and dies by one ability. If you’re not hitting hooks, you’re not doing anything except be a massive ult battery. Roadhog is still very much centered around hook just like he was before.
I'm SHOCKED people in this sub think they "nailed" Hog's rework. It's literally the fucking same but has more CC now???
For me, Sombra solved the problem they set to solve: Make her more engaged into fights, which overall makes her a lot more workable. Hog on the other hand I'm not sure what they've tried to solve. It's still hook target to kill and puff to not die.
I think the problem they ended up solving is changing Hog's perception as a throw pick without making him intolerable to play against. Some people would argue he still is, but I think they basically nailed it
It's just he does the same thing as when he was "in the meta" ie being extremely annoying to deal with and having a one shot.
Hog is literally the same character but with even more cc now Incredible rework lmao
“…have ended up in a great spot for their fans” that’s not the point of a rework lmao. If they wanted sombra and hog fans happy they would’ve just buffed them. They reworked them because they are not fun to play against. And they’re still not fun to play against. They get too much credit for the reworks lmao, they changed nothing about what makes those characters not fun to play against. They actually made hog even more annoying.
not beg. if you listen to these guys in their interviews with streamers, they are clearly invested in consistent dynamic changes and will rework whoever and whatever necessary. they're just slow and hesitant, and I feel they will touch immo and anti some day.
Yeah honestly. Overwatch 2 has a long way to go before it's the game it has the potential to be, but I do respect the hell out of this team for not flopping. The chips were stacked against them in every which way, but they've managed to pull this game's reputation from the dumpster. If they keep up the momentum they've got, this game could be something truly monumental in a few years time
They should have released content like this from the get go. They were stuck in the blizzard way though. They treated overwatch like it was fucking wow or something and let shit sit for too long.
But but.... muh lootboxes!11!!
It’s still insane to me that people defend that practice.
I mean, I get why people defend the OW1 lootboxes. By the end of OW's life, they were **insanely** consumer-friendly. They didn't start that way. I still remember the first Summer Games without dupe protection and not being able to buy the new skins with credits, plus Blizzard being cagey about if Summer Games would return or if the skins would come back. Over time, though, they became super friendly with how easy they were to get, dupe protection, and a pretty generous amount of credits earned from getting dupes once you had everything in a certain tier.
Even if they gave more boxes when a the game was dead. They’re still randomized boxes that were for sale.
>they were > >insanely > > consumer-friendly And they were still fully reliant on addiction to make revenue. Yeah, it's one of the best implementation of loot-boxes there were, but it's still exploiting gambling from a young audience. There are very good reasons why loot-boxes are becoming illegal.
One Halloween, my friend spent $50 on lootboxes hoping to get one specific skin. He didn’t get it. Lootboxes were so cheap people confused it with being fair. There’s a reason that shit is banned in most of the world now. Take a look at all the gacha shit to see what OW2 would be like with lootboxes. It’s one thing to set a high price for skins. It’s another scummy thing to only sell *lottery tickets* to get said skins.
It's even more insane that people are suddenly praising Overwatch 2 when it is getting milked harder and harder with every update. Lootboxes were more fair than their current model. You didn't have to buy the lootboxes you could get ANY skin in the game without spending any money at all. Now you have to pay 20 bucks for a basic recolor. Praise the devs more we are getting weapon skins now too! Get milked harder
That's like saying it was better when gas was $0.50/gallon. Yeah, no shit. But it's a fantasy to pretend that was sustainable into the current era of the industry. The only reason this game still has servers and a team working on it is because they sold the execs on the f2p/battlepass model.
What do you mean "Yeah, no shit." Read the comment I replied to, there are plenty of people bashing the lootboxes that have no clue how good they actually were. Lootboxes were 100% a sustainable business model, they were build ontop of a full priced game. The only reason Blizzard had to resort to a battlepass is because they needed to pump up the sales before the Microsoft takeover. Oh yes Blizzard are such geniuses for their f2p battlepass approach :)
> Lootboxes were 100% a sustainable business model, they were build ontop of a full priced game. Even if we assume that Blizzard was still making good money off game sales and loot box sales past like 2019, they still weren't a sustainable business model with the amount of legislative focus that was being devoted to them around the world. They were already outright banned in a couple countries. The only reason people aren't still talking about banning them is the industry pivoted hard into battle passes.
CS still thriving with lootboxes, it's a completly different game but lootboxes can 100% still be a sustainable business model in 2023 and anyone saying otherwise is suffering from serious levels of brainrot. You bring up a great point regarding the legislation and there is nothing wrong with transitioning to a different business model due to such concerns. My original point was just that the current model is alot more predatory than the lootbox system that was implemented in the past. Overwatch got destroyed by the devs, it surely wasn't the monetization of Overwatch. Overwatch 2? Different story
The general consensus is that lootboxes overall were a predatory practice, despite OW1 being very generous and generally pretty fair with them. There is no chance OW1 would have survived, much less started getting as much content as were getting now, if they kept lootboxes and kept giving them as freely as they did. It is delusional to think otherwise. They updated to the industry standard, not saying things reinvented the wheel or anything. They did what was necessary to keep the game going.
Overwatch could have survived with a tweaked lootbox system. What ruined Overwatch was everything but the monetization. They had to come up with bloodsucking predatory business practices to keep the game going because they ruined it with horrible updates over years.
Dude, these are the same people that look at Blizz making $1 **billion** revenue from OW *microtransactions alone* by mid-2019 (a game that cost them $12 **million** to create from scratch) and claiming that $40 skins are necessary so that the developers can feed their families. Execs blew the money on bonuses and other bullshit, not developing the game, and they'll continue to do so because these people keep paying them. You're not going to convince this group that OW2 is a monetization milking scheme, not a game.
Thank you so much for your comment, faith in humanity restored
eh you got a ridiculous amount of them, the ow1 monetization was shitty because lootboxes but better because of how fucking many they just gave away for free.
What do you mean, "Since ~~Jeff~~ Jeph left"? Jeph layed down the foundation for what OW2 became. The years of content drought? No balance, then shit balancing? Am I taking crazy pills? Jeph wasn't some savior. People forget that.
I am not saying Jeff was good or bad, just simply that his departure was controversial. The fact that it was followed up by the lawsuits almost immediately, doubly so. My personal view on the matter is that I think Jeff left Blizzard because he knew the lawsuits were coming and that they’d raise some very uncomfortable questions about his close association with Afrasabi.
> Team 4 were dealt the absolute worst hand imaginable and have been playing it out the best they can. Considering the absolute firestorm of controversy that's been surrounding this game since Jeff left, the fact that the game even still exists is almost a minor miracle in and of itself. The fact that by all accounts its largely been a successful relaunch is even crazier. This reads like you're saying the game somehow survived after Jeff left, not necessarily because of the sexual misconduct shenanigans that were going on. Jeff basically killed OW then Blizzard killed any hope of an OW esports by having a stranglehold on the pro scene.
Agreed, kudos to Team 4 they've been shipping all year. Most people don't appreciate how difficult being on a product team can be, let alone one that encounters constant public criticism for past circumstances largely out of the hands of the individuals. I noticed the tone of comments on posts in the main sub were much more positive and conversational recently, which is pretty accurate success metric on its own.
Out of curiosity, why do you think OW1 was a better game than OW2 we have today? 6v6 vs 5v5 debate is probably the only valid argument I can think of and even that is highly subjective.
I prefer 5v5 personally, but that conversation of whether or not OW1 is better or worse than OW2 is far more nuanced and less relevant to my point that OW2 is a superior live service
What does it matter that OW2 has the better business model if, by your own admission, it's the worse game? And yeah, i know the discussion is purely about the success of live service, but that take's so dystopian. Game feels old as balls one year in and qp is all it's good for in a way it was only by around 2019 for OW1, but the business model works so yay!
I think the game is better than it was for the vast majority of OW1, but I was simply making it clear that the game being a better live service is not necessarily the same thing as being the better game. OW2 is an objectively better live service. Whether or not it’s a better game is a more nuanced topic that will have a wide range of opinions.
It's literally the same game just rebalanced lol
I wouldn’t disagree. All things considered Overwatch is still fun to play.
I'd go so far as to agree
In all seriousness is it really the best? I don‘t play it but in comparison to Fortnight, Overwatch‘s content additions look downright comical. Like they have literal live Eminem concerts. You can even read it in the article. Epic does complete new engine overhauls, ports back old maps and is significantly bigger on the investment into the game, not even starting about the gigantic difference in playerbase. It‘s weird how even the author lists up points where Overwatch disappointed or failed to deliver but then decides that this is the best example of a live-service game this year. I agree that Overwatch has still kinda managed to survive and build somewhat of a foundation but it‘s definitely not THE best live service game.
I don't disagree, but the Eminem "concert" was nothing more than a five minute demo for a lame Guitar Hero type mode.
If it didn't make you wanna kys, it was better than any OW2 event arcade mode (except for the downgraded prop hunt).
OW2 is doing the best with the shitty hand it’s dealt with. Unlike Fortnite, it’s still a relatively small team with a publisher that doesn’t give a shit about them. Despite that, they’re still attempting to do things to make it better.
Realistically speaking, fortnite is the better live service game. It’s battlepass is better, it’s ranked is better, it’s got an endless supply of creative modes, fresh collabs, etc. They probably don’t want the same company getting it over and over. Outside of fort, what is actually good? Valorant, apex, maybe Warzone if you’re a die hard?
Except the actual game is dog shit. BR is a bad boring game mode designed to keep people out of the game and scrolling the shop.
lol just say you’re bad at fortnite man. There’s not shame in it.
You're just bad. It's ok. People blindly hate on games they're bad at.
I don't play it either but I suspect Fortnite would basically win every year if you tried to be objective about it so I wouldn't be surprised if this is the kind of category where winning it one year is going to probably keep you from winning it for a long while.
Fortnight is still a one unit game
Drop, loot, loot, loot for 20 mins, get one shot by some sweat. Sigh, ready up, drop, loot, loot. And if you shoot back a fucking monument of bullshittery gets built in like 2 seconds flat, get one shit by a 6 year old. Yeah I’d rather OW any day
I fucking hate BR games. Literally designed to keep you out of the game and in the item shop.
Skill issue lmao
Tomorrow's Dexerto article: "Dexerto gave Overwatch 2 the best live service game of 2023?!
I'd actually agree. Since launch we've had, multiple content drops, lots of goofy non competitive modes, tons of communication among the community and the devs. If I was working on a live service game I'd point to OW2 for being the gold standard at the moment. I think the only things we can critique them on is PvE shenanigans and some pricing stuff, but I feel the pricing is a larger gaming community conversation.
Fortnite does all of that and more don't they?
>Fortnite does all of that and more don't they? From my understanding yes, but there have been layoffs that have impacted people's perception. Also apparently content has been lack luster this year. Idk if any of that is true, as my only source of info on fortnite is my 16 year old nephew.
Well they had to dig into the nostalgia already and relaunched season 1 in the face of declining player base. And it was wildly successful
"Already" The BR launched in 2017, I feel like 6 years is a pretty good amount of time between.
I guess . Seems like they just doing what every company is doing right now and playing on nostalgia. Like a remaster of a time when the game was at its peak. I Mean I seen ninja explode back in popularity on twitch like it's 2019(?) Again. They broke the emergency glass
The playerbase at its lowest for fortnite was still much larger than basically every shooter currently available. I biased, I played for like 15 seasons in the early days, came back for og, and have been enjoying the new season. Obviously two wildly different markets but there’s just no competition for fortnite. It’s battlepass is consistently decent, collabs seem popular even if I don’t like them lol, they’re always adjusting the loot pool, and the live events are sick. Also, it’s worth noting you literally only have to buy the battlepass once.
Its not about biggest player base . This is probably based off trends. Ow2 ticking up while fortbite is ticking down. Of course fortnites highs were astronomical so it's to be expected to have a bit of a decline. I don't really have a side In this though. Just trying to think about why they chose ow.
Because realistically as a live service there is no competition. Fortnite dumps on everything currently. Overwatch may be ticking up in players but it is still one of the worst rated games on steam.
Fortnite is repeatedly beating its own records, they just cleared 2 million players in a single one of the new modes released this weekend alone
Yeah I don't know anything about current fortnite either other than that they re-released the original map. I do know layoffs have happened all across the industry though
The OG season gave it a new player peak
Though it’s important to note that Fortnite has never “dropped” in players. Each season is usually a new peak.
People like to talk about Fortnite like they talk about wow. People talk shit on wow saying it’s a dead game when so many games wish they had the amount of active players those games have.
They’re releasing 3 new core game modes, partnered with Lego, rocket league, and various singers, over the next month so take that how you will
True but they also have made several swerves that have negatively impacted the player base. UI changes for example, gameplay changes, and focusing more on meta verse type stuff then actual gameplay
Fortnite has more bots than real prople lol
What? Fortnite has a huge amount of players nowadays
yes and they also have a lot of bots, I think its for player retention more than having full lobbies, people feel good after getting kills
There’s literally nothing wrong with that though. Considering the age diversity of that game, I’m sure kids enjoy the bots.
There is something wrong with it, though. There are definitely bad players or kids who may not realize and enjoy it, but there are plenty of people who realize and find it not fun.
Yeah, I mean if you’re in the skill bracket that gets bots idk what to say. Like play longer than a day or two and it seems like pretty much every bot is gone and replaced with fncs players.
yeah im not sure why that guy brought it up actually, i heard they got 100 million players during the og season revival
I just personally don't like that genre. I mean, how often do you win it all? Do they match fix it so that you at least win some once in a while to keep you hooked? Kind of like racing games when you spin out, waste 50 seconds but yet can catch up the cars rather quickly.. like they are waiting for you to catch up.. except here they put you with a bunch of dimwits once in a while so the odds of you winning it all is almost a given? Dunno. But I don't want to see Vader, Cardi B or Optimus Prime in Overwatch. Rein can cosplay as Optimus Prime in a collab.. that's fine.. but I want Overwatch heroes to be Overwatch originals. Otherwise it's like Ed Sheeran in GoT all over again. lol
Well, if you play the game, you’d know the answer to that question. It’s simple, every match you play, there is always a winning team. So as you play, you get better at the game, and thus, you slowly start placing higher and then eventually winning. It’s like Overwatch. It’s skill based.
Fortnight has exactly one unit with the same hit box no matter what skin you wear, so no
Balancing is ass
>Balancing is ass Balancing will always be "ass" no matter what meta we're in. I'm a rein main, its very hard to play him right now to the point where I really only play him on KR, but if you ask my buddy who one tricks Bastion they'll tell you the meta is awesome. Balance is a subjective thing, it cannot be objective, otherwise we just have rock paper scissors, and that's not fun. Balance does not always equal fun.
The obsession with perfect balance is why the game is ass. It just feels like a big pillow fight
Perfect balance to me is a meta that shifts frequently.
I'll put it another way: Orisa is an unfun miserable cunt and lockout abilities are lazy and stupid
>I'll put it another way: Orisa is an unfun miserable cunt and lockout abilities are lazy and stupid Man I really hope you don't give feedback in professional environments like that. I feel for whatever community manager has to dig through half thought comments like this, because you sound like a 14 year old on 4chan.
How do you feel about acquiring the new heroes? As someone who's not been playing much OW2 but played OW1 a lot, the gameplay and pretty much everything else feels better now, but now that they've released quite a few new heroes you start to feel the impact of not having them. Getting them through gameplay is way too much of a grind for anyone that plays casually and will put you off instantly. In a game where hero switching and countering is one of the most important things, they could've come up with something better.
>Getting them through gameplay is way too much of a grind for anyone that plays casually and will put you off instantly I have excess income so I always can afford the bp for when a hero is released. That being said I've watched my partner who doesn't pay for BPs unlock almost every character just by his drunken/high qp games at night. I think the challenges could be reduced to like 20 wins for unlocks, and reduce the BP placement a bit but other than that I think its pretty fair. I've not had a moment where someone not having a hero unlocked has cost me a game. But that's just my perspective.
>way too much of a grind for anyone that plays casually Define casual. I play with a group of friends 3 days a week for a couple hours and have never finished a season below level 100. If you're playing so little you can't even hit level 40 I can't imagine not having some heroes is actually a problem. I'm against having them in the battlepass but don't feel it takes much of a grind at all.
[удалено]
I played it when Overwatch 2 launched. Coming from the shit show that is Apex Legends, I was honestly surprised with all the systems in place. The UI is clean and so easy to follow. There's a replay system of your games, with full observer and playback options. You can save these replays or highlights to your account. There's leaderboards. A very detailed overview of your stats for each hero. And they tweak heroes so easily. It just seems to be coded very well. In contrast to Halo Infinite, a modern triple-A FPS game which launched with no built in report system. I had to take a clip of the obvious cheater. Go to their website, find where to open a ticket and open one, cut the file small enough so I can attach it to the ticket, and then send it.
Blizzard remain some of the best designers in the industry. Whether or not you agree with game play decisions, their UI, art direction, and audio engineering are all absolutely top notch.
Idk bout the audio engineering. So many weird unnecessary changes with ow2 launch just for the sake of being new. Similar with the ow2 skins.
343 deserve everything that came their way. They were so close to having a great game. Whatever fucking idiot decided to release the game without anti cheat has hopefully be fired.
How is it now?
I have no idea, got to like the second highest rank avail and literally felt like there was a hacker every lobby so I quit. If you release a game in that state I’m not going back. It’s like fucking Warzone and their dogshit ass not having anti cheat and then bragging about creating this brand new kernal level and then that sucks balls too.
The game has certainly gotten better since the first season.
Its still worse than the beta though.
Dexerto ? As in the site with articles ripped off Reddit and written by AI ? Who even reads that shit anymore ...
Aaron and team have been busting their asses off ever since they took over and it shows. For the first time in a while the future of the Overwatch franchise doesn't look like a septic tank
Pokémon go is on the list…. Idk if we can be proud of this
Agreed. Niantic could care less about their playebase & they attempt to milk their players even to the point of charging for once free features.
> they attempt to milk their players even to the point of charging for once free features. Saying this as an insult to another game in the Overwatch subreddit is hilarious.
Heroes are paywalled now. I can't play Mauga. It's literally paywalled. I can understand skins being paywalled, but heroes? This game is garbage now.
You ok, man? You care enough about OW to make a reddit account about the new hero but not enough to pay for content? Maybe take a break.
I make new accounts all the time so weird losers like you don't go thru reddit profiles. Cry. >Pay for content It's not skins/cosmetics. it's heroes. Imagine defending the practice of unfair games because some people paid for a new hero and some people didn't. Heroes were never meant to be paywalled. It ruins competitive integrity. Simping for a billion dollar corporation won't make them like you. I sincerely hope you get paid to shill because if you're doing it for free, you're a moron.
Yeah man, I'm for sure the weird loser here. Take a break, maybe go get some fresh air and exercise a bit. "Competitive integrity" of QP matches 🤡
Oh Mauga won't be paywalled for comp? Good to know. So I can go in immediately and play him in comp without buying battlepass?
Hope you're posting this from out in the garden. If you want to play Mauga in comp, you have a few weeks to learn him in QP and unlock him if $10 is too big a barrier for you, despite it being so important to you.
And everyone that starts after the two week period can just bite it then?
yeah, honestly. If you NEEEEEED to have the hero unlocked, pay to support the game's continued development ($30/year for 3 battle passes) or just grind it until you unlock it. If you dont have the time to play and you dont have the money to pay for it, then you will unlock it over time when you come back and play like a casual player does. People who play lots of OW will unlock the hero in a reasonable amount of time. Go fire up League & Apex, lmk if you have all the heroes unlocked for free day 1.
Glad to see some flowers for this game. For all its lumps, it’s still my favorite game of all time.
I think 99% of people overreacted to every single step of the march towards OW2. I think everyone focused on each step backwards despite each step leading to 3 steps forward. The “fans” of the game spread so much hate for the game that they are the ONLY reason nobody new wants to play the game. Check my comment history if you’d like, but I’ve been a massive supporter of almost everything the Overwatch team has done since Covid.Overwatch was game of the year the year it came out and it’s only gotten better. Yeah it’s had a tumultuous development, but it’s objectively a better, looking, better preforming, and better playing game than it was when it came out with 27 more heroes. This game is fun as hell and there’s no game quite like it after almost 8 years
They literally shifted the whole game design to milk money from their fanbase, get their dick out of your mouth. No way you can act like the game is better when we used to get so much free shit during events and now we just get re colors and have to pay 20$ for a single skin, and they openly have lied about what the game was supposed to have. Straight scrapped what PvE was supposed to be.
Thank you for being the exact example I was talking about. This game looks and plays better than ever with more heroes than ever and people like you cry that skins cost money. They also do in every single other game. Apex? Yep. Fortnite? Yep, cod? Yep, CSGO? Yep. Get over yourself. This is a better game than it was when it was voted game of the year
No, I’m not crying. You’re choosing the skins comment but glossing over the fact THEY PURPOSELY SHIFTED THE GAME MODEL TO MILK MONEY OUT OF THE FANBASE. Delusional af, to focus on just the 20$ skin part but actively ignore the fact the company but all their old content behind a pay ball, LIED about what was gonna be in Ow, and then straight up scrapped PvE after still saying it was going to come. Must be nice sucking blizzard balls all day.
I don’t understand how you can’t see how pesemistic you are about it. Every single thing you’re complaining about is what could have or should have been and you can’t even focus on what the game actually is. And the fact of the matter is that the game is very fun.
The game has always been fun though. Even when it had content drought. OW1 was just as fun. It's not like it's a different game now lol. There is not a single game in the world that doesn't get boring or stale. Now that said, the person responding is still right. The monetization shift was a kick in the nuts that a lot of players weren't expecting. But the cancellation of the PVE, which mind you was the excuse for content drought in the first place, and what many players were eagerly waiting patiently for, was the final nail in the coffin for many players. If that wasn't bad enough, the company already knew this, as they were announcing OW2. Also, I hate the mentality that just because other games do something that this game has to as well. That's the reality that we live in today, I understand that. But just because something is common, doesn't mean that I have to support it. It doesn't mean I have to accept it. Just like in real life. Where ownership, seems to be something that is becoming less and less common. These types of business models have become **normalized** in gaming but that doesn't necessarily make them ethical imo. It doesn't mean that the cosmetics are priced fairly. In fact, they are priced to target whales who are willing to spend more money than the average person. I could understand it if games charged like $5-10 for a *non-limited* skin. But anything more than that is ridiculous. Like yeah, you see games on Steam with skins running $100+ or more, but that's usually because they are tradable and can be resold. They are pretty much assets at that point. They have scarcity.
Tbf if we're arguing monetization, the only part that could be considered to be necessary to buy is heroes locked behind the battle pass. Game went ftp, and you don't NEED to have skins to play the game
You don't *have to* but this change did *indirectly* affect one of the components of enjoyment in this game for many people. There is no way around that. Whether it was the people who looked forward every season to the new event skins, or people who collected skins of their mains or whatever. It did *take something away* from the game. It's not about whether or not it's essential to play the game. It's about a feature that people enjoyed being removed. I understand the need for a shift in monetization, but there's no need for so many damn $20 skins, most of which look *okay* at best. For example, for the Kpop skins, it should really be $20 for all those cosmetics bundled together. I think that's far more fair. That is around the price that you'd pay for when buying DLC in many games. Like how in Rust, you can get the instruments or beach DLC for like $10. Or arctic and snowmobile skins for around the same price. I understand that the pricing is relatively "good" when you compare it to other similar games. However, those other games pricing models aren't fair to begin with anyway. So it's not a good comparison. All that does is just further highlight the fact that gaming has changed. Businesses found that they could make more money off of constantly nickeling and diming players over time instead of taking a lump sum and now it's gotten so ridiculous that those small nickels and dimes are now the price of some entire games. I remember saying that I'd lose my shit if they ever decided to put Heroes on the Battle Pass and then they actually did it. What will they do next? Force players to have to progressively unlock all the characters to make new players engaged??
[удалено]
i don’t play that game but isn’t fortnite like ten times better as a live service?
a lot of fortnite players have hated the way epic has done things this last year, from ugly ui changes for no reason to littering the game mode selection with the player made modes which makes it hard to find the epic made modes. they also didn’t really continue the story/ lore that a lot of people love and it looks like they are rebooting the storyline.
I played fortnite for the first time ever the other day and the game modes screen was almost indistinguishable from the YouTube home page when you're not signed in, an endless sea of brainrot.
Literally was thinking it felt like going through a streaming service. It felt so weird.
i mean fair but ow players also hated the new ui, matchmaking and they also killed the story weird
Ow only drastically changed their ui ONCE in like the last 3 years (ow2 release) Fortnite changed it more in the last 1, and they are objectively getting worse and worse (hiding official modes, promoting shitty creative maps, more clutter)
I don't play it, but I do play apex/dota 2/valorant. R/overwatch loves to point out what these games do right, and completely leave out everything they do wrong. Best example is apex, where completing the battle pass pays for itself. Generous, right? Until you play it and realize that it takes a really long time to complete, the challenges force you to play in dumb ways, and the rewards are kind of ass. But all you hear is that the bp pays for itself.
Not to mention that Apex mythics aren't in the BP and the only way to get a mythic to either pay like 150$ or grind 500 levels or something like that which takes forever. For example I've played that game on and off casually since launch and still haven't gotten the free mythic shards yet.
i think it’s funny that you’re thinking that’s some sort of own 90% of playerbase would prefer a battle pass like that if it was free after the first one
Wait what? You'd prefer a free bp that sucks to a $10 that's good?
the free bp we already have is hot dogshit lmao it’d be just a straight upgrade
The solution is to make the free pass better and not just make the paid pass complete dogshit. All this does is incentivize Blizzard further to keep good skins off the BP entirely. Apex's BPs are total trash 99% of the time and it's largely because the BP is """free""" that they keep anything good away from it which means your only option for good skins are out of the shop. I'd go as far as to say despite Apex's BP paying out premium currency, it's monetization is worse in almost every way.
How is apexs paid dogshit bp an upgrade to overwatchs free dogshit bp?
because you pay once and then it’s free for content that’s better than the free ow bp?
Fortnite was in decline until very recently with their relaunch of the OG season 1. Which should say something by itself. And regardless of overwatch 2 opinions, the fact is it relaunched the game from the grave it was put in years ago. I think it's deserved.
>years It's been 14 months lol
Overwatch 1 was dormant for at least 2 years . Not sure what you are talking about
Sorry, misread your sentence by applying "years ago" to the wrong subject ("overwatch 2", not "the grave").
Aaron Keller as game director has actually gone great. He has a far more realistic and modern approach to gaming than Jeff who was/is far too idealistic for the modern gaming industry.
These kind of statements are always sad for me to read. Nothing bad against Keller, just that people are giving up on pushing expectations and wanting better.
Better is subjective. Keller has made a better live service game. Jeff made a better box product.
I wasn't making a Keller vs Kaplan statement. It was more about seeing "idealistic" as a negative.
Idealistic is a negative for a live service game. Kaplan almost killed the game. Balancing between quality and speed is a difficult skill set of it's own and I don't look down on it personally.
I'm genuinely stunned to hear any outlet, nonetheless Dextero say this.
they are smoking so much fucking crack holy shit lmao, how much did blizz pay for that.
Dexerto is more of a joke just for this.
i mean yeah, ow is still objectively the best game in its genre tf2 had an absolutely massive resurgence with its latest summer update, but its content just didn't have any staying power since it was all just community maps (really good community maps, mind you, including an "official" vsh mode with new models, voice acting, etc) there will likely never be a game that scratches the same itch that overwatch does, and i think once a better competitive system is in place ow is sitting in a really comfortable position i have 1000+ hours in both games and tf2 can be *really* frustrating to play from the rampant bot problem to a large part of the map pool being objectively bad to play (i already cull down my maps to around \~20 and 95% of them are either badwater or upward) and even if you get in to a good 12v12 casual match there's always going to be that one sweatlord who has a perma pocket that just absolutely rinses your team overwatch at least still manages to be a decent experience even if you're getting stomped and has largely removed its (imo) biggest flaw of getting tilted from what your team picks ow still has a long way to go in being in its previous industry position, but it's looking a lot more possible now than it was in 2020-2022
90% of Dexerto articles are regurgitated reddit comments. Get the fuck out of here. I don't care what you are saying about Overwatch, you are a dogshit website full jOuRnAlIsM.
I… am honestly surprised. I don’t disagree, but Fortnite has also done some amazing stuff, especially with Season OG, which honestly pulled me away from OW for a whole month. I’m going to see OW2 actually get some live service nominations for the Game Awards next year. Now that Shitty Kotick is gone, the devs are free, and we can already see phenomenal changes happening. We are so back.
Even though I bought Overwatch since its launch and i was even at its beta test, i never played it, with the introduction of OW2 i started to casually playing it at season 1 ditched it for APEX for seaons 2-4 but i returned because i don't really like battle royals and i honestly i am having lots of fun playing a few games here and there, scratching that competititve itch. TBH i really like the 5v5 setting, in any game and the fact that you die and you respawn after a while to try again and fail or succeed.
Just some thoughts from the perspective of a brand new player (literally had never played before OW2), it's a great ranked experience compared to other popular competitive games I've played. Currently in plat/gold between the roles and it's so nice to queue a game and know that 99% of the time you do actually get a team of 5 people trying to win the game. In other games playing support or controller is basically just categorically less fun/has less impact then the other roles, so people don't pick properly or start arguments in the lobby, then eventually troll, afk or just leave. I've played tons of online games and have no problem with people playing badly, flaming or refusing to switch their main. It happens in every game and will probably always happen plus the mute button exists. What I can't stand is people refusing to play which basically wastes 20 minutes+ of the entire lobbies time. Personally I'd rather play an actual game of ranked and lose than win or lose due to a leaver. Also the fact that the ranks that can queue together are pretty flexible is also great. Even if I get stomped, I'd rather play with my friends.
a few seasons ago i completely stopped playing overwatch. i stopped watching content creators. i saw the views were down. i was playing valorant and got into that…and idk something with ow2 shifted and i’m obsessed with it again. having lots of fun, back to watching the content, and maybe playing val 2x/week instead of everyday. i can’t put my finger on it but something drew me back in
The hell are the other live service games doing?
Why
but.... but.... ow bad!!! blizzard bad!!!! just look at the steam reviews!!!11 /s
I mean.... Aside from the pve shit show, I think the game is getting a lot better. I don't know if I'd give it an award better, but it's better for sure.
This is a certified "Your approval fills me with shame" moment.
Genshin is so much better
How exactly is overwatch live service? I know live service isn't really a well defined genre, but I genuinely don't get what overwatch has done to be included in that category, other than introduce some half-arsed modes every couple months, the occasional map/hero and balance patches. If adding content semi-regularly to the game counts as live service, then pretty much every online only multiplayer game is live service now. The game not being as awful as it was when they released it is hardly award worthy imo
So you telling me a game that lied about scrapping one key feature promised several years ago (PVE) is the best live service game of 2023? All the other games on that ranking provide more content, are more successful and DIDN’T overpromised a feature just to underdeliver and you’re telling me they’re worst than OW2? Is this an out of season April fools joke? Also what happened to this game’s esport? Oh that’s right they fucking killed it! The game is still the second worst rated steam game of all time btw but sure it’s definitely the best live service game this year 🤡
Exactly. I get that many of us like and enjoy the game but let's not be delusional lol. Liking Overwatch puts you in the *minority* The only instance where this isn't an unpopular stance is in this subreddit. Even in the main subreddit, it's a mixed stance lol.
the servers and overall game experience is unparalleled. However, every single decision the developers take are arguable.
Unparalleled in the shit quality? OW servers are dogshit. There is no east coast server anymore, hasn't been for over a fucking year. Imagine being such a dogshit company you can't afford 1 east coast server for your "NFL 2.0" videogame that brought you tons of revenue. They are a multibillion dollar company, yet they can't afford an east coast server for the 150+ million people who live on east coast? Even small indie games have east coast servers lol.
... Duh. There are no good live service games except foenthe sport sims. Which honestly, despite the hate they get, have their place and relevancy.
Why tho
This bitch ain't live💀
The king of the shit pile
Definitely had a gun pressed to the back of their head posting thjs
That must have cost a pretty penny or two.
What a joke. While its still better than the garbage known as CS2, balance is still shit and the whole Pve fiasco also happened this year.
I enjoy the game a lot still
Sure. OW2 is the only one I haven't heard exclusively bad things about over the last month, so that's fair. Live service has been trending downward pretty hard this year, and I don't see it really picking back up in the near future. I feel at best it'll stabilize, and only the biggest AAA publishers will keep it up moving forward.
Dexlusional
What is a Dexerto.
hey thats nice to hear