…when Overwatch was that hyped new thing at the gaming horizon?
At first, nobody believed that whatever landed in the trash can of the so called Project Titan, the back-then latest, cancelled sci-fi MMO project from the revered Blizzard studios could be turned into something great. An experiment maybe, a quick cash grab at best.
A few month later we were greeted with the alpha and beta stages in quick succession followed by a massive hype and very quick release of the - back then - pretty rough and unpolished game.
However, people began to enjoy. I remember playing with people I barely knew or liked because you HAD to organize as a group of six to play the game, and ideally HAD to use teamspeak or the upcoming Discord. However nobody was really bothered by that because honing your skills in what felt like that new, big thing seemed to be worth it.
I distinctly remember people telling me that THIS would be their new main game, the one they would stick to no matter what and would faithfully glorify as their destiny game.
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What followed was the emergency landing of the freight plane Overwatch, somewhere in the jungle of PR drama, right next to the sea of corporal, financial dry-leeching behind the mountains of misinformation.
During all its development Overwatch never felt like hitting its full potential. It actually never even felt remotely close to anything of that caliber. I remember years of hope and positivity. I remember the goosebumps when that grandma-esque healing support sniper thingy was announced at a blizzcon or in some league event I didn’t watch and only looked up later on in some youtube video.
I remember that feeling of “hey, I may be way too old for professional e-sports, but if modern sports have their local clubs and cult like hobbyist followings, maybe gaming can have that too, in the form of people playing less organized, fun-oriented Overwatch matches”. It seemed like a game to draw the masses, with massive diversity and a place for everyone to be a hero. As a former Heroes of the Storm player I still, to this day, wait for my Abathur equivalent - that one out-of-the-box-hero that plays so completely different and is basically its own minigame within the game. I mean - Hammond and Doomfist come really close, but are not as off-the-charts as I always hoped for.
I remember watching that one movie, Ready player one and catching a glimpse of Reaper and Tracer running alongside the other Avatars mixed from random pop-culture and gaming environments and felt like “wow, look: there’s my people”.
I remember playing with dozens of people regularly, some I knew better and some random folks showing up on my teamspeak server because they tagged along with someone, some staying strangers and some becoming regulars.
I remember the hope and positivity we all had for that one game uniting us, the tickling in the guts when queueing for a game together excited for how we may perform as a team together.
However, I also remember all the drama around the game, the introduction of a report system that a certain to-be-famous canadian streamer got banned for for abusing, multiple times.
I remember the scandals about milk and things I can’t remotely name here for fear of being banned, myself.
I remember Overwatch 2 being announced, luring us with promises of a dedicated PvE part to the game, that so many people -me included- wished for and then looked forward to.
I remember that H U G E explosion covering the jungle, the sea and the mountains when it was announced that it all was a glorified scam by the developers.
I remember the shop taking over, destroying my beloved system of “unlocking the free stuff every season taking all the skins we were promised for free”. I remember no more even semi-regular updates to the game, counting heroes, maps and gamemodes.
I remember PvE in the progressive form that we were hyped for for years being completely cancelled.
I remember the introduction of battlepasses that slowly but steadily were stripped from any notable, interesting content pushing more and more of the seasonal improvements (“bling skins”) into the shop.
Most of all I remember that feeling of one person after the other quitting comraderie, relationships and my teamspeak server. I remember cancelling the subscription to my root server two or so years ago, several years after the last person I played with visited me there.
I remember that feeling of Overwatch being this huge, inclusive thing. I remember the idea of the hyped international e-sport becoming part of pop-culture history and being a part of it with my friends supporting the idea from the virtual “hobbyist benches” being the backbone to any successful sport like a regional league is to the real ones.
I remember when the cozy feeling of hope turned into disappointment and hopelessness.
Do you?
