How Will Story Missions Be Released? (speculations)

Do you guys think OW2 will come with the entire “campaign” available so we can play it through in its entirety from launch (like a Halo or CoD campaign story mode) or will the story missions be added in maybe bundles of episodes that come in monthly updates (like in the TellTale games/Life is Strange manner?) and which would you prefer?

It’ll be a mix of both. I think we’ll get the entire campaign at launch. Jeff did say more missions will come after the release of the game though. These missions might not be related to the main storyline of the game, just an expansion for other hero’s probably.

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Oh, sweet. I didn’t hear about the “adding more missions post-launch” bit until now. Also, I’m flattered that my post is the first you’ve ever replied to on that account.

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a mix, most likely.
but hey, as long it isn’t as bad as the 2017 battlefront 2 campaign, i won’t really mind

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I, too, believe it will be a mix; with more emphasis on episodic models as time goes on.

Related to that, one thing that I hope they don’t do when it comes to ‘Hero Missions’ is to simply meet certain, basic achievements for specific heroes. E.g. “Get 5 Solo Kills as McCree”, “Heal 3 Teammates with 1 Moira Orb”, etc. I would like there to be actual objectives that flesh out the characters, not simply meet game play checklists.

The objectives change each time you play. For example, one mission could be an assassination (kill the target). Another one could be waves/rounds of enemies.

Maps also look different. Game Informer got to look at a sneak peek of D.va’s Meka base damaged and on fire. Sounds really cool that the maps change each time.

Oh and they’re still working on a entire progression system, one of which are talents (which you’ve already seen).

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It’s all speculative, but once the current ‘Omnic Crisis’ main arc is done and included in OW2, it’s likely they will sell expansion DLC’s with new missions and story.

It’d be a sound way to make more money for Blizzard without relying so much on loot boxes. Be a great way to do so and avoid all that previous law drama, too.

And there’s plenty of room: Talon mission DLC, Moon Gorilla Revolution DLC, Omnic/Null Sector-side DLC, prequel stories, they can make up a lot of stuff if they want.

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I remember they said they weren’t doing Archives Events anymore because of the hero missions, making it likely they’ll have an episodic model. I think episodic works well, because “one and done” just wouldn’t be satisfying in the Overwatch world. Plus, you can build up story arcs with it.

Example, I’m a huge supporter of Widowmaker breaking free from Talon and getting redeemed, but I feel it needs to be timed right for it to have the biggest impact. If they build up to it, the payoff would be fantastic. That kind of thing is what they should do.

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I agree with this. Episodic or Season Pass esque systems for post launch PvE content sounds like it would be ideal. Tell a story in independent chunks.

On the other hand, I am strongly against this. The world could always use more villains, and having her “break free” or whatever feels like it would be a detriment to her character. I do not think she has given off anything that would say she wants to “break free.”

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You’re kidding?

Dude, it goes against the nature of Overwatch for her to stay a brainwashed villain forever. It’s basically the only route they can go, and like it or not, they’ve already given signs of it happening that others besides myself have picked up on.

Honestly, we have plenty of villains since OW launched and more on the way, that’s not a good excuse. Nor is it a good excuse to say “because it would be cliche”, because Overwatch heavily plays into so-called “cliches” of comic books and superheroes. Maybe if this were a grimdark story like Starcraft and Diablo, it’d make sense, but not Overwatch.

And “detriment to her character”? Don’t know if you’ve heard this, but characters generally develop, and go through a little thing called an “arc”. That’s Storytelling 101.

To be honest, I’m surprised that people are still trying to argue this. I thought most have given up because it’s pretty widely accepted that Amélie is breaking free, and is the popular opinion.

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The first big thing is the (semantic) difference between brainwashed and conditioned. Brainwashing is your traditional sci-fi forcing someone to go against their will through magic science. Conditioning is simply a process of training someone through reinforcement. In Widowmaker’s case:

Talon operatives kidnapped her and subjected her to an intense program of neural reconditioning. They broke her will, suppressed her personality, and reprogrammed her as a sleeper agent.

The interpretation I go with this is that they had conditioned her into this, as that is the word they chose. Its not something you can just “break” from. You would need an equally intense and rigorous cycle of will breaking Pavlovian conditioning to undo its effects.

Widowmaker doesn’t feel pleasure. When she kills things, she feels alive. For a suggestion on how this works scientifically, she was conditioned to feel a rush of dopamine whenever she kills things, and any other source of it was eliminated through either that, her altered physiology, or both.

If you’re talking about her Gerard quotes, or visiting his tombstone, I disagree. She didn’t lose her memory. She still remembers that she loved Gerard, was married to him, and shows respect to his memory when Ana insults him. Maybe she was visiting his grave out of respect, or maybe it was her trying to see if something else could make her feel. I prefer the first of those two interpretations of Reflections, but neither of them suggest that she is “breaking out” like people often say.

Popular opinion is not always the correct opinion. I fought for a long time that Hammond was a small harmless animal and could not possibly be a chimp or monkey like everyone else was certain. Likewise, I continuously fought against the Mercy rezzing Reaper theories which riddled the popular opinion back in 2016. I felt that there was more evidence against them than for, and I feel the same about Widowmaker “breaking out.”

If you have any other evidence or something I missed out, I would like to read more.

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Dude, you don’t understand, Widowmaker remaining brainwashed forever goes against the entire theme of what Overwatch is about. You think they would’ve made any hints that she feels emotions again, if they had nothing they were going to do with it?

Again, it’s clear they’re setting it up, with subtle hints over time (a very long time thanks to slow lore delivery but that’s changing). It’s literally the only path they can go with her story, because the alternate path, again, completely goes against Overwatch’s theme of hope and heroism.

Yeah, an innocent woman is forced to kill her husband and become a murderous assassin… that’s going to go completely unpunished and will always be what she is. No development, no arc. Just a straight-up cold hollow shell of someone who got the saddest backstory in the game. Totally sounds like something you’d see in an optimistic world where one of the most enduring lines include “The world could always use more heroes”, and “Never accept the world for what it appears to be…dare to see it for what it could be.”

In case you couldn’t tell, that was sarcasm.

Amélie remaining Widowmaker just doesn’t fit. At all. With any of what we’ve seen from Overwatch. That’s why most have accepted that it’ll happen, and furthermore, want it to happen because that’s the most ideal and logical arc to take. That’s what we want to see, because if there’s any justice in the world, and there is, she will get her happy ending.

What even happens if Talon is defeated and she’s still brainwashed? I can’t imagine that being the case.

Also, they said “Amélie was gone.” in the bio, but she evidently isn’t. So that’s another strike against your case. You really shouldn’t be using the old OW1 bio as your definitive, “game-winning” argument.

Saying that she should remain brainwashed forever has no basis besides wishful thinking. It’s not even a case of being a fan of Widowmaker, just her being a femme fatale without appreciation for her whole story.

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Just because you think it should happen or you want it to happen doesn’t mean it will.

Right now, there is no solid evidence that Widowmaker will be redeemed, and if she does, what then? She still murdered a lot of people, including some very important people. That can’t just be forgiven because “oh, she’s a good guy now”. Any sort of redemption arc would end with Amelie spending the rest of her life in prison.

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I wouldn’t bother, some people in these forums care very little for character development and satisfying arcs that don’t end in tragedy, or go against cliche/harmful tropes. I for one hope that Widow breaks free from her brainwashing (idc what else people here call it) and she gains agency, otherwise she really will have been just a plot device femme fatale made for cis het men to ogle at.

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I think (and hope) for a series of missions followed by episodes (like Archives).
The first campaign seems to be based, at least on a part, on recreating Overwatch and fighting the Null Sector worldwide invasion. From the trailer it seems there is a possibility for a part of the campaign in Monte Carlo with Talon.

If they can do that. They’ve have ruined stories because all they do is give more questions and never end (or even start) anything.

I would be down for the episodic/bundle formula if each episode focused on a different group of heroes and it really felt like converging stories culminating together in the final episode. Might not be best for the story pace wise, but it would satisfy fans of heroes that never get a chance to shine and currently have very little lore. If every episode is focused on the same 7-8 heroes as always though I prob wouldn’t bother to keep up as much, I care a lot more about what Symmetra is up to than how Winston files his taxes.

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Yeah, I’m in the same boat. I think they might do what that Tracer person suggested earlier, like we’ll get the main campaign at first that will just tell the story of Winston and friends and some new recruits defeating Null Sector, but then we’ll get later chapters that revolve around other groups and characters

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I can see that happening, I just personally hope it doesn’t take too long to get to the other heroes.

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Even if they won’t admit it, and some here would argue with me, to me it seems like they’re kinda rushing to get Overwatch 2 out as fast as possible (they’ve been working on it since like 2017 I think?) and along with that leak from PlayStation Brasil last week that said OVW2 will come out in 2020 (not sure how accurate it is but it was deleted really quickly, which raised some eyebrows) - so like I really hope it’ll come out either by the end of this year or spring of 2021, and yeah I hope that will just mean the sooner we can possibly see the “rest of the cast” in action

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