You know, i said i was leaving the forum. But i absolutely had to come back after like 4 major news bombs dropped in my absence.
Im sorry to say this. It honestly hurts after being absolutely in love with this franchise with 6 years… but this sequel is an absolute joke and i am beyond disgusted and disappointed with it.
It started with locking heroes behind the battle pass. A change that was defended despite having purely negative intentions for the game.
But in recent weeks, things have gotten even worse. Of course they have.
SMS protection in of itself is a good feature. But, in classic overwatch style, its implementation has been completely and utterly botched. “Should we tell them the active available phone carriers and maybe test this feature in overwatch 1 competitive for awhile to make sure the transition goes down smoothly?” “Nah, just throw it on them in the last 5 days leading to launch they’ll be fine”
Obviously features are needed to deter smurfs and cheaters, and i honestly think SMS protection is basically the best option for that. But the horrendously bad communication about which carriers are active and which arent, as well as restricting arcade(which already has horrendously bad matchmaking anyway) has just led to blizzard chopping off a huge part of their community, a community who never even saw it coming and were likely looking forward to overwatch 2’s launch in a few short days only to find that they dont get to play.
The new things such as not showing ranks to players when entering a comp match as well as the new 7 win 20 loss system doesn’t actually solve any real problems.
“We dont want negative judgements as soon as a match starts. Our matchmaking doesn’t purely depend on SR” Well it should. Under no circumstance should a low gold player be in a mid plat lobby, and instead of fixing these matchmaking problems blizzard is simply hiding the information and saying “look, we fixed it!”
In a similar vein, “with this new placement and match progress system, matches will feel less important as youll only make rank changes after so many wins or losses” Visible rank changes. Your matches will, realistically, still matter just as much as they do in 1, With the only exception being your match to match progress now being hidden from you, which like i said doesn’t solve an issue, it simply hides it.
Next up, i know this may be a more minor thing for some, but these doomfist changes are an absolute joke. Theyre taking a bad hero that they already butchered the playstyle for and making him feel even worse. People who hate the hero can argue he needed the rework; i agree. As well designed as doomfist was from a gameplay perspective, he was also terribly designed for the average playerbase. The issue with the rework is that it is clearly and blatantly rushed, and is just a vague idea that on paper seems okay but in execution(especially with their numbers for the kit) feels absolutely terrible. Just further hero butchering from the team with half baked, poorly executed reworks.
And finally, the nail in the coffin, the store. This store looks absolutely awful. It looks even worse than the CoD stores and thats saying something. 20 dollars for these items is a joke. Do i think the kiriko and JQ skins are bad? Definitely not. Theyre decent. But are they worth twenty dollars? Hell no.
Not to mention upcharging overwatch league team and premium skins just because why not. If you wanna make new premium league skins 300, that’s fine. Theyre new and you could just say this is the new expected price for league skins going forward. But to upcharge the originals too? Skins that were literally 5 dollars cheaper not even 3 weeks ago?? Thats truly pathetic.
In conclusion, overwatch 2 uses the guise, the allure of new fresh content to absolutely suck the loyal fans who have supported the game and sat and suffered for 3 years dry for all they have. We waited for so long, watching blizzard stumble and fumble the ball over and over again, only to finally be treated to what we waited for… and its this? A blatant money sucking game with no real content to offer outside of paying?
There is a very clear, fine line between “Monetary sustainability” and overpricing everything and monetizing as much as possible just because they can. “At least maps and modes are free” You mean like every other game? Its not 2015 anymore. Paid map expansions aren’t something we should expect. And heroes are about as free in this game as they are in every other multiplayer character based game.
Overwatch 2 has certainly taken some steps forward, such as against toxicity and an exciting new prospect of detailed ways to improve. However, in the very same breath they take even more steps backward, making mistep after mistep.
Im truly disappointed by this game and what it has become, and it hurts my heart immensely. That said, i hope the best to those who can still find enjoyment in the game. If its what you wanted, then good. You deserve it after waiting so many years with no solace.
But as for me… my time with overwatch has come to an end. While i will remember this game fondly, i am repulsed at the form it has taken. A game that once stood out as beautiful has become just another game. And while thats okay for some… not for me.
Thanks for reading this wall of text. I just needed to get the emotion out.
Stay hopeful, heroes.