I would like to share this fun fact that I found on Overwatch. I was looking at old lore articles and always noticed that the developers always avoided putting precise years (2060-2070 etc), giving Overwatch lore a history based on Recall as “year zero”. viò almost always makes valid the assertion that the future of Overwatch “in 60 years” is valid both in 2014 and in 2020, ideologically and never foreseen.
but there is only one case where a 20XX date is said, and I found it in the Rumbotico article for Storm Rising:
we can see that 2060 is mentioned, which seems to me the very first time that a real date is said in OW (or at least, in the original language). However, we are talking about a previous generation of Alicia Diaz. I don’t expect at all to investigate the exact date of the Overwatch events, it just seemed nice to notice this little detail.
The mention of 2060 in that article gives us an earliest possible date for present day, which is consistent with the “60 years from now” we’ve been consistently given.
To add to this, there have also been a few instances where dates (day/month) have been given, or can be approximated through real-world events.
Mei’s journal details her adventures over October 24 to November 2, following the Recall (we know it’s post Recall since she’s awake, and she mentions her friend Winston.)
Nguyen’s report about Cuerva’s strike team going to look for Baptiste is dated from February 21, and the captain’s last message is from August 27 of the previous year. Nguyen’s report is from before Recall, since in What You Left Behind we learn that Nguyen and Mauga catch up to Baptiste 3 days after Recall.
(My timeline theory places Recall in early/mid March, which fits with these dates.)
The Dorado power plant was scheduled to go online November 1, and did so, marked by protests and mayhem brought about by Sombra and Los Muertos. Immediately following this, Sombra and Talon make an attack on Volskaya Industries.
Other dates that can be inferred due to the presence of real-world events are Masquerade, which features Carnivale (which happens yearly in late February/early March), and Reflections, which features Christmas (which happens yearly in late December). The timing of Reflections also means Bastet and Valkyrie happen in the weeks following Christmas, in late December/early January.
