I felt I needed to make this thread since I see a bunch of people having incorrect views on what kind of game OW is.
Overwatch doesn’t have any lanes, OW doesn’t have any ai units, no units to recruit, no top down view, you dont click a spot on the map for your character to move to it, No towers, you dont purchase items/skill during the game, etc
None of this is in OW.
FPS games are not all like CS:GO or generic military shooters. There are many type of FPS games. Faster paced arena FPS games are the ones more similar to OW.
Overwatch is like a mash up of games like , Quake, Team Fortress2, Unreal Tournament, Tribes, Planetside, and Battlefield. Its like they borrowed elements of all those games and made a unique FPS game out of it. With some fighting game and moba elements sprinkled in.
Here is an article where this is stated:
h ttps://www.digitaltrends.com/features/overwatch-anniversary-interview-with-jeff-kaplan/
Digital Trends: How was Overwatch inspired by other shooters out at the time?
Jeff Kaplan: We talk about Overwatch being a “Blizzard shooter”. So this was an initial goal we had when we started making the game. It was the summer of 2013 and we were huge shooter fans on the team… We had come from that old-school shooter crowd that played a lot of the Quakes and Unreals, and we remembered when shooters had rocket launchers and crazy, over-the-top weapons. We had sort of entered this era of the modern military shooter… We absolutely love the modern military shooters, and have a lot of respect for them as well, but we felt that when it was time for us to make a shooter there wasn’t a new statement waiting to be made in the sort of shooter reality genre that was going on, so we really wanted to make something a little bit more over-the-top.
Lets look at OW’s gameplay elements and heroes:
- Game is played in a First person perspective
- Capturing points has been in many FPS games before. Its called domination, king of the hill, etc, etc
- Push the payload is a combination of escort missions and protect the VIP missions in FPS games.
- Capture the flag and death match modes are staples in FPS games.
- Having different classes like tanks, medics, attacks, heavies have been present in other FPS games like Battlefield, Rainbow six, etc. Along with having unique abilities according to the class. Abilities have cooldowns. Medics that can drop healing and even resurrect players with defibrillators. Tank/Heavy class with Riot shields, Armor and barrier abilities. Recon class that can drop a spawn beacon that works like Sym’s old Teleporter, etc. Have all been in FPS games before.
- Ultimates originated in fighting games, but have been present in FPS games before OW.
- Apex Legends all the guns are projectile, yet it is a 100% FPS shooter game. Unreal Tournament and Quake have both hitscan and projectile guns and those games are 100% FPS games.
- In order to win you have to kill the enemy. To push the payload of capture a point you have to kill the enemy. Just like all FPS games.
Lets look at all the heroes:
- Ana - hit scan and projectile gun - FPS type support
- Ashe- FPS type hero
- Baptiste - FPS type support
- Bastion - FPS type hero
- Brig - Her playstyle is more in line with a fighting game than a Moba. Mele attacks, Shield bash, Mace throw ranged attack. Spam attacks, etc.
- DVA - This one can pass for moba type hero. While out of Mech is an fps hero.
- Doomfist - 100% a fighting game hero more than FPS or Moba.
- Echo - There have been flying heros in fps games like echo with jet packs, Beam weapons and laser projectiles like in quake and Unreal tournament. Sticky grenades are similar to other types of gun like the Bio Rifle in Unreal Tournament.
- Genji - More of a fighting game hero than FPS or Moba. Even though his shuriken’s resemble the ripper gun from Unreal tournament.
- Hanzo - Bows have been in FPS games before.
- Junkrat - Grenade like his have been in many FPS games. Grenade Launchers function he same way. Bouncy till they explode. Traps have been in tactical shooters before. His ultimate is like the Redeemer in UT.
- Lucio - He can be considered a moba type hero
- McCree - FPS hero
- Mei - many Sci-fi FPS shooters have had Ice/Freeze guns/weapons
- Mercy - Can be considered a moba hero.
- Moira can be considered a moba hero
- Orisa - FPS hero even though she has a shield. Shields have been in FPS games before , Like Riot shields.
- Pharah - FPS hero. Rockets behave exactly like Quake or Unreal Tournament rockets.
- Reaper - FPS shotgun hero
- Rein - More of a fighting game hero than Moba. Fire strike = fire balls, Charges, hammer swings, etc. More fighting game than anything else.
- Roadhog - FPS type heavy class. Shotgun/scrapgun is exactly like the Flak cannon from UT, hook is from fighting games.
- Sigma - Can be considered a moba character. Even though his projectile balls are similar to weapons seen in sci fi fps games.
- Soldier 76 - FPS hero
- Sombra - FPS hero. We have seen cloaking and translocaters in other FPS games like Unreal Tournament.
- Symmetra - She is more like an FPS hero than Moba. Her weapons, her beam weapon alt fire have been in sci fi FPS games before. Like the shock and plasma rifles in UT. Her teleporter is like the sniper spawn beacon in Battlefield. Her Turrets are the only thing that are like a moba game mechanic.
- Torb - FPS type engineer hero.
- Tracer - FPS rapid fire pistols like the enforcer guns in Unreal tournament, and rapid dashing has been in FPS and fighting games before.
- Widow - FPS sniper hero
- Winston - half fps half moba hero because eclectic guns have been in FPS games like Quake and Unreal Tournament before.
- Wrecking ball - half fighting game hero and half FPS. Has hitscan gun and also has fighting game moves like pile drive, ball and chain move, etc.
- Zarya - FPS games like Quake and Unreal Tournament have had beam guns that look similar to hers. Also the alt fire is the same as several sci fi guns in other FPS games. Even the energy barriers she gets have been in these game when you pick up powerups that make you invulnerable for a few seconds.
- Zen - Many sci fi FPS games have had projectile weapons that shoot like his balls.
21 heroes that are similar to things we seen in other FPS games.
4 heroes that are inspired by fighting games.
5 maybe that can be considered like MOBA heroes.
2 heroes that are half and half
So how is this game not 90% an FPS game?
Here is a video of the guns in Unreal Tournament 99 as reference to show how OW was heavily inspired by UT and other similar games. Even shows the translocator. Look at the sniper how it makes Widow look like a joke.
Here are some Jeff quotes:
Jeff Kaplan, game director: With our map design it’s been pretty interesting because our goal is to actually create the focus on team-based shooter gameplay
Jeff Kaplan: I think that Overwatch undoubtedly is going to attract a competitive crowd. I think the fact that there’s the rich Blizzard history in competitive multiplayer games, I think the FPS genre attracts a very competitive, spirited type of player. And we really want to speak to those players and deliver something that they’ll be excited to play and where they can sort of show their level of competition.
Master Ian: Retrospectively, are there any things you wish you’d done differently with the 11 post-launch heroes? (i.e., release frequency, roles, identities, etc.)
jeffrey kaplan So i actually think the release frequency was good (3 a year – i know we’ve slowed down approaching ow2)… ow isn’t a moba and isn’t DOTA2 or LOL… we don’t need or want 100s of characters in the game."
An article from 2015 where they state that Overwatch was always going to be a competitive shooter:
h ttps://www.pcgamer.com/overwatch-game-interview-jeff-kaplan/
How can there be any confusion as to what kind of game OW is?
