OW is NOT dying, the OW hype is dying

General Discussion
1

Of course people aren’t just leaving solely because of this(balance changes, slow updates, etc.), but hype is probably the most defining feature of what makes a person leave. When Overwatch came out it was like the game of the century; youtubers and streamers playing non-stop and game reviewers giving out praise for how cutting edge it is, and it was the talk among social circles in videogame culture.

There’s no denying there are tons of players that purchased the game just because it was popular. You could even be one of those players! Maybe some people got this game because a famous youtuber played it or maybe their friends were playing it. Some people got the popular game because they thought that if they didn’t play it, they were missing out.

This is exactly why posts that say “OW is dead” or “I’m leaving” are showing up more often. Because combined with the flaws of the game that has grown more and more noticeable, and the new guy on the block “Fortnite”, which has been hyped up to the brink of no return, everyone is moving over to play the new thing that everyone else is playing.

People that only got the game because it was popular found a new popular game to play and eventually brings their friends with them, OW youtubers and streamers convert to fortnite to get more views which convinces people to convert as well, and the hype train has dropped OW off and picked up Fortnite. But not everyone is like this. You’ll get people who leave soley because they are upset at OW and maybe feel like they need to take a break, and will return to play again once they feel like it.

But if you look at the typical reasons that people give when the “I’m leaving” posts show up, it’s usually

  • [other popular game] is more fun
  • my friends are leaving to play [popular game].
  • no one plays this game anymore.
  • this game is dead bye.

In conclusion:
If you are worried that this game is dying, don’t worry it’s not happening anytime soon. This happens to every game with a large amount of hype around it. People will leave looking for the new thing and in a few years only true loyal fans to a game will stick around just like LoL or TF2, games that OW takes after that still have a big fan base even to this day.

2

I don’t see any new class based shooter in the horizon on the scale of TF2 or Overwatch. So there isn’t much direct competition.

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3

People are leaving because Blizz put too many 1 shot kills in, combo (effectively 1 shot kills) kills in, or so many CC that people are becoming miserable playing it.

4

The fact hardly anyone watches the OWL doesnt’ help.

100k at peak on weekends… Those are really bad numbers.

They need to fix the competitive balance first and foremost.

5

I’d rather play, than watch other people play.

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6

To be fair, that’s part of the problem.

If you want to play a game like Overwatch, you don’t have many options, so two years into this being your only option, you’re just going to get burnt out and move onto fresh choices instead.