On fire borders, different types of endorsements and endorsing the enemy team, end of match mvp voting, player level and rank borders, and 5 maps and a mode that all could’ve been reworked with the slightest effort.
Most of this had literally no effect on the gameplay whatsoever and just improved how rewarding the game felt. Maps and a mode being removed only had some modicum of sense because they needed to be rebalanced - but instead of doing that you’ve removed it entirely.
Removing all of this is incredibly destructive to game health on top of the mountain of other problems you introduced in this mini expansion of a sequel.
Edit: Almost forgot in game LFG. Another system that didn’t need to be removed.
the on fire voice lines can still be heard in-game which is hilarious. but yea I miss the cards, the fire border and rank border. even if in the grand scheme of things they aren’t important.
Add to them or add to map geometry, tweak how the gamemode plays fundamentally, maybe add features into the mode? or even morph the maps into FFA, Team Deathmatch, Push, etc. if they really can’t figure it out.
Tilesets, creative work, general flow, etc. is already fully done - redesigning or adding onto them would be significantly easier than brand new maps. Admittedly “-slightest effort” might be a bit exaggerated but for what they want to call a sequel, this effort should’ve been afforded.
It’s Blizzard 2022. They have no idea what they are doing. They have to hire from the bottom of the barrel. So obviously those people don’t have a clue about good design.
Would take as much effort as making a completely new map (Which is actually their plan for the 2CP maps btw. They’re gonna reuse the assets for new maps)
They did the first two of those things to an extremely minor extent - I’m implying they should go drastic with those changes and also add new mechanics into the mode. Certainly, before removing them outright this should’ve been attempted.
It would not have taken as much effort to just properly rework them; I’m going to have to disagree there just on common sense. I don’t understand where you’re getting that from.
They could also do this new reused assets plan you mention alongside this. It’d actually be nice to see both I think.
Sorry but, player level and rank borders being removed isn’t Blizzard’s fault. Its the community’s. The community loves to judge everyone based on border and rank, not actual skill and stats.
Had everyone just played nicer, it’d still be here. Sorry to drop the truth bomb.
A lot of things over the past weeks feel like last minute decisions.
Removing a level border and little on fire animation, but adding a fully detailed scoreboard where I can see that the other player did 500 less damage than me? I don’t know if that was a good move, if the reason was lowering bad player behavior.
Never in my 6 years playing this game, engaging in game text/voice chat, social media, or YouTube videos have I ever heard of someone being belittled because of their portrait or XP level.
I think it’s kinda clear the battle pass being sorta hamfisted into the game is why it was removed.
Edit: Should say it’s entirely possible I totally missed some sort of community wide issue there - if you’ve experienced toxicity there don’t want to take away from it. Just don’t think that was a good reason to take it out either way
Toxic players will be toxic, but at least we have an unbiased understanding of how the match is progressing. And people who actually are the problem themselves are less likely to draw attention to it.