Yet again, it is time to share some thoughts on the season that has mostly passed.
As always, a list of the stuff we got this season;
- New Damage Hero: Shion
- New Hybrid Map: Neon Junction
- New Stadium Map: Oasis University
- YOASOBI collab
- Mythic Skin: Ascendant Phoenix - Illari
- Mythic Skin: World Forger - Mauga
- Mythic Weapon Skin: Tokyo Rebel - Hanzo
- New Ultra-Tier Skins: Nyan Cafe - Sierra & Kiriko
- Hero Ban Updates
- Anima Strike Event
- Excavation Initiative Event
- Community Crafted Event
- Summer Games 2026 Event
- Quick Play Hacked 1-3-2
- Quick Play Hacked 2-2-2
- New Battle Pass & Shop Cosmetics
(If I missed something, let me know)
My thoughts:
I think this season was okay. I’ll start with the stuff I really liked;
Shion is a great addition imo. I haven’t actually played as her myself, but I’ve found her pleasant to play with and against. Her design is pretty cool, her story is alright and her VA is excellent. I really don’t have any major complaints about her, the only thing I wish was different was her mask being completely expressionless to play more into the whole uncanny creepy vibe she’s got going on, but that’s not a major critique. Great hero all around, way, way better than Sierra was.
The Community Crafted event mode was neat. I didn’t love that it was role queue, but that didn’t detract too much from my enjoyment of it. I particularly enjoyed playing a version of Bastion that was actually allowed to be fun again, but other heroes were fun to try out too. Overall it felt like a lesser version of the April Fools patches, which I also really enjoy.
The new Neon Junction map is alright. I’m not personally really into the aesthetics/vibes of the map, but I don’t dislike it, and gameplay-wise it’s just fine. I struggle to really asses the map fairly though, because map voting continues to be a thing that shoves payload maps down my throat all the time, and I’m pretty tired of it. Maybe I’d like the map more if that weren’t the case.
That was pretty much all the positives I had to say about the season. There’s a bunch of stuff that I don’t care enough about to form a strong opinion, I don’t play stadium, role queue, or competitive, so all the changes/additions/experiments to those modes don’t affect me. Though I did try out the QPH modes out of curiosity, and while that didn’t change my feelings about role queue, I will say that the 1-3-2 mode they tried out is probably the closest I’ll ever come to actually enjoying role queue, for what that’s worth.
Both mythic skins were pretty dull, which is a shame cause I like both Mauga and Illari. Cosmetics in general haven’t really been all that great lately imo. And the new Ultra-tier skins are just yet another ugly stain on this game’s god awful monetization model. I still hate that they’re doing collabs, though at least this latest one was with another band again, which is mildly less egregious to me than the ones they do with other games and tv-shows, since the skins are at least “original” in some sense, rather than just being characters from other properties.
The main things that continue to sour my experience are things they added well before this season, those being the qp leaver penalties, the 2 tank limit in open queue, overzealous chat moderation, and map voting. Obviously those aren’t this season’s “fault”, but they’ve been continuing to worsen my experience ever since they were added, so they keep shaping the experience I have every season to be worse than it otherwise would be.
(Ps. I decided to stop doing the number rating thing, but y’all can feel free to give your own one if you want to.)
Thanks for stopping by, I wish y’all a lovely rest of your day 
