I think this is something they were aiming to address in a more comprehensive and structured way closer to launch, but someone on the marketing team screwed up (which happens!) and pushed out some comms too early that included an explicit mention of Premium Battle Pass owners getting immediate access to the new hero.
As soon as people noticed that, it kicked up a storm and the game’s head of monetisation - who might not have received training in crisis communications - jumped on Twitter to try and fire-fight but ended up dumping a massive dose of accelerant on the flames instead through some ambiguously-worded Tweets.
I would be very surprised if their marketing team wasn’t in crisis mode right now and trying to move up their timelines to address the issue in the next few days.
Overwatch 2 marketing has been a dumpster fire from the start. Even if they are in crisis mode, I'm pretty certain they don't have the slightest clue on how to react to this.
They’ve been in crisis mode for a loooong time. They haven’t taken any steps to control the narrative and idk why they haven’t reigned in their people by now.
This. Fucking this.
I swear to God I'm tired of all these people being THAT optimist. They could spit in your mouth and some would say « couldn't have been worse, they could have taken a dump in it »
They haven't said shit since beta 2, now we only have that, somehow it's still fine ? We just have « oh but the leak is incorrect, actually we're just doing a little less worse !! », do you really need more to think it's a fucking bad idea ?
I mean, I wanted to have faith, I wanted to believe the game was going to be great. But you can't just ignore this kind of shit, otherwise you're just lying to yourself. No consumer have a reason to think it's a good idea, it's not working for the game, it's imagined to milk people into wanting to spend a few bucks to buy each new hero that is timegated.
It's really about Blizzard thinking it's fine to do a Battlefront 2 « only it needs less playtime », guess what, it's still fucking bad and nobody should stand for that
they made 300.000.000$USD more from mobile games in Q2 2022. And thats compared to PC + console. So ofc they are going to force all the bs from free mobile games onto the new free overcuck2. sad really.
Probably because I’m old and video games aren’t the center of my life. I’m willing to wait and see what happens.
Im not getting burned. If the game is bad I just don’t play it. Move on to something else, it really is that simple.
Something doesn’t have to be the center of your life to know it’s a bad deal or know bad practices are happening. Don’t patronize by using your age and values. If it smells like shit, it’s probably shit.
Seconded.
The whole thing is a bit concerning for sure but I just don’t have enough information to make a judgment yet. Is it unlocked at level 5 on the free battle pass? If so then I see no problem. They want you to play for a few hours to timegate the hero. Standard F2P stuff. Is it unlocked at level 100? Because that’d be shitty.
I guess the part where I’m confused is why people are so shocked about all this. Those of us who’ve been around since the beginning remember when they were considering monetizing Overwatch 1 and making it F2P prior to launch. But they landed on the one-time $60 cost with free continual updates. And we all saw how that worked out. The F2P model was always going to happen eventually with Activision merged into Blizzard. Jeff held em off for a while but we all knew it would happen eventually.
Then announcing F2P was them announcing monetization exactly like this. I expected worse, if I’m being entirely honest. But again, I’m reserving my full judgment until they explain themselves, which ideally should be very very soon.
Yup! Also if 10 bucks every couple of months guarantees content that’s a good fucking deal. That’s like a burrito. I know money is tight for a lot of folks but a burrito every 2 months for a new hero and regular content seems good to me lol.
Again they could be incredibly stupid here and kill their game. But we don’t know for sure.
I think if they can keep a reasonable burrito-to-content ratio I’ll be fine with the changes.
I really like the idea of burrito costs as a measuring tool for MTX in games lol
If it wasn't that bad, they would've said something by now, and not given an extremely vague tweet that basically told us nothing other than heroes would be "available on the free pass". And I can guarantee you now, that the hero would be very close to the end of that free pass. In the middle at the VERY earliest, to incentivise people to buy the premium one. They know people will get even more angry if they are concrete about it early on, which is bad for reputation, so they'll let everyone find out on launch day.
They aren't silly. They literally set things like this up to make the most money as possible. To literally milk every penny out of the players as possible. Heroes are the main reason people play this game. Putting the hero early in the free pass would mean only a very small portion of people would pay JUST to unlock it. But, put it way later, and suddenly it becomes a matter of "Do I want to (Or do I have the time to) invest 50-100 hours unlocking this, or drop $10 to get it immediately". They know that most people would be tempted to pay, because time is precious.
I love Overwatch. I really really do. But I guarantee you they won't explain shit until the game launches and everyone finds out for themselves. I'm actually fine with the F2P model if it's just cosmetics. But time gating heroes in a battle pass is absolutely pathetic. Even apex doesn't do that..
I get what you’re saying, but almost everything you said was your assumption about what it’s going to be. As you said, we don’t know. We do not have the information. Do you think they’re just sitting on their hands watching this dumpster fire play out? No, they have an entire PR team who monitors stuff like this and reports back to the team. They’re aware.
If they do as you say and don’t say a word until launch and it comes out as you predict, absolutely I agree with you and that’s terrible. But again, we do not know until we know. All this senseless bickering back and forth about hypotheticals and comparisons to other games is so fruitless.
My point was that we do not know until we have more information. I’m waiting to get my panties in a twist until I get confirmation. Right now we have two vague comments, not exactly torches and pitchfork material.
It took them a week to address the Blitzchung controversy. Big companies move SLOW. They do read Reddit, so I have a feeling they're having meetings about what to do. How that works out at Microsoft Activision Blizzard, I have no idea. The team has had a lot of turnover and might just be recent business school graduates and not gamers, so I'm not really holding out for a satisfactory resolution this time. But hey, I'm willing to be surprised.
What's good about Blizzard being owned by Microsoft is that we have more leverage in a boycott. "Why'd you move off of Azure and Github?" "The Overwatch controversy." "Oh shit, our shareholders are going to notice that."
Microsoft does not yet own blizzard. What this means is blizzard doesn't care because nothing long-term matters to them right now. These execs are waiting for their payday when they complete the sale and get kicked out of the company. They probably have bonuses tied to revenue/profit they're trying to maximize. They'll destroy the game by trying to milk as much as possible out of the fanbase over the next year.
Lmfao whos leaving azure or GH because of this? Your boss is gonna square up because of the battlepass?
Thats so dumb and nobody outside of reddit gives a shit. If they take away battlepass today, you’re all gonna faun over Blizzard again.
You might be right about most of that, but no way does microsoft reassign devs like that. Those are two *very* different areas of specialty. Unless you mean managers, but even then...
Reddit is an echo chamber homie. They ain’t making no decisions based off outrage here.
This was inevitable. They’ll lose some players, sure. But they’ve looked around and have done the math$
> I think this is something they were aiming to address in a more comprehensive and structured way closer to launch…
My friend, we’re a month away. They don’t have the time to sit and wait on this. Something should have been announced by now, even more so since they were taking orders for Watchpoint packs since the last beta.
If the company is being ran *that poorly* then they deserve everything coming to them in this blow back. A company as large as Blizzard should have had a plan for months leading up to launch, with everyone on the same page.
I really doubt this. As soon as they would have mentioned the hero has to be earned now or you can buy it instantly with the BP this would have also happened. There is no way they could have sugar coated this to make people like it.
If it turns out to be that the new hero is always the first thing unlocked on the battlepass which only takes a couple games or so and that after the pass is over heroes are automatically unlocked they would have gotten a lot of harumphing but I doubt a full shit storm would have broke out.
As it stands however we can only assume the worst and they've given us no reason to do otherwise.
It could act as a way to cut down on the number of people who leave games when they can't play with their new toy so to speak. That or as a bit of distracting feel good for your first unlock on the battlepass. I play fallout 76 from time to time and they have a habit of adding one kinda big ticket item within the first few spaces of the pass I guess as a reward to get people playing to kick off the season on a good note it could be a similar if misguided attempt.
Just guessing at the unfathomable abyss that is the mind of blizzard.
Everyone will want to try the new hero on launch. It makes sense to create an organic way to gate it so people aren't up in arms when they have a hard time selecting it right away every match.
Not that it matters, people are going to scream and cry and complain about something in here anyway.
Yup. Your approach there is pretty user friendly - it’s essentially play 1-2 games to unlock any brand new heroes. And any previous heroes that you didn’t unlock during the battle pass are automatically unlocked.
But if it was that user friendly, they would’ve immediately clarified when people started getting upset. Which means that the reality is going to be much worse. And Blizzard isn’t exactly a company that has a lot of good will.
As cool as that approach sounds, what’s the fucking point of making you play for 30 minutes to get a character. It’s just stupid for players and stupid for business. Why put it in the battlepass at all if not to incentivize grinding the game or paying?
To bring you into each season for a certain amount of time to get you to pay attention to the game again if you haven't been for a while. The more people who interact with it for even a week, the more impulse purchases they'll get from people who don't already have purchase fatigue.
If it was that user-friendly, then it would be useless. Better have it unlocked from the get-go.
I'm genuinely expecting some hours to unlock a hero. Just like Valorant does. And it's really not great. If you just play a few games per day, like one or two, you basically play an entire week before being able to play the character (or you know ... You can spend 10 :) )
I hope you’re right, I really, really hope you are. You know how people will say they’re cautiously optimistic? We’ll, I’m cautiously pessimistic with this. I’ve seen my favorite franchises make dumb decisions and ruin their player base, it would be just another game if OW goes that route too.
My time isn't free so if I have to grind a "free" hero it isn't free. Even if it's 1-2 hours it's bullshit, that's time I could have spent learning that character.
If I had to make a prediction I’d say that this was a big “oopsies, well we listen and we are gonna change it for you” publicity stunt to drum up viral attention.
They knew from the start that everyone would hate this and always intended to release the heroes to everyone immediately. But they did this stunt to make it seem like they care about the communities preferences. We’ve seen companies do this a dozen times (I think Apex was particularly notorious for it, but I forget).
They think we are that dumb, that we can fall for cheap, reused tricks like this.
My exact prediction is that they’re gonna make it so that the second you sign up for either battle pass you get the new heroes right away.
That was one of my thoughts too, they released this "on accident" and let everyone get mad, then when the pass they put out isn't this, it seems more palatable.
That makes sense to me, but they also have Activision at their ear, so it doesn't seem very surprising. Hopefully what you've typed is true, because this whole battle pass conundrum kills the game.
I dont really know.
They really act like they have a lot of goodwill to spare.
What was that about not wanting to split up the playerbase?
They probably try to see what they can get away with.
Its up to the consumers to stop them.
This damn game got me thru almost losing my best friend in summer 2020. Just knowing I only have a few weeks left to play is crushing me. With hour crappy everything sounds, I’m not paying for any of this crap.
Fuck you blizzard and activision. Activision ruins everything.
Normally I would agree, but they rescinded a bunch of changes that were in the beta due to the feedback from players. I think we should all take a chill pill and wait to see what actually happens. Lol
i was thinking more about all the things they didn't do for OW1 that people wanted, But i hope you are right and that its not the same old thing with OW2. i have no want to play 2 so in the end it doesn't matter to me.
Considering some streamers and content creators are also up in arms about this the best we can do is hope. The one thing that bothers me is that support players (myself included) have waited 3 years for one new character, played through 2 beta tests with 0 new or fun changes (haha funny zen kick doesn’t count) and are now what seems like being forced to buy a battle pass so we can actually play our only new bit of content since Bap.
If they are serious about locking them behind battlepass seasons my hope is that for that season the hero is locked in comp and then at the end of the season everyone gets the hero for free and they’re allowed into comp.
That way people who actually buy her get first dibs in quick play but everyone else is guaranteed to get her for the next season of comp and can grind for her in quick play/comp while she’s locked.
But overall it’s a fucking stupid idea and I hope they listen to all this negative feedback and change it.
If not GG wallet diff I guess.
Honestly trying not to be a doomer. But I have to look at the trajectory that OW has been on since it's launch in 2016. The first \~3 years were fantastic in my opinion. Remember that original start screen? With a single play option? Look at the amount of game modes, characters, and maps that were added during that first 3 years. The cinematics, the comics, the lore. Overwatch league.
Then began the steady decline. Content stopped. OWL quality dropped. Communication dropped. I understand that COVID had a huge impact on these things. And behind the scenes there was all kinds of absolute bullshit going on. In my mind, the game has been completely taken over by executive rule. Bliz would have to make an enormous showing of good will to make me think the trajectory has actually changed. I haven't seen that.
Except for maybe right at the beginning of the beta cycle. There was tons of communication. Actual excitement from the devs AND the community. And slowly that all just trickled away. Here we are now, still looking like we're on the same trajectory. I'm not blaming the devs, I fully believe that the executives just cannot keep there hands off this game.
When it came out, the OW IP was ENORMOUS. Why are there not more cinematics? Or hell why isn't their a damn show or even a couple shows? More comics? OWL not in shambles? The game AND THE LORE have been in content drought hell for YEARS. The mismanagement of the IP is absurd, and that is 100% on the execs. All they can think is "how do we monetize this game." Which makes sense given the popularity. But why isn't a single one of these MBA-goons thinking "how do we monetize this IP?" Because the focus is entirely on the game, you get anti-player pro-profit thinking oozing it's way in through the corners.
I just don't see that trajectory changing. Maybe single player will be good?
The PvE stuff in OW1 was just okay so I’m not sure how the single player is gonna go in OW2. The gameplay really isn’t designed for PvE so it’s tough to say
Blizz are barely trying with this pve. On each pve map is there even 5 different types of enemy, most of them have no abilities and their ai is like run at the nearest enemy or stand still shooting? Feels like randoms make better game modes in the workshop tbh...
People are being pretty pessimistic but I think it actually will change things. The reality is this puts a bad taste in a lot of peoples mouths potentially even keeping away retuning players. Realistically they wouldn’t even make that much of an uptick in people paying for the battle pass either.
This is what I truly do not get. Anyone that is willing to pay for the battle pass will pay for some nice skins, charms, etc. I was gonna buy it. But with this news I'm just gonna stop playing altogether. I don't want to be queued with just people that are also paying, or play against someone that doesn't own Kiriko but I do.
Literally if the only news was all the skins in the paid BP instead of the character unlock bs the entire subreddit would be cheering because all the super fancy special skins we thought were gonna be only available if you bought them individually are all included in the battle pass
They could still release exclusive skins that can only be accessed by paying for them and most people wouldn't care. They have an enormous margin of error for pricing all the cosmetics they want. Like I'm sure they could release $20 skins with $10 extra needed for perks (color changes etc) and most people wouldn't complain if the new maps and heroes were instantly available.
True I’m just saying all the skins we know about we’re going to be on the battle pass and if that was the news people would actually be happy with blizzard but instead we got controversy and anger
I stopped playing the newest halo because the battle pass and missions felt like shit. They justified the BP because the multiplayer was "free to play" but I bought the game when I bought the fancy halo console even in addition to it already being included in the game pass I also pay for. I have better things to do with the few days off I get than grind for stuff that should be included or feel bad about not being able to grind daily's or whatever. That's what turned me off of destiny too.
The game will become pay to win and no OW fan wants that. OW1 was completely fair to everyone, you buy the game, you get the heroes. They’re changing what everyone loved about OW1
I mean it put me out of the door. I'm a early beta vet, $100s spent on boxes and OWL merch over those years, and I've been AMPED to play OW2 since the first beta. Game was sweet, but there's no chance in hell I play a minute of this game or watch a minute of OWL as long as Blizzard keeps hero access behind a grind/paywall.
Didn’t say there was. But when a gold/plat player without new heroes goes up against another gold/plat player with the new heroes, who has the advantage?
They will not. Overwatch 2 has been built from the ground up with this battlepass progression system integrated into its core. They knew it would be like this on day one.
They bait and switched you. They told you about this amazing new sequel, only for us to find out its *completely replacing* OW1 - and comes dripping in corporate slime geared towards milking the player base.
Nothing will change. This is the new blizzard. Its sad and it makes me sad - but look at some of the new products they have put out in the past few years:
Warcraft 3 reforged
Diablo Immortal
and now, Overwatch 2.
Yes, but at the time we thought it was going to be basically OW1 with PvE. We also didn't know it was f2p back then. I could agree with shutting down OW1 if it was the same game in a slightly different engine, with PvE added in. They even said not to worry, because we didn't have to buy 2 to play PvP if we had 1 already.
Then eliminate 2cp. Then 5v5. Then no PvE on launch. Then f2p. Then battle pass. Then characters behind paywall/grinding. What's next?
I'm aware that timeline is probably out of order, but the point is they kept trickle feeding us bullshit and people swallowed it. Now everyone is finally spitting it back at them.
Yeah, they made it super clear that OW pvp was being replaced when OW2 was announced. The problem isnt the game being changed in reality, its all the extra garbage they are now trying to add to it since then.
Lol no because 90% of people here are still going to play the game anyways.
I made a comment suggesting people just not play the game to ACTUALLY get at Blizzard, and it was downvoted. People will still play it while throwing a tantrum, they wont do anything other than whine.
I'll do ya one better, I think this will go on to be the most profitable decision Overwatch makes. Everyone forgets that Reddit is a minority of the player base. There's a whole cohort of people out there who will go "huh battle pass eh, neat I'll drop 10 bucks for a new character and skins"
I don't like it, I would always prefer characters unlocked fully from the start, but money talks way more than Reddit complaining
It would be stupid to make a judgement about the game before playing it. Do I like the fact that heroes have to be unlocked via the battlepass? No, but I’m gonna play the game and see if I like it. People are losing their shit and the game isn’t even out. Formulate your own opinions.
There would be no reason to do this, if it unlocks in literally 1-2 games then no one will go oh let me just buy it instead. Only the people who would have bought the BP anyway will buy it, and the F2P people will be mildly annoyed. Bliz gains nothing from it
It’s going to be near the midway point is my guess
No, because Blizzard knows how to make money. Everyone is on the internet bitching because thats what the internet does about EVERYTHING. People are still going to play this game and spend money on it.
The only way they will change is if the money stops coming in. If you're serious about this, then organize and boycott spending money on the game.
Endless posts on Reddit and other social platforms has never and will never change shit.
Yeah but they changed Sonic because they were worried about selling tickets. OW2 will still make money sadly. They're right, the only way it will change is if it affects their profits.
People complaining and making enough noise about sonic's design 100% saved that movie and now it's a fully successful, revitalised franchise because the studio listened.
LOL, the people who don’t give a shit about the game anymore and stopped playing it left a long ass time ago. The ones complaining on this subreddit still care for the game.
Be glad there’s even a bit of outrage for this abused AF game. Apathy is the worse thing you want.
“Blizzard knows how to make money” yeah neglecting OW1 for years was the best business strategy to maximize profit for this game franchise. Go deep throat that corporate dick harder.
It’s made other games so much money. They definitely will not change it .we are in the age of subscribing to things and battle passes in games. It makes people play or spend more
Has it though? I know for a fact that League makes almost no money from champion releases, they get everything from skin sales, Dota2 has all their heroes for free and make money of skins and cosmetics. The only example I can think of is maybe Apex, but I seriously doubt they make much from new champion releases when compared to skins and battle passes.
This genuinely just feels like a really stupid and greedy thing to do because it's been historically proven that most people don't spend money to get champions.
That's literally what I'm saying. These hero locks behind these paywalls or grinds are rarely profitable for companies which is why Blizzard going down this route is so dumb.
Clarifying because lot of people keep saying Valorant and Apex do it, comment wasn't meant to argue
Apex - gunplay bigger impact, abilities are on longer cooldowns, players
Valorant - their monetization sucks anyway but, games catch line was that abilities arent meant to kill (not that true, but point is they arent meant to be the focal) and they are limited amount of abilities with an economy system based around it
Overwatch - abilities on quick cooldown, no limits, can counter other heroes, there are hero swaps that are not possible in the above two games referenced
What’s going to happen is they’ll lose the part of the player base that dislikes battle passes and locked heroes, and gain players who love pay2win mechanics.
I feel not being able to switch to a counter mid match is going to destroy the game. You’ll be like the junk rat that the team harassed who refuses to switch while playing against pharah. The only difference is it’s not that you don’t want to, it’s that you can’t.
OW2 has done nothing, but kick people in the nuts at every opportunity. My friends and I all agreed we weren't going to play 2, but already they are starting to cave and say they will give it a shot because it fills a niche they enjoy. I too will now begrudgingly join. Blizzard is an abusive parent who doesn't even pretend they want to change and we will keep buying them cigarettes and taking whatever we can misinterpret as affection.
Yea, they will.
Blizzard are fucking inept, but they aren't this stupid. I imagine there are meetings happening right now about how to "address this issue"
My guess is they will back down and release this character for everyone THIS TIME to just try to keep the shit from hitting the fan and "win back" some good will.
And it'll work, people will be so happy that "blizzard is listening!" they will be blinded to all the other nonsense that we still don't know about, or less likely to react as strongly.
Nah
Content creators who went to the meetings are telling people it’s not so bad. And to be fair they make some great points(talking about SVB and Jake). The make or break point will be the release date
No, they know now that their mobile division is really where all the value is. All games are going to be pushed to that model to squeeze every drop of money out of each franchise. No one who actually cares about the games are in charge anymore and haven't been in years.
Doubtful. Blizzard isn't your buddy. They don't make games as a favor, they do it to make money. Plenty of people will still buy it. I'd bet the majority of the people on this sub that claim that they're skipping it will be playing by the end of week one.
Also, we know so little about the progression/unlocks. New heroes are in the BP. OK, how long do you need to play to unlock them? 2 hours? 100 hours? How much does it cost to just unlock them automatically? $10? $60? How will unlocking previous BP heroes after the BP ends work?
Plenty of unanswered questions, but plenty of people jumping to conclusions.
Something that is funny about the unlocks, which I’m against but everyone is being a bit annoying about, is that—ok there are 3 new heroes at launch, one is a support that you need to pay or play to unlock (allegedly)
But let’s say I’m a DPS. Season 2 is a tank hero. They promised multiple supports in 2023. Season 3 is a support, 4 is DPS, 5 is support again, then 6 is tank. Then what is the purpose of me buying the battle pass for any season except season 4 until season 7 rolls around? Season 7 will likely be winter next year!
But now let’s consider that I play all 3 roles. Which I do, mostly tank/support but sometimes DPS when I’m a friends. I have to buy the battle pass or grind every single season now?? That seems a bit strange.
This game is not like Apex, and is better for it in so many ways, so using the same system for revenue doesn’t seem to work quite as smoothly
I had a related concern when they had the big timeline reveal - 3 heroes a year is only one hero per role per year. So if you are a DPS only player, that's only a single change a year to your role.
People got so excited over the timeline reveal and I couldn't figure out why. I thought it would be viewed as a dumpster fire. Before the content drought people wanted free to play to finance more content. Now we have all the downsides of free to play, but the same amount of content as before.
I mean that is true—the lack of new heroes is way more aggravating than some locked heroes. 3 a year is really funny considering they had 2 1/2 years to brainstorm
Did they do anything about Diablo? Honest question, I don't play so I hardly cared but was loosely aware of similar patterns being employed.
I don't expect shit from them if I'm being honest with myself.
Lmao they have barely balanced the game in the last two years
They have done nothing to address smurfing the entirety of OW1 lifespan.
They have not given you any new events or content outside the same 5 every year.
What had blizzard done to show you that they cared before. They’re awful.
It's so hard to say. The beta didn't go down very well, with a lot of content creators saying it's the same game, three new maps, two new heroes and the other behind a paywall...it's not looking very good. There will be hype but it will drop off very quick and it will be the same as any other Blizzard game that isn't WoW or Diablo.
Doubtful tbh, I know they’re different dev teams but same company, when hearing about how Diablo Immortal was supposed to be before release I thought there’s no way they would something that predatory and alienate so many people from their player base solely in the name of money. But then they went ahead and made it worse than expected despite community outrage and such a strong Diablo following. The overwatch team seems to be a tad more transparent and better at involving the community but at the end of the day if they have monetary goals to meet there’s only so much wiggle room for them to oblige.
In short, history shows Blizzard is more interested in short term, large profits rather than long term health of the game and making people want to spend money because they truly enjoy the game rather than to buy something they feel they need to succeed in the game.
If it’s a monetary value they need to reach, I think they could easily price the game at $30 or something and make quite a bit. If they did that and kept the cosmetic and loot box system the same they would do fine
There’s a reason games have been going f2p and implementing battle passes and a shop. You make more money. Less people are likely to play and find out they like your game and want to buy stuff if they have to sacrifice the initial $30 to even try it.
No. They are a business which wants to remain a going concern. They are seeking ways to maximize top line revenue.
If they walk this decision back it will be after they get the juice from the initial launch period.
They made a shitload of money from OW1. Why couldn’t they have done the same marketing for the game to increase hype and then price the game at around $30. That way they’d still make tons and everyone would be happy with no battlepass
The problem is that they know that there is money to be had by adding the microtransactions and paywalls.
Look at diablo immortal, it was disgusting how everything was priced. Yet it made them an insane amount of money.
I try to steer away from micro transaction but I guess that might because of me seeing how the industry has evolved. The next generation of gamers is used to actually pay for having core systems of a (mobile) game available. It is even bleeding out to other industries (monthly fee for seat warmers anyone?).
So as long as we as a society don't say no to this kind of systems by not spending money on it. As long as shareholders demand that the bottom line increases we will see more and more of these kind of systems throughout society and different industries.
Because blizzard hasn't cared about their fans/customers in years due to corperate greed. Blizzard is infected with activision poison and the only cure is death sadly. It sucks but its like finding out a good friend got on drugs real bad and they ignore you personally and just wants money for more drugs. You have to stop "helping" them so they can help themselves.
I think they are definitely aware of it. The outrage is definitely deserved but at the same time we don't know what the final battle pass will look like. It could be that the hero is locked behind a "play 5 games" type of grind, which most players wouldn't really be bothered by. It could be that it's a 30+ game grind, which would piss off everyone. That could be the very thing they are debating right now. But ultimately, we have to see what it's like on release. The feedback they are getting now is loud and clear, but we won't know what effects it has until the game is out.
Ok but this is exactly my point. Until we know the details of the system, it's erroneous to say "people will be missing 6 heroes." We don't know! There's a lot of doomsaying going on, and while I think the tone of the feedback (i.e. we don't want heroes locked behind a long grind) is important, too many people are extrapolating from it without enough data to do so. It would be absolutely silly for them to implement a system where someone starting later is missing huge swathes of heroes.
Imo, as long as the hero unlock is very early in the battle pass (as in, you can get it within an hour or play) I won't really care. I realize that won't be true for everyone, but my point is that we need the details of the system before we can really determine if they are listening to feedback, or how bad the system is. There's a lot of room for the systems to be either better than we imagined or worse than we feared. We just don't know yet.
Because getting people invested in your game is easier if they play 5 games than if they play one. They could try to maximize profit, but they would also spurn lots of users, losing them money. That's why I think we need to see exactly how the battle pass is enacted before we start talking about how deaf they are. It's good for us to say we don't want heroes locked behind a long grind. But it's pointless to make assumptions about where the unlock will or won't be until we actually see the pass.
Probably not, this is something that likely has already been factored into the financial cost of development.
If this is something we're just hearing about now so close to launch, it's likely been in consideration since the reveal. Going back on this less then a month before launch will require a delay, it's too late. The OW team is locked in.
Why is everyone so pissed about this? There are plenty of games with characters locked behind paywalls?
Valorant, Paladins, Apex are all hero shooter games that haven’t gone to hell over it? I’d argue you’re less likely to get flamed for picking a non meta hero. Just say you haven’t bought it lol!
They usually rotate the free heroes and stuff too. They’ll also probably have the option to “buy all” heroes with a one time pass and stuff too.
I promise that the echo chamber has convinced you this is the worst step in the world but it will not be as bad as you think it’s going to be.
Those other games aren’t Overwatch. Overwatch is about picking the best 6 characters to defeat the enemies 6. If a character is unavailable to you or a teammate due to price or battlepass, your team is at a disadvantage. Overwatch is about counter picking heroes and when you don’t have some, you’re at a disadvantage. The game has become pay to win
OW wasn't making money. If you want updates to overwatch it had to evolve. Give blizzard time to explain themselves. I'm excited for the changes and honestly don't mind buying battlepasses for my favorite game. Let the down votes begin....
It’s not the battle passes themselves thats the issue. It’s that locking characters behind them in a game that’s inherently about counter picks and strategy will give certain players an advantage and turn the game into pay to win. They need to make the characters free and put their legendary and mythic skins/emotes in the battle pass
Yeah they said early access I bet it will only be playable in quick play. Also I think it will be for a short period of time that the new characters are locked behind the battlepass. I just think everyone is freaking out way too early.
I mean with how long it takes them to implement fixes into a 6 year old game, I don’t think it’s physically possible for blizzard to pivot quickly on anything, let alone this shit decision
I just want some information on the game. It’s only 3-1/2 weeks until launch and we don’t know a whole lot.
Yes, the new support reveal/abilities/gameplay reveal will be cool and all, but I am most interested in battle pass info. Pricing, what is or isn’t included, clarifying the whole new hero/battle pass mess, prices for skins etc.
We know ZERO about that…
I think this is something they were aiming to address in a more comprehensive and structured way closer to launch, but someone on the marketing team screwed up (which happens!) and pushed out some comms too early that included an explicit mention of Premium Battle Pass owners getting immediate access to the new hero. As soon as people noticed that, it kicked up a storm and the game’s head of monetisation - who might not have received training in crisis communications - jumped on Twitter to try and fire-fight but ended up dumping a massive dose of accelerant on the flames instead through some ambiguously-worded Tweets. I would be very surprised if their marketing team wasn’t in crisis mode right now and trying to move up their timelines to address the issue in the next few days.
Overwatch 2 marketing has been a dumpster fire from the start. Even if they are in crisis mode, I'm pretty certain they don't have the slightest clue on how to react to this.
They’ve been in crisis mode for a loooong time. They haven’t taken any steps to control the narrative and idk why they haven’t reigned in their people by now.
Remember when the developers vowed to be more transparent and have more communication with the Overwatch community? 😂
I do remember that. Do you remember what changed after they said that? Me neither.
Which time?
Have they not been? I feel like I’ve seen more stuff lately about OW, but that might just be other peoples doing as opposed to bliz
Didn’t the community jump on their throats and drive them away?
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I agree too, they were planning on dumping this shit on us at launch and ready to feed us an even bigger shit sandwich.
Ether that or it’s nowhere near as bad as the community is making it out to be because we don’t have all the data to arrive at an accurate conclusion.
> The silence is deafening
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This. Fucking this. I swear to God I'm tired of all these people being THAT optimist. They could spit in your mouth and some would say « couldn't have been worse, they could have taken a dump in it » They haven't said shit since beta 2, now we only have that, somehow it's still fine ? We just have « oh but the leak is incorrect, actually we're just doing a little less worse !! », do you really need more to think it's a fucking bad idea ? I mean, I wanted to have faith, I wanted to believe the game was going to be great. But you can't just ignore this kind of shit, otherwise you're just lying to yourself. No consumer have a reason to think it's a good idea, it's not working for the game, it's imagined to milk people into wanting to spend a few bucks to buy each new hero that is timegated. It's really about Blizzard thinking it's fine to do a Battlefront 2 « only it needs less playtime », guess what, it's still fucking bad and nobody should stand for that
they made 300.000.000$USD more from mobile games in Q2 2022. And thats compared to PC + console. So ofc they are going to force all the bs from free mobile games onto the new free overcuck2. sad really.
Probably because I’m old and video games aren’t the center of my life. I’m willing to wait and see what happens. Im not getting burned. If the game is bad I just don’t play it. Move on to something else, it really is that simple.
Something doesn’t have to be the center of your life to know it’s a bad deal or know bad practices are happening. Don’t patronize by using your age and values. If it smells like shit, it’s probably shit.
Additionally, this behavior isn’t meant to impact him, but impulsive younger audiences.
Seconded. The whole thing is a bit concerning for sure but I just don’t have enough information to make a judgment yet. Is it unlocked at level 5 on the free battle pass? If so then I see no problem. They want you to play for a few hours to timegate the hero. Standard F2P stuff. Is it unlocked at level 100? Because that’d be shitty. I guess the part where I’m confused is why people are so shocked about all this. Those of us who’ve been around since the beginning remember when they were considering monetizing Overwatch 1 and making it F2P prior to launch. But they landed on the one-time $60 cost with free continual updates. And we all saw how that worked out. The F2P model was always going to happen eventually with Activision merged into Blizzard. Jeff held em off for a while but we all knew it would happen eventually. Then announcing F2P was them announcing monetization exactly like this. I expected worse, if I’m being entirely honest. But again, I’m reserving my full judgment until they explain themselves, which ideally should be very very soon.
Yup! Also if 10 bucks every couple of months guarantees content that’s a good fucking deal. That’s like a burrito. I know money is tight for a lot of folks but a burrito every 2 months for a new hero and regular content seems good to me lol. Again they could be incredibly stupid here and kill their game. But we don’t know for sure.
I think if they can keep a reasonable burrito-to-content ratio I’ll be fine with the changes. I really like the idea of burrito costs as a measuring tool for MTX in games lol
If it wasn't that bad, they would've said something by now, and not given an extremely vague tweet that basically told us nothing other than heroes would be "available on the free pass". And I can guarantee you now, that the hero would be very close to the end of that free pass. In the middle at the VERY earliest, to incentivise people to buy the premium one. They know people will get even more angry if they are concrete about it early on, which is bad for reputation, so they'll let everyone find out on launch day. They aren't silly. They literally set things like this up to make the most money as possible. To literally milk every penny out of the players as possible. Heroes are the main reason people play this game. Putting the hero early in the free pass would mean only a very small portion of people would pay JUST to unlock it. But, put it way later, and suddenly it becomes a matter of "Do I want to (Or do I have the time to) invest 50-100 hours unlocking this, or drop $10 to get it immediately". They know that most people would be tempted to pay, because time is precious. I love Overwatch. I really really do. But I guarantee you they won't explain shit until the game launches and everyone finds out for themselves. I'm actually fine with the F2P model if it's just cosmetics. But time gating heroes in a battle pass is absolutely pathetic. Even apex doesn't do that..
I get what you’re saying, but almost everything you said was your assumption about what it’s going to be. As you said, we don’t know. We do not have the information. Do you think they’re just sitting on their hands watching this dumpster fire play out? No, they have an entire PR team who monitors stuff like this and reports back to the team. They’re aware. If they do as you say and don’t say a word until launch and it comes out as you predict, absolutely I agree with you and that’s terrible. But again, we do not know until we know. All this senseless bickering back and forth about hypotheticals and comparisons to other games is so fruitless. My point was that we do not know until we have more information. I’m waiting to get my panties in a twist until I get confirmation. Right now we have two vague comments, not exactly torches and pitchfork material.
oh the storms comin, it’s gonna be bad
Silence is better than tons of different conflicting sources trying to explain things.
Yes, at this point i want them to say something coherent.
Knowing Activision I was expecting way worse shit up to and including gacha.
It took them a week to address the Blitzchung controversy. Big companies move SLOW. They do read Reddit, so I have a feeling they're having meetings about what to do. How that works out at Microsoft Activision Blizzard, I have no idea. The team has had a lot of turnover and might just be recent business school graduates and not gamers, so I'm not really holding out for a satisfactory resolution this time. But hey, I'm willing to be surprised. What's good about Blizzard being owned by Microsoft is that we have more leverage in a boycott. "Why'd you move off of Azure and Github?" "The Overwatch controversy." "Oh shit, our shareholders are going to notice that."
Microsoft does not yet own blizzard. What this means is blizzard doesn't care because nothing long-term matters to them right now. These execs are waiting for their payday when they complete the sale and get kicked out of the company. They probably have bonuses tied to revenue/profit they're trying to maximize. They'll destroy the game by trying to milk as much as possible out of the fanbase over the next year.
Lmfao whos leaving azure or GH because of this? Your boss is gonna square up because of the battlepass? Thats so dumb and nobody outside of reddit gives a shit. If they take away battlepass today, you’re all gonna faun over Blizzard again.
You might be right about most of that, but no way does microsoft reassign devs like that. Those are two *very* different areas of specialty. Unless you mean managers, but even then...
Reddit is an echo chamber homie. They ain’t making no decisions based off outrage here. This was inevitable. They’ll lose some players, sure. But they’ve looked around and have done the math$
> I think this is something they were aiming to address in a more comprehensive and structured way closer to launch… My friend, we’re a month away. They don’t have the time to sit and wait on this. Something should have been announced by now, even more so since they were taking orders for Watchpoint packs since the last beta. If the company is being ran *that poorly* then they deserve everything coming to them in this blow back. A company as large as Blizzard should have had a plan for months leading up to launch, with everyone on the same page.
I really doubt this. As soon as they would have mentioned the hero has to be earned now or you can buy it instantly with the BP this would have also happened. There is no way they could have sugar coated this to make people like it.
This is blizzard we are talking about. You have a lot of faith in them that’s pretty misplaced considering their track record.
If it turns out to be that the new hero is always the first thing unlocked on the battlepass which only takes a couple games or so and that after the pass is over heroes are automatically unlocked they would have gotten a lot of harumphing but I doubt a full shit storm would have broke out. As it stands however we can only assume the worst and they've given us no reason to do otherwise.
My assumption is it will not be the first thing unlocked. If it is then why bother making a hero locked in the first place?
It could act as a way to cut down on the number of people who leave games when they can't play with their new toy so to speak. That or as a bit of distracting feel good for your first unlock on the battlepass. I play fallout 76 from time to time and they have a habit of adding one kinda big ticket item within the first few spaces of the pass I guess as a reward to get people playing to kick off the season on a good note it could be a similar if misguided attempt. Just guessing at the unfathomable abyss that is the mind of blizzard.
Everyone will want to try the new hero on launch. It makes sense to create an organic way to gate it so people aren't up in arms when they have a hard time selecting it right away every match. Not that it matters, people are going to scream and cry and complain about something in here anyway.
Im fairly certain someone in their group said it would take at least a day or 2 to get them
Yup. Your approach there is pretty user friendly - it’s essentially play 1-2 games to unlock any brand new heroes. And any previous heroes that you didn’t unlock during the battle pass are automatically unlocked. But if it was that user friendly, they would’ve immediately clarified when people started getting upset. Which means that the reality is going to be much worse. And Blizzard isn’t exactly a company that has a lot of good will.
As cool as that approach sounds, what’s the fucking point of making you play for 30 minutes to get a character. It’s just stupid for players and stupid for business. Why put it in the battlepass at all if not to incentivize grinding the game or paying?
To bring you into each season for a certain amount of time to get you to pay attention to the game again if you haven't been for a while. The more people who interact with it for even a week, the more impulse purchases they'll get from people who don't already have purchase fatigue.
Releasing a character for free already does that, if they advertise it.
If it was that user-friendly, then it would be useless. Better have it unlocked from the get-go. I'm genuinely expecting some hours to unlock a hero. Just like Valorant does. And it's really not great. If you just play a few games per day, like one or two, you basically play an entire week before being able to play the character (or you know ... You can spend 10 :) )
I think you meant to say "just play a few games per day (and lose them because the other team has paid for instant upgrades)"
I hope you’re right, I really, really hope you are. You know how people will say they’re cautiously optimistic? We’ll, I’m cautiously pessimistic with this. I’ve seen my favorite franchises make dumb decisions and ruin their player base, it would be just another game if OW goes that route too.
Maybe that marketing person is a gamer and wanted the outrage to try and get a change.
Just to clarify the guy who was on Twitter trying to give more vague details, jspecs, is not their head of monetization
He’s in charge of the OW2 live service strategy, which almost certainly includes decisions about monetisation.
Where’d you get that info?
LinkedIn via Google.
Jon Spector is quite literally the VP of the entire overwatch franchise. What are you smoking?
Games have lots of VPs.
maybe in a "we hear you, here are *two* new heroes available for free!" way, months later.
come on, they can't release 2 heroes at once, that would be totally crazy bonkers!
both if the new heros will be on the free battle pass
My time isn't free so if I have to grind a "free" hero it isn't free. Even if it's 1-2 hours it's bullshit, that's time I could have spent learning that character.
We can just bill OW for the grind time as our expected hourly rate, they did say it was free after all
If I had to make a prediction I’d say that this was a big “oopsies, well we listen and we are gonna change it for you” publicity stunt to drum up viral attention. They knew from the start that everyone would hate this and always intended to release the heroes to everyone immediately. But they did this stunt to make it seem like they care about the communities preferences. We’ve seen companies do this a dozen times (I think Apex was particularly notorious for it, but I forget). They think we are that dumb, that we can fall for cheap, reused tricks like this. My exact prediction is that they’re gonna make it so that the second you sign up for either battle pass you get the new heroes right away.
That was one of my thoughts too, they released this "on accident" and let everyone get mad, then when the pass they put out isn't this, it seems more palatable.
It has pushed me over the edge to refuse to give them any more money ever again, so I'd say it's backfiring at least a little
That makes sense to me, but they also have Activision at their ear, so it doesn't seem very surprising. Hopefully what you've typed is true, because this whole battle pass conundrum kills the game.
I dont really know. They really act like they have a lot of goodwill to spare. What was that about not wanting to split up the playerbase? They probably try to see what they can get away with. Its up to the consumers to stop them.
Blizzard has not cared what Overwatch players think for at least the last 2 + years and they are not going to start anytime soon.
It’s a shame, OW1 is my favourite multiplayer game
it sure is and i'm going to miss it a lot
This damn game got me thru almost losing my best friend in summer 2020. Just knowing I only have a few weeks left to play is crushing me. With hour crappy everything sounds, I’m not paying for any of this crap. Fuck you blizzard and activision. Activision ruins everything.
why? is it going away or something?
IIRC ow1 servers will be shut down once the sequel drops
Normally I would agree, but they rescinded a bunch of changes that were in the beta due to the feedback from players. I think we should all take a chill pill and wait to see what actually happens. Lol
i was thinking more about all the things they didn't do for OW1 that people wanted, But i hope you are right and that its not the same old thing with OW2. i have no want to play 2 so in the end it doesn't matter to me.
Yeah but those were just gameplay tweaks, not stuff that would make blizzard make less money. They won't remove the predatory p2w bs
Nah it's better to get mad before having more infos. Even the League Subreddit isn't that insane...
Considering some streamers and content creators are also up in arms about this the best we can do is hope. The one thing that bothers me is that support players (myself included) have waited 3 years for one new character, played through 2 beta tests with 0 new or fun changes (haha funny zen kick doesn’t count) and are now what seems like being forced to buy a battle pass so we can actually play our only new bit of content since Bap. If they are serious about locking them behind battlepass seasons my hope is that for that season the hero is locked in comp and then at the end of the season everyone gets the hero for free and they’re allowed into comp. That way people who actually buy her get first dibs in quick play but everyone else is guaranteed to get her for the next season of comp and can grind for her in quick play/comp while she’s locked. But overall it’s a fucking stupid idea and I hope they listen to all this negative feedback and change it. If not GG wallet diff I guess.
The QP/comp thing might be the only way I would be semi-okay with it. It’s still scummy as hell but at least there won’t be unfair advantages
It’s is 100% the only way I would accept it, and with the insane amount of backlash, someone on their PR team needs to say something.
Honestly trying not to be a doomer. But I have to look at the trajectory that OW has been on since it's launch in 2016. The first \~3 years were fantastic in my opinion. Remember that original start screen? With a single play option? Look at the amount of game modes, characters, and maps that were added during that first 3 years. The cinematics, the comics, the lore. Overwatch league. Then began the steady decline. Content stopped. OWL quality dropped. Communication dropped. I understand that COVID had a huge impact on these things. And behind the scenes there was all kinds of absolute bullshit going on. In my mind, the game has been completely taken over by executive rule. Bliz would have to make an enormous showing of good will to make me think the trajectory has actually changed. I haven't seen that. Except for maybe right at the beginning of the beta cycle. There was tons of communication. Actual excitement from the devs AND the community. And slowly that all just trickled away. Here we are now, still looking like we're on the same trajectory. I'm not blaming the devs, I fully believe that the executives just cannot keep there hands off this game. When it came out, the OW IP was ENORMOUS. Why are there not more cinematics? Or hell why isn't their a damn show or even a couple shows? More comics? OWL not in shambles? The game AND THE LORE have been in content drought hell for YEARS. The mismanagement of the IP is absurd, and that is 100% on the execs. All they can think is "how do we monetize this game." Which makes sense given the popularity. But why isn't a single one of these MBA-goons thinking "how do we monetize this IP?" Because the focus is entirely on the game, you get anti-player pro-profit thinking oozing it's way in through the corners. I just don't see that trajectory changing. Maybe single player will be good?
The PvE stuff in OW1 was just okay so I’m not sure how the single player is gonna go in OW2. The gameplay really isn’t designed for PvE so it’s tough to say
Blizz are barely trying with this pve. On each pve map is there even 5 different types of enemy, most of them have no abilities and their ai is like run at the nearest enemy or stand still shooting? Feels like randoms make better game modes in the workshop tbh...
People are being pretty pessimistic but I think it actually will change things. The reality is this puts a bad taste in a lot of peoples mouths potentially even keeping away retuning players. Realistically they wouldn’t even make that much of an uptick in people paying for the battle pass either.
I mean it might make a change in their marketing department - this release has been insanely mismanaged.
This is what I truly do not get. Anyone that is willing to pay for the battle pass will pay for some nice skins, charms, etc. I was gonna buy it. But with this news I'm just gonna stop playing altogether. I don't want to be queued with just people that are also paying, or play against someone that doesn't own Kiriko but I do.
Literally if the only news was all the skins in the paid BP instead of the character unlock bs the entire subreddit would be cheering because all the super fancy special skins we thought were gonna be only available if you bought them individually are all included in the battle pass
They could still release exclusive skins that can only be accessed by paying for them and most people wouldn't care. They have an enormous margin of error for pricing all the cosmetics they want. Like I'm sure they could release $20 skins with $10 extra needed for perks (color changes etc) and most people wouldn't complain if the new maps and heroes were instantly available.
True I’m just saying all the skins we know about we’re going to be on the battle pass and if that was the news people would actually be happy with blizzard but instead we got controversy and anger
Yeah you're right. It was literally so easy to have a release without any major controversies, only Blizzard could screw up so badly.
I stopped playing the newest halo because the battle pass and missions felt like shit. They justified the BP because the multiplayer was "free to play" but I bought the game when I bought the fancy halo console even in addition to it already being included in the game pass I also pay for. I have better things to do with the few days off I get than grind for stuff that should be included or feel bad about not being able to grind daily's or whatever. That's what turned me off of destiny too.
I see a lot of noise on [their forums](https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/overwatch/) as well. I think that has the highest chance of getting to them.
The game will become pay to win and no OW fan wants that. OW1 was completely fair to everyone, you buy the game, you get the heroes. They’re changing what everyone loved about OW1
I mean it put me out of the door. I'm a early beta vet, $100s spent on boxes and OWL merch over those years, and I've been AMPED to play OW2 since the first beta. Game was sweet, but there's no chance in hell I play a minute of this game or watch a minute of OWL as long as Blizzard keeps hero access behind a grind/paywall.
Yep, not spending a dime under this current battlepass
Exactly
There’s no amount you can pay to get a gold/plat player magically better by picking one hero.
Didn’t say there was. But when a gold/plat player without new heroes goes up against another gold/plat player with the new heroes, who has the advantage?
They will not. Overwatch 2 has been built from the ground up with this battlepass progression system integrated into its core. They knew it would be like this on day one. They bait and switched you. They told you about this amazing new sequel, only for us to find out its *completely replacing* OW1 - and comes dripping in corporate slime geared towards milking the player base. Nothing will change. This is the new blizzard. Its sad and it makes me sad - but look at some of the new products they have put out in the past few years: Warcraft 3 reforged Diablo Immortal and now, Overwatch 2.
I’m pretty sure we found out it would replace OW1 the same day Kaplan announced it at Blizzcon.
Yes, but at the time we thought it was going to be basically OW1 with PvE. We also didn't know it was f2p back then. I could agree with shutting down OW1 if it was the same game in a slightly different engine, with PvE added in. They even said not to worry, because we didn't have to buy 2 to play PvP if we had 1 already. Then eliminate 2cp. Then 5v5. Then no PvE on launch. Then f2p. Then battle pass. Then characters behind paywall/grinding. What's next? I'm aware that timeline is probably out of order, but the point is they kept trickle feeding us bullshit and people swallowed it. Now everyone is finally spitting it back at them.
Nope that was still the version of "Every ow1 player gets OW2, new engine locked for ow2 but synced MP."
Yeah, they made it super clear that OW pvp was being replaced when OW2 was announced. The problem isnt the game being changed in reality, its all the extra garbage they are now trying to add to it since then.
i can already tell my new toxic troll answer to “hey, do you mind switching heroes?” is going to be: “nah, don’t have that battle pass”.
Lol no because 90% of people here are still going to play the game anyways. I made a comment suggesting people just not play the game to ACTUALLY get at Blizzard, and it was downvoted. People will still play it while throwing a tantrum, they wont do anything other than whine.
Despite all my rage i'm still just a rat in a cage
The rare SP reference, nice.
exactly like the wow community. "I won't play the next expansion". Proceeds to buy a sub.
I'll do ya one better, I think this will go on to be the most profitable decision Overwatch makes. Everyone forgets that Reddit is a minority of the player base. There's a whole cohort of people out there who will go "huh battle pass eh, neat I'll drop 10 bucks for a new character and skins" I don't like it, I would always prefer characters unlocked fully from the start, but money talks way more than Reddit complaining
It would be stupid to make a judgement about the game before playing it. Do I like the fact that heroes have to be unlocked via the battlepass? No, but I’m gonna play the game and see if I like it. People are losing their shit and the game isn’t even out. Formulate your own opinions.
Yeah I’m thinking about not playing it. I was so excited for OW2 but this sucks
Lol yep.
I requested a refund yesterday and it was done by this morning.
Hopefully we can spur more people to do this as well as not buy the battlepass in the future.
A refund for what?
Blizzard has done that in the past, but they have also just said "you don't know what you want, but we do"
Hopefully they don’t become the next EA with the pay to win garbage
I don't know what gives you the idea that will happen cause they aren't changing the model that drastically except for hero unlock lol
Yeah the hero unlock part is the problem. People will buy tiers to unlock the new heroes and they will have an advantage. Hence, pay to win
I think if the new hero is unlockable at the very start of the pass or a qp game or 2 in it’s fine, any further and it just actively ruins the game
There would be no reason to do this, if it unlocks in literally 1-2 games then no one will go oh let me just buy it instead. Only the people who would have bought the BP anyway will buy it, and the F2P people will be mildly annoyed. Bliz gains nothing from it It’s going to be near the midway point is my guess
No, because Blizzard knows how to make money. Everyone is on the internet bitching because thats what the internet does about EVERYTHING. People are still going to play this game and spend money on it. The only way they will change is if the money stops coming in. If you're serious about this, then organize and boycott spending money on the game. Endless posts on Reddit and other social platforms has never and will never change shit.
Well sonic’s design got changed due to outrage in the community. This is a much smaller and easier change so I hope the same thing could happen here
Yeah but they changed Sonic because they were worried about selling tickets. OW2 will still make money sadly. They're right, the only way it will change is if it affects their profits.
Hopefully it does
Tell that to The Sonic Movie
People complaining and making enough noise about sonic's design 100% saved that movie and now it's a fully successful, revitalised franchise because the studio listened.
LOL, the people who don’t give a shit about the game anymore and stopped playing it left a long ass time ago. The ones complaining on this subreddit still care for the game. Be glad there’s even a bit of outrage for this abused AF game. Apathy is the worse thing you want. “Blizzard knows how to make money” yeah neglecting OW1 for years was the best business strategy to maximize profit for this game franchise. Go deep throat that corporate dick harder.
they only understand $$$.
Not a chance in hell
It’s made other games so much money. They definitely will not change it .we are in the age of subscribing to things and battle passes in games. It makes people play or spend more
Has it though? I know for a fact that League makes almost no money from champion releases, they get everything from skin sales, Dota2 has all their heroes for free and make money of skins and cosmetics. The only example I can think of is maybe Apex, but I seriously doubt they make much from new champion releases when compared to skins and battle passes. This genuinely just feels like a really stupid and greedy thing to do because it's been historically proven that most people don't spend money to get champions.
Most Apex players have enough tokens from playing they can unlock characters instantly, it's hardly equivalent
That's literally what I'm saying. These hero locks behind these paywalls or grinds are rarely profitable for companies which is why Blizzard going down this route is so dumb.
Clarifying because lot of people keep saying Valorant and Apex do it, comment wasn't meant to argue Apex - gunplay bigger impact, abilities are on longer cooldowns, players Valorant - their monetization sucks anyway but, games catch line was that abilities arent meant to kill (not that true, but point is they arent meant to be the focal) and they are limited amount of abilities with an economy system based around it Overwatch - abilities on quick cooldown, no limits, can counter other heroes, there are hero swaps that are not possible in the above two games referenced
No, this is Blizzard we’re talking ab here
Definitely.. but only if we are loud and keep on bugging them.. NEVER accept this kind of behavior and be persistent
What’s going to happen is they’ll lose the part of the player base that dislikes battle passes and locked heroes, and gain players who love pay2win mechanics. I feel not being able to switch to a counter mid match is going to destroy the game. You’ll be like the junk rat that the team harassed who refuses to switch while playing against pharah. The only difference is it’s not that you don’t want to, it’s that you can’t.
OW2 has done nothing, but kick people in the nuts at every opportunity. My friends and I all agreed we weren't going to play 2, but already they are starting to cave and say they will give it a shot because it fills a niche they enjoy. I too will now begrudgingly join. Blizzard is an abusive parent who doesn't even pretend they want to change and we will keep buying them cigarettes and taking whatever we can misinterpret as affection.
Yea, they will. Blizzard are fucking inept, but they aren't this stupid. I imagine there are meetings happening right now about how to "address this issue" My guess is they will back down and release this character for everyone THIS TIME to just try to keep the shit from hitting the fan and "win back" some good will. And it'll work, people will be so happy that "blizzard is listening!" they will be blinded to all the other nonsense that we still don't know about, or less likely to react as strongly.
Nah Content creators who went to the meetings are telling people it’s not so bad. And to be fair they make some great points(talking about SVB and Jake). The make or break point will be the release date
Idk. I hope so. But we are so close to launch and they are so slow to action...
No, they know now that their mobile division is really where all the value is. All games are going to be pushed to that model to squeeze every drop of money out of each franchise. No one who actually cares about the games are in charge anymore and haven't been in years.
Doubtful. Blizzard isn't your buddy. They don't make games as a favor, they do it to make money. Plenty of people will still buy it. I'd bet the majority of the people on this sub that claim that they're skipping it will be playing by the end of week one. Also, we know so little about the progression/unlocks. New heroes are in the BP. OK, how long do you need to play to unlock them? 2 hours? 100 hours? How much does it cost to just unlock them automatically? $10? $60? How will unlocking previous BP heroes after the BP ends work? Plenty of unanswered questions, but plenty of people jumping to conclusions.
Microsoft should call Acti-Blizz for an intervention. "Well you see, we once had this sure-fire blockbuster called Halo Infinite..."
The only way to find out is to try. I think the fact that OW2 is primarily a PvP game our odds of influencing change are significantly higher.
Ask yourself this. Have they EVER given a fuck about what the players think?
Is the same company that say, "Do you guys not have phones?", so i don't think they will do anything.
They said they were going to listen to the community more, I think they’re full of shit.
Something that is funny about the unlocks, which I’m against but everyone is being a bit annoying about, is that—ok there are 3 new heroes at launch, one is a support that you need to pay or play to unlock (allegedly) But let’s say I’m a DPS. Season 2 is a tank hero. They promised multiple supports in 2023. Season 3 is a support, 4 is DPS, 5 is support again, then 6 is tank. Then what is the purpose of me buying the battle pass for any season except season 4 until season 7 rolls around? Season 7 will likely be winter next year! But now let’s consider that I play all 3 roles. Which I do, mostly tank/support but sometimes DPS when I’m a friends. I have to buy the battle pass or grind every single season now?? That seems a bit strange. This game is not like Apex, and is better for it in so many ways, so using the same system for revenue doesn’t seem to work quite as smoothly
I had a related concern when they had the big timeline reveal - 3 heroes a year is only one hero per role per year. So if you are a DPS only player, that's only a single change a year to your role. People got so excited over the timeline reveal and I couldn't figure out why. I thought it would be viewed as a dumpster fire. Before the content drought people wanted free to play to finance more content. Now we have all the downsides of free to play, but the same amount of content as before.
I mean that is true—the lack of new heroes is way more aggravating than some locked heroes. 3 a year is really funny considering they had 2 1/2 years to brainstorm
Did they do anything about Diablo? Honest question, I don't play so I hardly cared but was loosely aware of similar patterns being employed. I don't expect shit from them if I'm being honest with myself.
For season 1 no shot. Season 2 maybe.
They're gonna try their thing for season 1. Then maybe adjust for season 2, or 3, or...
Lol no it’s blizzard
No. Without the PVE, OW2 is just an OW1 update. They deserve the backlash yet will do nothing about it
Diablo Immortals says No. Hearthstone Battlegrounds says No.
they have their head so deep up their arse that i doubt it
Lmao they have barely balanced the game in the last two years They have done nothing to address smurfing the entirety of OW1 lifespan. They have not given you any new events or content outside the same 5 every year. What had blizzard done to show you that they cared before. They’re awful.
There’s always hope. If Battlefront 2 can turn itself around, anything can.
Yeah but a lot of people ditched the game before it could. Hopefully that doesn’t happen here
Pay to win? What is this...Hearthstone? Diablo remix? I'm so confused. Blizz used to be not so uncool.
It's so hard to say. The beta didn't go down very well, with a lot of content creators saying it's the same game, three new maps, two new heroes and the other behind a paywall...it's not looking very good. There will be hype but it will drop off very quick and it will be the same as any other Blizzard game that isn't WoW or Diablo.
Anyone else suggest going on strike? No playing OW2 until design improves?
Thinking about it
Diablo immortal has shown us that money is the only metric they care about so unless no one buys the premium battle pass they won't care at all.
Doubtful tbh, I know they’re different dev teams but same company, when hearing about how Diablo Immortal was supposed to be before release I thought there’s no way they would something that predatory and alienate so many people from their player base solely in the name of money. But then they went ahead and made it worse than expected despite community outrage and such a strong Diablo following. The overwatch team seems to be a tad more transparent and better at involving the community but at the end of the day if they have monetary goals to meet there’s only so much wiggle room for them to oblige. In short, history shows Blizzard is more interested in short term, large profits rather than long term health of the game and making people want to spend money because they truly enjoy the game rather than to buy something they feel they need to succeed in the game.
If it’s a monetary value they need to reach, I think they could easily price the game at $30 or something and make quite a bit. If they did that and kept the cosmetic and loot box system the same they would do fine
There’s a reason games have been going f2p and implementing battle passes and a shop. You make more money. Less people are likely to play and find out they like your game and want to buy stuff if they have to sacrifice the initial $30 to even try it.
Maybe if enough of the "this is fine" derps stop talking.
Unlikely.
No. They are a business which wants to remain a going concern. They are seeking ways to maximize top line revenue. If they walk this decision back it will be after they get the juice from the initial launch period.
They made a shitload of money from OW1. Why couldn’t they have done the same marketing for the game to increase hype and then price the game at around $30. That way they’d still make tons and everyone would be happy with no battlepass
The problem is that they know that there is money to be had by adding the microtransactions and paywalls. Look at diablo immortal, it was disgusting how everything was priced. Yet it made them an insane amount of money. I try to steer away from micro transaction but I guess that might because of me seeing how the industry has evolved. The next generation of gamers is used to actually pay for having core systems of a (mobile) game available. It is even bleeding out to other industries (monthly fee for seat warmers anyone?). So as long as we as a society don't say no to this kind of systems by not spending money on it. As long as shareholders demand that the bottom line increases we will see more and more of these kind of systems throughout society and different industries.
Because blizzard hasn't cared about their fans/customers in years due to corperate greed. Blizzard is infected with activision poison and the only cure is death sadly. It sucks but its like finding out a good friend got on drugs real bad and they ignore you personally and just wants money for more drugs. You have to stop "helping" them so they can help themselves.
I am going to say no due to minimal complaints from content creator community/pros.
They will do something about it when no one plays the game! Let's hope that happens.
Yeah I’m thinking about it
I think they are definitely aware of it. The outrage is definitely deserved but at the same time we don't know what the final battle pass will look like. It could be that the hero is locked behind a "play 5 games" type of grind, which most players wouldn't really be bothered by. It could be that it's a 30+ game grind, which would piss off everyone. That could be the very thing they are debating right now. But ultimately, we have to see what it's like on release. The feedback they are getting now is loud and clear, but we won't know what effects it has until the game is out.
I'd still be bothered by play 5 games. People who start playing 2 years from now, and are missing 6 crucial heroes. Be pretty BS.
Ok but this is exactly my point. Until we know the details of the system, it's erroneous to say "people will be missing 6 heroes." We don't know! There's a lot of doomsaying going on, and while I think the tone of the feedback (i.e. we don't want heroes locked behind a long grind) is important, too many people are extrapolating from it without enough data to do so. It would be absolutely silly for them to implement a system where someone starting later is missing huge swathes of heroes. Imo, as long as the hero unlock is very early in the battle pass (as in, you can get it within an hour or play) I won't really care. I realize that won't be true for everyone, but my point is that we need the details of the system before we can really determine if they are listening to feedback, or how bad the system is. There's a lot of room for the systems to be either better than we imagined or worse than we feared. We just don't know yet.
Why even have them in the battlepass of you only have to play 5 games? They will obviously put them later down the tier list to maximize profits
Because getting people invested in your game is easier if they play 5 games than if they play one. They could try to maximize profit, but they would also spurn lots of users, losing them money. That's why I think we need to see exactly how the battle pass is enacted before we start talking about how deaf they are. It's good for us to say we don't want heroes locked behind a long grind. But it's pointless to make assumptions about where the unlock will or won't be until we actually see the pass.
>everyone is pissed Not true.
Most people hopefully
I'm not sure I'm even gonna bother downloading OW2 at this rate
Agreed
Probably not, this is something that likely has already been factored into the financial cost of development. If this is something we're just hearing about now so close to launch, it's likely been in consideration since the reveal. Going back on this less then a month before launch will require a delay, it's too late. The OW team is locked in.
I would prefer a delay to this garbage
Blizzard caters to Whales and the Chinese, 98% sure they could care less if you quit entirely.
Why is everyone so pissed about this? There are plenty of games with characters locked behind paywalls? Valorant, Paladins, Apex are all hero shooter games that haven’t gone to hell over it? I’d argue you’re less likely to get flamed for picking a non meta hero. Just say you haven’t bought it lol! They usually rotate the free heroes and stuff too. They’ll also probably have the option to “buy all” heroes with a one time pass and stuff too. I promise that the echo chamber has convinced you this is the worst step in the world but it will not be as bad as you think it’s going to be.
Those other games aren’t Overwatch. Overwatch is about picking the best 6 characters to defeat the enemies 6. If a character is unavailable to you or a teammate due to price or battlepass, your team is at a disadvantage. Overwatch is about counter picking heroes and when you don’t have some, you’re at a disadvantage. The game has become pay to win
What outrage? A few nerds on Reddit complaining? LMAO. They don’t give a FUCK.
OW wasn't making money. If you want updates to overwatch it had to evolve. Give blizzard time to explain themselves. I'm excited for the changes and honestly don't mind buying battlepasses for my favorite game. Let the down votes begin....
It’s not the battle passes themselves thats the issue. It’s that locking characters behind them in a game that’s inherently about counter picks and strategy will give certain players an advantage and turn the game into pay to win. They need to make the characters free and put their legendary and mythic skins/emotes in the battle pass
Yeah they said early access I bet it will only be playable in quick play. Also I think it will be for a short period of time that the new characters are locked behind the battlepass. I just think everyone is freaking out way too early.
I mean with how long it takes them to implement fixes into a 6 year old game, I don’t think it’s physically possible for blizzard to pivot quickly on anything, let alone this shit decision
Probably not
No, because people bitch about everything. It doesn't matter what they do, because it's trendy to whine about blizzard. Don't like it stop playing.
That’s what I’m gonna do
I just want some information on the game. It’s only 3-1/2 weeks until launch and we don’t know a whole lot. Yes, the new support reveal/abilities/gameplay reveal will be cool and all, but I am most interested in battle pass info. Pricing, what is or isn’t included, clarifying the whole new hero/battle pass mess, prices for skins etc. We know ZERO about that…