Overwatch 2, which has been drawing bread for a long time, may arrive sooner than we think.
As a sequel to Blizzard Entertainment's new IP, Overwatch 2 was first announced at the 2019 Blizzard Carnival, but suffered several delays in release. In 2020, Blizzard tried to show a new character design and a new PVE game mode to attract more players' interest, but fans felt that the game was not enough to attract them to buy a brand new product.
By 2021, Blizzard had unveiled some reworks of old heroes to accommodate the all-new 5v5 style of play, a significant update, but no more progress in the months that followed. And Blizzard hasn't explicitly answered the question of how far they've made Overwatch 2, and will it really be able to attract fans to continue to support it?
In addition, Blizzard's busyness with legal matters and allegations of gender discrimination and harassment caused them to not bring overwatch 2 updates for most of 2021. Overwatch founder Jeff has left the team, and many fans have even speculated that the project may have stalled or even been canceled due to the lack of follow-up developers.
Overwatch hasn't received any substantial updates in the last two years, with no new heroes and no new maps. Even after being announced by Microsoft this year, Overwatch 2 did not publish a developer blog, and Blizzard is ready to develop a survival game with a new IP.
But judging by this week's gossip, Overwatch 2 isn't dead.
On February 5, some players discovered some interesting changes in BattleNet's test suits, which gave everyone a new idea, and perhaps Overwatch 2 will be released in the near future. Judging from the unpacked data, Overwatch 2 and Demo2 have been deployed into Battlenet's test suits. Extranet players said that this game content is the same as the "World of Warcraft" update in the test suit, and the Battlenet client also upgraded the game in this way when it was upgraded from 8.0 to 9.0.
In addition, some overwatch content creators (and overwatch content creators?) Was officially invited to a private developer conference, which made everyone optimistic about Overwatch 2. The game is being developed in an orderly manner and has not been secretly stopped because of the creator substitution. However, while Overwatch 2 shows some new gameplay and content, how the new game fails to meet people's expectations will make Overwatch's two-year hiatus a joke.
Some rumors from participation in secret meetings suggest that a beta version of Overwatch 2 will go live in February. And this screenshot of overwatch 2 game content added to the Battle.net test suit seems to confirm this possibility.
After all, Blizzard said last year that the 2022 Overwatch League OWL will adopt Overwatch 2 as a game suit version, and professional players will also need to adapt to the rhythm of the new game as soon as possible, and the gameplay has changed from the traditional 6v6 to 5v5. The 2022 OWL League kicks off in April, so it makes sense for Blizzard to start overwatch 2 testing in the next two months.
Of course, until Blizzard officially announces the beta version of Overwatch 2, we can't be sure if the message is true or not. But the question is, after so many years, how many people are willing to answer the call and gather at the Lijiang Pagoda or the Flower Village?