Overwatch 2's long-promised PvE mode is canceled
Before writing this text, I reread my first publication for Esports.net. In that text, published a little over a month after the full release of the game, I use, in the title itself, the word “unpleasantness” and I honestly think that it could not have been better used.
I don't know if any of the readers has already gone through the unfortunate situation of ordering a coffee in a restaurant and, accidentally, tearing up the wrong package and mixing a handful of salt in the liquid. This is exactly how I feel right now. With the cancellation of the PvE promise, Activision Blizzard has salted my coffee.
Official photo of OW2 on the Battle.net store
Reading the tweet below, very similar to any other common tweet from big developers, we expected little more than the announcement of the fifth season, possibly some event linked to some special date and, of course, some news about the expected PvE mode that, according to Activision Blizzard itself, was supposed to be released this year.
Sadly, we couldn't be more wrong. My friends, the PvE mode announced on the 2019 Blizzcon stage, the reason for the addition of the “2” in the game's title, has, after almost four years of development, been cancelled.
It is difficult to understand the situation. Let's go back in time a little.
Overwatch was, without a doubt, one of the most overlooked games in competitive gaming history. Let's remember that, with a giant professional league going on, a legion of fans and thousands of people playing every day, the game went from April 2020, with the launch of Echo, until April 2022, with the launch of Sojourn in the first Overwatch 2 open beta, without a new hero.
Two years of almost complete abandonment, with the promise of the major launch of a campaign mode, with progression experiences for each character, called “Hero Mode”, which would work both cooperatively and single-player, with choices and paths to be followed, and which, ultimately, would provide the player with a new experience at each run. All of that went down the drain.
It's no exaggeration to say that the game went through a major patch. Teams were shrunk from six players to five, several heroes had their skill sets changed, some key pieces were moved around, but the game was still, indeed, the same game. An interesting comparison for League players, for example, is that the move from Overwatch to Overwatch 2 felt like a big pre-season.
Especially the 2016 pre-season, for those who remember, where elemental dragons were introduced, changing the flow of matches, but not affecting the natural essence of the game.
The point is that, literally, the entire name change was based on the introduction of this new progression mode within the game.
Overwatch 2 was released in October of last year, basically with the idea of "play while we finish the real game", and now the "real game" is not going to happen anymore. The reality is that with the significant and gradual drop in viewership in the professional league and the discomfort of the community that felt, rightly, left behind, the release was probably early and rushed, going back to the previous comment: “play there while we finish”.
So, if what made Overwatch 2 meaningful was the PvE mode, and the PvE mode isn't going to happen, what's the point of Overwatch 2?
Apparently, and since the game is now free-to-play, the store. One of the big changes was that the loot box system was completely abolished in the transition from the first title to the “second”, and replaced by a virtual points store, very similar, for example, to Valorant or Fortnite. So, and as was also commented in my first text, the values of any skin for the characters went through the roof, and little to nothing was given to people who had been playing the game forever, generating even more discomfort among fans.
The following excerpt is an interview during the announcement, video linked in the tweet above. The following sentence is said by Jared Neuss, executive producer of Overwatch 2, and one of the great minds of the project:
“We had to make a very difficult decision: do we continue to put effort into PvE, hoping to be able to launch at some point in the future? Or do we stick with the set of values we've aligned with so far and focus on the current game and serving you all?
With everything we've learned about what it takes to operate this game at the level you deserve, it's clear that we won't be able to deliver on that original PvE vision that was showcased in 2019.
What that means is we're not going to deliver the dedicated hero mode, the talent trees, that long-term power progression. These things are no longer in our plans.”
As a fan of the game, and of the created universe in general, it's shocking to hear something like that. As the executive producer himself says, the PvE mode and, returning once again, the main reason for the game to even be called “2”, is no longer in Activision Blizzard's plans, and that has been a while.
In an interview with GameSpot, both Jered Neuss and Aaron Keller, game director, commented on the current status of the game's development and "kept hopes up there" with what's to come.
What's to come? For those who played last year's Halloween event, more missions like that, where players will be able to play with friends and defeat zillions of NPCs, but no systemic progression, skill trees and the much-promised re-playability. However, we were presented with an image describing what the next contents will be released.
Roadmap announced for the next seasons of the game. Photo: Activision Blizzard
As you can see, one of the great promises of next season IS A CINEMATIC.
New maps, two heroes, some season events and previously described cooperative missions is what comes to the future of Overwatch 2. What bothers the most, however, is the argument used by the heads of the game. According to them, the scale of the project proved to be much larger than previously anticipated and that, in order not to make the game feel abandoned again, the developer decided to put an end to the production of the alternative mode.
This argument would be perfectly understandable if it came from a small developer like Shiro Games, producer of Wartales, a game that stole many hours from my last weeks, but not the size of Activision Blizzard, which owns not only the cashcow that became Overwatch, but also Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, Candy Crush, Diablo, Hearthstone, etc.
Finally, it is also interesting to think about the company's employees. Since the game's announcement, back in 2019, a large part of the team of developers responsible for the game has been working on the PvE part and, from one moment to the next, the work of three years is left aside.
This work, however, was not necessarily put in the trash, since for sure, much of the technology developed will still be used, or adapted, for future heroes, maps, or even cooperative missions, but not with the same objective for which it was created and that is, at least from a fan's perspective, sad.
But as we now know, thanks to GameSpot's aforementioned interview, at the launch of Overwatch 2 in October of last year, the vast majority of developers were already working almost exclusively in PvP mode, and the decision to drop the PvE version already would have been taken almost a year and a half ago.
Obviously, the news didn't sit well with anyone. Many personalities were justifiably upset and even angry, but the reality is that Overwatch 2 was the latest victim of very high expectations, lack of developer organization and internal pressure for the game to keep making money.
Admirable, really, is the courage of the executive producer and the director of the game who, whether they wanted it or not, showed honesty and transparency when breaking devastating news.
Not long ago I commented, in another text, about how current games are coming out broken or unpolished, but that a game of this magnitude simply doesn't come out, is something new.
What would be better? Another game where expectations flew so high that they burned their wings? Or the simple cancellation and that was it? The debate remains.