For those not yet aware, Overwatch 2 is the upcoming ‘sequel’ to the latest Blizzard IP and popular first person shooter, Overwatch. The use of the term ‘sequel’ is one that Blizzard and especially the overwatch team seem explicitly keen on sticking to, but I believe this to be one of the largest causes of the confusion and frustration surrounding the marketing of this new development to the overwatch product line.
The Overwatch team’s decision to call this a sequel remains entirely theirs, and while I do understand their reasoning behind it and respect their choice, the term sequel comes with a different understanding from the community that I believe is the root of the perceived backlash. Most often, when a sequel to a game is announced, it involves players needing to purchase a new title to play with all of the features that have been designed and developed for it. See every iteration of call of duty, FIFA, battlefield; a majority of the recurring triple A game series expect you to buy a whole new game to play with the latest content. Overwatch’s sequel isn’t this clear cut.
So will you have to buy the sequel to overwatch to play the new content? Well yes and no. At the time of the announcement for Overwatch 2, the team made it clear that Overwatch 2 PvP content will be cross compatible with the original overwatch game, in fact people that own the original will get a free upgrade to the new version of the engine, along with access to the new heroes, PvP game modes; and improved graphics, performance and audio tweaks. The separation is in the fact that you will have to buy the sequel to gain access to any of the new PvE content that can only be achieved with this new engine, along with new hero design ‘skins’ to fit in with the new era of overwatch both in canon and in technology.
This is a confusing thing to explain, and has left many people believing that either they will no longer be able to play the original Overwatch when the sequel is released, or that they will be forced to pay for PvE story missions to continue playing, when in fact the release will be a free upgrade and an optional purchase of new kinds of content.
So why are Blizzard calling this a sequel? It’s difficult to say, and my theories vary a lot on how pessimistic I am about blizzard’s intentions. I think it’s very likely that they believe that this project enhances Overwatch way beyond the level that it was originally released on, which from what we’ve seen and what we know about the limitations from the first engine may well be very accurate. Perhaps they believe that they made a promise to always provide new content within Overwatch for free, and that calling this a sequel rather than a dlc or expansion maintains that promise by technicality. Perhaps they’re banking on people blindly buying the sequel despite the fact they may not be interested in the PvE that it would pay for. Realistically, I think that the executives at Blizzard are keen to release a sequel in the same way that other studios would, and that the overwatch team are fulfilling that responsibility while also treating the community as well as they can buy fulfilling their commitment to keep the Overwatch people payed for playable and interesting.
How could they have done this differently though? Well Blizzard already have a precedent set for expansions over the course of their other IPs, and the gaming community have seen many free updates to games that revolutionise what they can do.
Introducing: the Overwatch 2.0 update.
This is a much clearer way of suggesting that this isn’t a new purchase, but instead a free update to your existing game that allows you to do all new things, using language that has already been understood by the community previously. But what about the PvE content? Well really and truly, I think this fits much better as an expansion that you pay for. By calling it an expansion that runs on the newest version of Overwatch, it not only makes it clear what you’re paying for, but sets a precedent for future sets of story missions and PvE content. Call it something that fits the tone of the story, like Overwatch: Insurgency, or even just the PvE pack 1. In the future, they could even tell new stories and add new PvE content in the form of these packs.
Functionally this would be exactly the same as what they’re currently doing, but in a much clearer way for the community to understand. So why bother? Well this would quell the apparent backlash from the community. In a recent interview with Jeff Kaplan after BlizzCon 2021, he expresses that he thinks the community want to be treated how they are usually, implying that we would have been happier with being made to pay for access to the same game as a ‘true sequel’. I find this smug and self righteous, as it completely misinterprets the community response. Nobody wants to get less for their money, but the way that the announcement was presented to us led a lot of people to misinterpret what was being offered. While Overwatch 2 is intended as a sequel in the teams eyes, the dialogue that the community created in response was more to try and understand the situation. To be clear, I wouldn’t want the outcome to be any different, but the presentation could easily be so much clearer, and allow the community to be happy with what they’ve been given.
He also expresses how he hopes to keep the community more up to date with development going forward, which is another popular grievance with the situation, the content drought for the past year and a half. The complete lack of communication about the game they’re focusing their attention on, while simultaneously not giving new content to the existing game, is a grievance that has caused more passionate fans to claim that the game is ‘dying’ and being forgotten. While I don’t fully agree, the opening ceremony for BlizzCon was a huge disappointment for many. As the first BlizzCon with no Overwatch reveal, no Overwatch cinematic, and no mention of the game for the first time since even before its release.
While there was an extensive look at Overwatch 2 behind the scenes after the opening ceremony, this didn’t detract from the disappointment many felt from the opening ceremony, almost as though they just couldn’t be bothered to put together a piece of high enough quality to reveal during the ceremony. If they had just compiled a handful of cinematic clips and shots of new content, the kind that were already shown in the presentation afterwards, and Jeff coming on stage to apologize for the delay in news and set expectations properly, then it would have been a huge hit which just makes the lack of effort even more confusing. To see how low the effort was, notice how the Overwatch 2 page on Blizzard was populated at BlizzCon in 2019, and then the lack of updates after this one. This would have been the slightest effort, adding the new skin reveals for McCree Widow and Reaper, but was overlooked.
Despite these negative handlings of events, I’m incredibly excited over the future of Overwatch and fully believe it will be a big hit. The PvE content is one of the most exciting things I’ve seen come out of this franchise and I have the utmost faith in the teams ability to deliver a quality product when it’s ready, but I’m saddened by the handling of marketing and communication for this whole ordeal.