Overwatch 2 Presses On; Shooter Played by Millions
Overwatch 2 has attracted a record number of players, almost doubling the score achieved by the first game. Blizzard boasts about the numbers and announces more changes to the game's balance - this time a bit more significant, at least „on paper.”.
Despite the criticism airmed at it, Overwatch 2 is much more popular than its predecessor. We learned the specific numbers thanks to the financial report of Activision Blizzard for the third quarter of 2022 (the game was released on October 4, but was included in it anyway).
- As we informed you, in the first ten days after the debut,Overwatch 2 attracted more than 25 million players. In the entire first month, the number jumped to about 35 million.
- In the corresponding period, the first Overwatch was played by "only" 15 million people. In contrast to reach the result achieved by its successor, the first game needed as many as eight months. (not without significance is the fact that the first part was a premium game, and the second is F2P).
- According to Activision Blizzard, those 35 million are both new and returning players.
- The corporation is also satisfied with the revenues from microtransactions. Given the general criticism of the business model adopted by Overwatch 2, it can be said that while reluctant, the players are investing their hard-earned money in this game.
So it seems doubtful that Blizzard intends to make significant changes to the microtransaction system - at least not in the near future. The characters of Moira and Brigitte, on the other hand, are expected to get some modifications. Such a suggestion was made by Alec Dawson - chief character designer for Overwatch 2 - in an interview for GamerBraves.com:
"There’s still stuff on our radar, where we might return to Moira and take a look at how we can add a little bit of utility to her. We’ve mentioned that we are looking at Brigitte and maybe changing her Ult down the road, if we find something that really hits us."
"On paper," these changes look more significant than those made to Sombra, Genji, Zarya, D.Va and Kiriko. Whether this will be the case, however, we will see in some time. It is worth recalling here that Blizzard already announced that another character will join the heroes in the second season of Overwatch 2 - it will be the tank Ramattra - at the same time arousing further concerns among the fans. PvE content is also heading to the game, but we will have to wait until 2023 for it.
Overwatch 2 is available on PC, PS4, PS5, XOne, XSX/S and Switch.
