There are still signs and wonders taking place. Blizzard is expanding its games from Battle.net to Steam. We have all the information for you.
Blizzard games are played on Battle.net. This has been an indisputable truth for almost 20 years. But that will change now. Because Blizzard has announced that the in-house games will soon be available on Steam. It starts with the Free2Play shooter Overwatch 2, which will be available on Steam from August 10, 2023.
Do you need a Battle.net account? Yes, it is necessary to link a Battle.net account to the Steam account to access Overwatch 2.
What else does Blizzard say? In a Blizzard blog post, Mike Ybarra, head of Blizzard Entertainment, said, “While Battle.net will remain a priority for us now and in the future, we’ve heard from players that they want Steam for some of our games , starting with Overwatch 2 on August 10th. We’re happy to be working with Valve to make this possible.”
What’s the point? The advantage is that you no longer need your own launcher, such as the Battle.net launcher, if you want to play Overwatch 2 and are already using Steam anyway. You can also access Steam features while playing Overwatch 2 – such as the friends list, from which you can invite other players, or Steam Achievements.
As of now, everyone is playing together, so there is no separation between Battle.net Launcher players and those joining via Steam.
Are there more games coming? At least that seems to be the plan. Although no specific details have been released yet, Overwatch 2 should only be the first step. It would be easy to imagine that other Blizzard titles – such as Diablo IV, Hearthstone or World of Warcraft – will be playable on Steam in the future. As soon as there is more information, we will of course report about it.
What do you think? A good thing to target more players? Or “pointless” if you still need a Battle.net account anyway?