The first phase of Overwatch 2 starts on October 4th. The sequel to Blizzard’s successful hero shooter Overwatch, which should seamlessly integrate into the first part in multiplayer. In the future, the developers would like to rely on more heroes that you don’t have to meet at all. We at MeinMMO summarize.
Where does the statement come from? In an interview with Dexerto, Lead Hero Designer Geoff Goodman talked about the future of supporters in Overwatch 2, among other things. A big point is also the actual aiming in the well-known Blizzard shooter.
That shouldn’t be that important anymore, especially for supporting classes. According to Goodman, future support heroes would like to be more modeled after heroes like Mercy and Moira. Their abilities are mostly goal-seeking and it is enough, for example as a Mercy, to only look in the general direction of the target with the healing ray.
Why is that important? In the interview, the hero designer goes on to explain that it should also be important in Overwatch to make strong moves without really good aiming. According to him, a player’s “skill” is not only defined by how well he actually hits.
Personal ability is defined much more by how you position yourself, what decisions you make and when you revive whom: “We should make sure that there are more ways to prove your skills than just aiming well. Mercy was just a very early example of that.”
He goes on to explain that these heroes will then be more focused on their own team than dealing damage to the enemy. Nevertheless, they should be able to make “big plays”. Goodman says they want to make heroes like this a lot more often in the future, and not just place them in the support role.
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Ban system for heroes is not off the table yet
What else does he say in the interview? Dexerto also asked the designer about hero bans. It’s about a system with which you could block certain heroes before the match. League of Legends, for example, uses such a mechanic in its ranked games. In Overwatch, however, this has not yet been possible.
A similar concept was already in Overwatch with the hero pool, but was then removed again. However, Goodman says that the basic idea of banning heroes has not yet been completely rejected, even if game designer Aaron Keller would be fundamentally opposed to implementing such a system.
“It keeps coming up every once in a while, so I don’t think we’ll ever completely overhaul it. There are issues with the system and we’ve been thinking and talking about how to design it to make it work.” He’s also referring to the poorly received hero pool.
Where are the problems? One of the biggest problems is that on a competitive level, players could be specifically selected and their main heroes blocked as a result. Aaron Keller also said in an interview with GameSpot that he is against removing characters from players. Mainly because some players can identify with the heroes.
So while hero bans aren’t something we should expect early on in Overwatch 2, it’s possible that the feature will be implemented later on.
What do you think? Are you looking forward to heroes that require less aiming, or do you think that only players who hit well should go far? What do you think of the hero bans? Write it to us in the comments here at MeinMMO.
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