After announcing the release date for Overwatch 2: Invasion over the weekend, Blizzard has now confirmed you’ll have to pay for the new PvE content.
What is with the horrible headlines around this game lately?
First, the headlines all said PvE was cancelled when it wasn’t. The scope and feature set was scaled back, but it was never cancelled.
Now that there’s a trailer for the PvE, people can’t pretend it was cancelled, so all the headlines have to act surprised that it wasn’t. But they’re still pushing a misleading narrative, saying that the PvE outright costs $15, which it does if you want to play it after season 6, but the PvE missions are still free at the time they are introduced.
I get it, Blizzard is a persistent PR shitstorm. People are angry at them, and often for good reason. But adding misinformation on top of their own shitty behavior does nothing to help anyone.
The way this is rolling out is certainly unusual, but I don’t find the act of charging for story content inherently distasteful. The fact that you can play this content in its entirety, for free as much as you want when it first drops, seems uncharacteristically generous, but still weird. In it’s original incarnation, this content was going to be a separate $60 boxed release.
I think the way Destiny 2 worked all this out was far worse. I bought the game for $60, and even paid for an expansion. This was all fine until they started straight up removing campaign content that I had paid for. So the fact that I can play OW2’s campaign content for free on release, and have the option to buy it with the promise that it will be mine forever, seems better. Again, it’s weird, but not fundamentally different than any other game selling story DLC for $15/pop.
And the really weird thing is, whenever I bring any of this up, nobody is able to argue against it. They just see that I’m not immediately shitting on Blizzard and downvote with their feels, rather than actually engaging with the argument. I’m glad to see kbin’s community is apparently not much better in this regard.
Blizzard originally announced that they were releasing an entire PvE campaign that you would be able to play from start to finish upon release. That was the majority of the justification for a $60 price tag. Since then, it’s been delayed, and now that’s been dropped. Instead, this is essentially the Overwatch Archives missions that players were already able to access in OW1, but now you likely have to pay for each consecutive mission set. In the original announcement blog post, there’s only one line that is seemingly intentionally vague about whether you can access the story missions for free when they’re introduced or not:
You can get started on your mission to save the world with the Overwatch 2: Invasion Bundle for $15 USD. This bundle includes:
- Access to the Overwatch 2: Invasion Story Missions, during the season and permanently after
- 1,000 Overwatch Coins (equal to the Premium Battle Pass, $10 USD value)
- A brand-new Sojourn Legendary skin ($19 USD value)
- Permanent access to Sojourn as a playable hero for new players: unlocked upon completing Story Mission challenges.
While this could be read as being able to play the story missions for free during the season, it doesn’t explicitly explain this, nor is it implied anywhere else within the announcement. What’s also troubling is the attachment of “permanent access to Sojourn as a playable hero for new players”, and later “you can also choose to unlock all the above, plus the six heroes new to Overwatch 2—Sojourn, Junkerqueen, Kiriko, Ramattra, Lifeweaver, and the new Support hero coming August 10—with the Overwatch 2: Complete Hero Collection for $20 USD.” They’re now locking 2 characters, alongside their respective abilities, that were previously attainable both by new and returning players for free behind a paywall, in a live service PvP game.
Combined with other changes like the transition from lootboxes to the seasonal battle pass model, it feels like Blizzard is taking a more predatory direction in monetizing Overwatch 2, and burning both new and veteran players alike with these changes.
I really wish there was a decent competitor to Overwatch as I love the game itself, I just hate every development that’s happening around it.
Paladins often get offered as an alternative, but it really doesn’t feel the same. The gunplay lacks any sense of impact, and as bad as Overwatch’s matchmaking is Paladin’s is absolutely atrocious.
There’s also Apex Legends and Valorant. Both different enough from OW that they don’t feel like a bland clone.
Both different enough, that they are different genres, both from OW and from each other.
Neither of those are even in the same genre.
Paladins is really the closest equivalent, and it suffers from being not nearly as fun and having a greedier business model. In fact, all of these alternatives have pretty much the same business model that OW2 has, so I’m not sure how switching to them gets anyone away from the big OW2 change that pissed everyone off.
Wow I’m just gonna hold off on my D4 purchase a little while longer
Honestly, it’s a pretty solid game right out of the gate. Not perfect, but solid. I’ve definitely enjoyed my time with it.
