Overwatch 2 was released on Switch and multiple other platforms just over a week ago, and it's safe to say the launch has been a bit of a nightmare for Blizzard and the game's community. The servers were apparently hit by "mass DDoS attacks" and there were lengthy queue times and connection issues.
Blizzard has been working around the clock to improve the situation and has now issued an official apology to players who experienced "any issues" around the time of the game's launch. Here's part of what the company had to say in its latest blog update, as highlighted by company president Mike Ybarra on social media:
"Launching Overwatch 2 as a live service comes with amazing opportunities and challenges, both anticipated and unexpected. We’ve largely stabilized the game overall, and we’ve made a lot of progress in fixing or improving issues some of you are facing. We're committed to consistently investigating issues as they arise, working quickly towards fixes, and being transparent with our community on the status of Overwatch 2.
"The team continues to work to deploy further stability updates, with another patch planned for later this week, and we are monitoring the game closely for emergent issues and bugs. We’ve been keeping you all up to date on the forums with separate posts, but moving forward, our known issues will be tracked here. We apologize for any issues players experienced around the game’s launch."
To make up for this "lost time", Blizzard will run several double match XP weekends in the near future and will also be giving away a "Cursed Captain Reaper Legendary skin" along with a health pack weapon charm. These items will be up for grabs from October 25th through to the end of Season One.
Blizzard says it will "continue to listen" to its community, as Overwatch 2's live service model apparently allows it to "make changes at a faster pace" than previously. It follows Blizzard announcing it would be removing the mobile phone number requirement for existing Overwatch players and Battle.Net users.
How has your experience been with Overwatch 2's launch? Leave a comment down below.
[source overwatch.blizzard.com]
Comments 28
They never listen that's just it so why would they listen now?
Despite the problems and oddities around this game. I've heard good things about the gameplay, though I'm not signing up my phone number to play it.
Blizzard, go away, no one likes you. Can't tell if you're worse than EA or not. lol
@Kermit1 It is a pretty good game (I played the first one) but forcing new Players to give them your number is a major invasion of Privacy and who's to say they won't sell your number to third party Companies? everything about this setup is just setting off alarm bells.
The community forgot to tell them to release a finished product. Blizzard would have listened if you had just told them you wanted a playable game.
The battle pass rewards and grind needs fixed badly but at least I can get on and play when I want now. And it sure is fun.
I wish Nintendo would issue a statement like this and fix the connectivity issues with Splatoon 3.
I hope diablo 4 releases in a much better state than this game...
@RubyCarbuncle It sets off a lot of alarms. Plus Google already knows everything about me anyway, I don't need Blizzard too.
This game is really fun, aaand that’s it, no progression, no sense of reward, the only thing ai can work towards now is ranked, which I’m going to do once I get bored.
Microsoft can't take over this company soon enough. Do we know yet when that's supposed to happen?
This seems like another case of asking for forgiveness instead of asking for permission where the terrible practice where a game gets released too early in order to make money then is fixed over time to the quality standard of where it should have been at launch. This is happening too much in the game industry with major releases and consumers are becoming too stupid because they will throw money at games regardless of the state it is in just to join the new games community in spite of fomo or other means just to play a broken game in the launch window period. People really ought to vote with their wallets and wait until a game is truly complete to properly buy it, otherwise developers will continue to release games in early and unfinished states. Heck, the practice is so bad Nintendo is copying the other major developers in this trend too (the Mario Switch sports games are a great example of this). Yes, I know Overwatch 2 is technically free, but you are still required to give away your personal information (phone number, terms & agreements, etc) to still play this mess.
@Not_Soos Last I heard they have some major hurdles to get over for the deal to go through. A lot of governments have been deeming it a monopolistic move and are trying to stop it from happening.
They'll listen to the community? Do they not have anyone there that knows how to launch a game then??
@XenoShaun I understand people's concerns about hostile corporate takeovers, but I really hope the deal will go through. In this case, I think a Microsoft acquisition can only improve things.
@Not_Soos
The same Microsoft that launched Halo MCC broken and ignored it for years before finally fixing it?
Nah things wouldn’t be better under Microsoft judging on their track record when it comes to handling studios.
@Not_Soos Gods know they will do a better job.
@RubyCarbuncle It’s not an invasion of privacy if you’re freely giving them the information.
Continue to listen?? That would suggest they'd ever started, and that information doesn't track with Blizzard in their modern form, esp where Overwatch is concerned. That especially is more of a "we listen only so we can point and laugh about how we're gonna do the exact opposite".
I get the phone number concerns, but same time...wifi number apps exist. Talkatone on android being one. With little to no ads that is free.
I think it's great we got yet another hopefully quailty and fun ftp game on switch! Can't say the same for multiversus 😑.
put a lot of time into Overwatch in the first 2 years. Haven't played since Sombra was the latest character though. used to Main D.va solo or Torbjorn when playing with friends. Still hate Hanzo mains though.
Love this game, although it won't give me my heroes... I played Overwatch 1.
@Xiovanni I agree with all of those except 6v6. 5v5 is SO much better.
They’ll listen. They like the screams.
Just wanna say, the phone number requirement is gone. Although I WOULD still set up 2 factor authentication regardless just for safety reasons.
Blizzard who ? Because I sure don’t buy their crappy games and never will
is this game "only" online? or I can play it offline against bots?
@scottishwildcat No Phone number no game for new Players. Existing Players don't have to do this so new Players shouldn't have to either. The requirements should be the same for everyone.
I get what you're saying but there are people who really want to play and having to hand over your telephone number for a free to play game is insane. I don't even give my telephone number to my boss at work, if there's a problem I get in touch with him not vice versa. You should never feel forced into giving your number to anyone.
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