Overwatch 2: Another Free2Play after the Diablo Immortal fiasco. Can this go well?
Free2Play games have been popular and successful for years, but mostly have a bland aftertaste. Because games that can be played completely free of charge have to be financed in other ways. After all, the developers, designers and people in charge want to be paid for their work – who can blame them. This is where the wheat separates from the chaff. While some Free2Play games come with quite fair shop models (like Valorant or Path of Exile), others don’t shy away from any tricks to get as much money out of the players’ pockets – from blocked content to artificial waiting times to undoubtedly playful advantages.
Diablo Immortal currently has to deal with the latter. Its shop is accused of flawless Pay2Win and the developers at Blizzard don’t do it any better with their statements. And before the shitstorm has subsided, Blizzard is full-bodiedly announcing the next Free2Play game: Overwatch 2!
A plus point, a minus point
Overwatch 2 was originally announced as the successor to the extremely successful team shooter. But after some modifications and the disappointment of the community given the small amount of content, Blizzard left the chosen path and recently announced that Overwatch 2 would be a Free2Play experience.
Of course, we don’t know why that was in detail. But it shows two things quite clearly: On the one hand, Blizzard has understood that a lot more is expected of a full-price game than what Overwatch 2 can/wants to offer, and draws conclusions from this. On the other hand, it also shows that Blizzard still doesn’t have a particularly good hand when it comes to timing. Whether it’s announcing Diablo Immortal while everyone is waiting for Diablo 4, or things like McCree being rebranded as a porn star.
What kind of Free2Play is this supposed to be?
Unlike Diablo Immortal, Overwatch’s Free2Play model will certainly look different. That’s in the nature of the game as such. In Overwatch there are neither items nor relevant XP or the like. But how do the developers then want to make money?
The most obvious would certainly be the different hero skins. So far, these have mainly been obtained from the loot boxes, which in turn can be earned in the game (or bought in the shop). If we stick with this system, it’s hard to imagine Blizzard making enough money to make Overwatch 2 profitable – but the developers certainly know the numbers better than we do. And other shooters show that such a system can definitely work.
Completely without a loot box or gambling: The book “The Art of Overwatch” offers a great insight into the development
Overwatch 2: After the Diablo Immortal fiasco, another Free2Play – can that go well? (5)
Source: PC games
But this would certainly include Blizzard increasing the incentive to buy. This could happen by reducing the freely earnable loot boxes as well as a division into normal loot boxes for the game and improved loot boxes for the shop.
Is Blizzard really that bold?
Another option that the developers have already experienced with the less successful Heroes of the Storm would be to sell the heroes individually. If you want to play a specific hero, you will be asked to pay. In a weekly rotation, there would always be a handful of heroes per role that would be playable for free, so that newcomers could also play. However, that would be a brazen solution and would certainly not go down well with current Overwatch players.
Overwatch 2: After the Diablo Immortal fiasco, another Free2Play – can that go well? (1)
Source: Blizzard
It is more conceivable that the developers will keep parts of the new PvE content under lock and key – similar to Hearthstone. In PvP you can play freely and without costs (and buy a number of skins) and you have to gradually buy the PvE missions in different packs in the shop. On the one hand, many players would certainly welcome that, on the other hand, the PvE players would then pay for the free fun of the PvP players – somehow not fair either.
Pay2Win will hardly exist – even if the developers wanted it
However, there is little to worry about in Overwatch about a Pay2Win, as many believe it is currently available in Diablo Immortal. Even if the developers didn’t have a problem with that, and some Hansel from the finance department decided that, there’s hardly any way to build a Pay2Win system into Overwatch. At least not in the features and game systems that we currently know.
Overwatch 2: After the Diablo Immortal fiasco, another Free2Play – can that go well? (6)
Source: Blizzard
There is no progression, no items, no advantages of any kind for a hero. To integrate Pay2Win, new systems would be needed – such as a talent system with improvements for PvP. However, the developers have not announced anything in this regard. What is not, however, could still come as part of the announcement live stream next Thursday (June 16, 2022). Only the single purchase of heroes could be understood as Pay2Win if the “best” heroes are not free of charge.
How do you find the step away from the full-price game to Free2Play? A step in the right direction, or do you have a bad gut feeling that this might backfire because of Diablo Immortal and its disastrous shop design? Tell us your opinion in the comments.
Reference-www.buffed.de