Rustar
Back
happy melon
Oct.31,2023
Is "Three Kingdoms Kill" in jeopardy? "Overwatch 2" is about to land on Steam! For many players, Overwatch is a game they have a love-hate relationship with. They love the memories of playing it with countless friends on maps like "King's Row" and "Li Jiang Tower" back in the summer of 2016. They hate the subsequent series of questionable decisions, disappointing updates, and fragmented hero balance changes that led Overwatch's popularity to decline significantly. Recently, Blizzard made a surprising announcement without any warning: some of their games will be landing on the Steam platform in the future, and the first to arrive will be Overwatch 2. According to the Steam store page for the Chinese region, Overwatch 2 is set to launch on August 11th, and playing it on Steam will require linking a Battle.net account. The news of "Overwatch 2 coming to Steam" quickly trended on various social media platforms. What's even more unexpected is that Overwatch 2 wasn't region-locked, although it initially lacked Simplified Chinese language support (Blizzard later added Simplified Chinese support to Overwatch 2 on Steam). This unusual move might seem odd for most game companies, but for Blizzard, a company known for its unorthodox decisions, it's not entirely surprising. This means that as long as you have a Steam account, you can experience this game that should have been non-existent in China, provided you also have a Battle.net account. But there's a catch: Chinese Battle.net accounts won't work, which means all the items, skins, and in-game purchases from your previous Chinese account won't carry over. So, the question arises: Will Chinese players play Overwatch 2, which can't be played on Chinese Battle.net? The answer is almost certainly no; most Chinese players won't bother. In recent years, Blizzard's reputation in the gaming community has plummeted due to questionable decisions, including their split from NetEase, which drew heavy criticism. Given their poor reputation, Overwatch 2 coming to Steam might only lead to a flood of negative reviews. Interestingly, Overwatch 2's launch day on Steam may resemble the "glory days" when Three Kingdoms card game launched on the platform. There might even be a race to see who can top the other on the negative review charts, offering another "spectacular" scene of review bombing. Furthermore, Overwatch 2's game design and operation have been a mess since its launch, and players have had little patience for it. Blizzard has continuously displayed questionable "corporate culture" with Overwatch 2, including promising a PVE mode for years only to cancel it abruptly, turning the scrapped PVE mode into a microtransaction project sold to players at a high price, introducing numerous new heroes and changing the backgrounds of old heroes into LGBT characters, having long-standing, game-affecting bugs that are left unaddressed, and adding a lot of in-game microtransactions after transitioning to free-to-play, which offer poor rewards and have a poorly designed system, among other issues. Blizzard's constant string of bad decisions has left a bad taste in the mouths of most players. The launch of Overwatch 2 on Steam might have something to do with Microsoft's recent victory in a hearing with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). According to leaked internal documents, Microsoft views Blizzard's withdrawal from Steam and focus on its own Battle.net platform as a complete failure. After Activision Blizzard removed Call of Duty from Steam in 2018, the Battle.net platform's active users did not show significant growth, and Overwatch 2's arrival on Steam is an opportunity for Blizzard to expand across platforms. Moreover, another significant reason for Overwatch 2 coming to Steam is the continuous decline in player engagement. In the latest Q2 quarterly financial report, Activision Blizzard admitted for the first time that player spending and participation in Overwatch 2 have been consistently decreasing, and the game's performance this quarter continues to slide. Even Blizzard, known for its stubbornness, acknowledged that the game's engagement is decreasing, suggesting that the situation might indeed be dire. Of course, Blizzard remains optimistic, believing that the upcoming sixth season and the "Invasion" PvE expansion will attract more players to the game. So, for those of you listening, will you revisit Overwatch 2 after it lands on Steam?
#News
share
0
9
Best Comments
No more
Add a comment
Selected Games
Download Rustar APP
Join Telegram Group