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The Key to Overwatch’s Future Discovered?

The Key to Overwatch’s Future Discovered?

Over 20 million play Overwatch now. It’s quite an accomplishment. It isn’t entirely unexpected, of course. This is a major multiplatform multiplayer game. It’s from Blizzard, a company that has shown it knows how to pull people in and keep them playing with titles like World of Warcraft , Diablo , StarCraft , Hearthstone , and Heroes of the Storm . Plus, its only real competition, Battleborn , crashed and burned. It’s riding high on a popularity wave right now, and Blizzard’s doing the exact perfect thing to keep it there.

So far, Blizzard has put together two Overwatch events. They’re time sensitive. They cover things people care about. They give us an excuse to dress up our characters in awesome costumes, enjoy new game modes, and frantically play as much as possible to earn limited time rewards. And they’re going to be the key to keep people constantly coming back to the game. In short, they’re brilliant.

It all started with Overwatch ‘s Olympics event, though Blizzard referred to it as the Summer Games . It added a temporary Lucioball mode. This was a three on three mode in an arena that amplified Lucio’s abilities and let people basically play soccer with him. It was an incredibly entertaining change of pace, akin to Metroid Prime: Federation Force ‘s Blast Ball or Rocket League . And, if that wasn’t enough reason to play as much of the game as possible, the custom emotes, sprays, and skins for Lucio, Tracer, Zarya, Mercy, McCree, Genji, Torbjorn, and Widowmaker being randomly doled out in loot boxes were motivation enough to keep coming back.

Now that the Halloween event is here, Blizzard’s shown it’s willing to learn from past events to make current ones even better. There’s an event again, of course, but this one gives people something Overwatch hasn’t really offered yet – cooperative multiplayer. You can take part in PvE fights with three other people to fight Dr. Junkenstein, Junkenstein’s monster, and other eerie and undead characters in an entirely new experience. You’re limited to Ana, Hanzo, McCree, and Soldier: 76, forcing you to think strategically. Naturally, there are also pumpkin-shaped Halloween loot boxes with special skins, sprays, and emotes. But, you don’t have to mindlessly and fanatically keep playing until November 1 in hopes you’ll randomly get the drop you wanted like in the Summer Games event. You can actually purchase specific Halloween event items. Which may even prove a better incentive to keep playing, since you’ll be trying to earn the exact item you want.

The Key to Overwatch’s Future Discovered?

Look at some other games that have kept themselves relevant long after launch thanks to such events. GTA Online pulls more people in every few months, thanks to Rockstar Games’ constant doling out of updates that add more things to do. Rocket League is always expanding with new cars, arenas, and modes. Team Fortress 2 is a game that never quits. It sure seems like Blizzard is doing the same thing with Overwatch .

Creating a great multiplayer game is one thing. Making one people will constantly return to and keep playing is another thing entirely. Blizzard put together something good with Overwatch , but continually delivering events is what’s going to make sure this game stays relevant for weeks and months to come. The Olympic and Halloween updates have already done a great job of keeping people coming back, and Blizzard has to keep that up to keep this game relevant.

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