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Overwatch’s announcement trailer, launched again in 2014, was bombastic and delightful, and it kicked off a fervent fandom. Gamers beloved the intense designs, robust characterization, and optimism inherent to the setting. The sport’s launch and follow-up cinematics solely solidified this fan base; individuals beloved to ship characters, think about their missions, and daydream about future lore. Overwatch was so widespread and iconic it even revolutionized the Rule 34 scene; the sport was in all places.
Then, simply as out of the blue, it vanished. The lore slowed to a trickle after 2018 and finally got here to a whole cease, together with main additions — we haven’t seen a brand new hero since 2020. Now, on the cusp of Overwatch 2’s PvP getting into beta and a brand new Overwatch League season, the sport must be poised for a triumphant return. As an alternative, it’s on shakier floor than ever, and different builders have snatched the momentum from Blizzard and ran with it as a substitute.
Open the floodgates
Overwatch didn’t invent the concept of constructing a hero shooter round robust characters proven off by cinematics. Valve’s Group Fortress 2 and its “Meet the Group” cinematics nonetheless maintain up almost 15 years later, they usually’re far much less complicated and elaborate than Overwatch’s trailers.
However Overwatch’s utopian near-future and various forged attracted a fan base that had been traditionally underserved by the first-person shooter style. Communities of ladies and queer players gathered across the sport; a few of them had been there largely for the gameplay, whereas others had been there for the lore and characters above all else.
Overwatch was, throughout its heyday, a respectable cultural phenomenon. The attractive cinematics, vibrant character design, and hints at a bigger narrative impressed an enormous fandom. Folks cosplayed Overwatch characters and their skins, created fan artwork, wrote lengthy fanfiction epics, collaborated on 3D animations of their very own unique heroes, and extra. These gamers had been the center of Overwatch fandom, enjoying the sport and letting it gasoline their imaginations.
The affect of Overwatch is obvious in lots of its rivals. Character rosters really feel extra essential than ever; simply having a sequence of gun guys with mysterious backstories doesn’t minimize it anymore. Apex Legends, Rainbow Six Siege, and Valorant are all nice examples of video games the place a personality’s aesthetics, personalities, and background matter as a lot as their gameplay. Different builders now create and promote characters like Valorant’s Neon, a Filipina speedster; Rainbow Six Siege’s trans operator Osa, and nonbinary Apex Legends character Bloodhound.
Overwatch would lose out to those different titles within the coming years, not due to its roster or its lore, however due to the dearth of consistency round it.
Plot, pacing, and goal
Overwatch arrange huge, dramatic dominos — after which proceeded to simply gesture at them and say “Fairly cool, huh?” There have been huge mysteries arrange from day one, like a climactic showdown at Overwatch’s Swiss HQ. Within the 2016 cinematic “Recall,” Winston presses the large crimson button to restart Overwatch. We don’t see Overwatch really go on a mission till the 2019 cinematic “Zero Hour,” which units up marketing campaign content material that at the moment has no launch date.
My private breaking level was the Storm Rising Archives occasion in 2019. This lore occasion culminated with a robotic man assembly with Doomfist, the chief of the terrorist group Talon. He agreed to hitch the trigger, then took off his hood to disclose … simply, like, a robotic man. I haven’t seen him earlier than or since. As an alternative of resolving something with the present forged, there’s a random new character with many extra mysteries concerned. I had waited months to search out this out, and all it actually left me to do was watch for extra solutions. I couldn’t do it anymore.
Whereas Overwatch stumbled, video games like Valorant and Apex Legends jumped within the hole. Valorant is about to launch six new heroes a 12 months, however extra importantly, Riot has demonstrated it could maintain a fandom.
Valorant, specifically, establishes a cushty “current” that followers can safely theorize about and picture characters in. There are huge story-heavy cinematics, however they’re additionally peppered with smaller items meant to arrange the second. You possibly can watch Raze dance round her hometown and take a manga-inspired have a look at Yoru’s typical day. A cinematic from January known as “Heat Up” exhibits a piece of the forged hanging out and having goal observe; there are not any narrative stakes, no confrontations, no epic storyline. It’s simply enjoyable banter and motion. Nothing is held in stasis ready for the story to click on collectively completely.
In the meantime, Overwatch followers would daydream about elements of the sport’s canon as they waited for the following set up within the story, solely to have their concepts concerning the previous or current contradicted later because the plot lurched ahead from disclose to reveal. Questions arrange about Reaper, all the way in which again in 2016, had been answered in a 2022 novella, however many followers had been dissatisfied with the solutions.
Too little, too late
On the finish of 2021, Blizzard lastly moved the Overwatch plot ahead. The corporate launched a sequence of comics displaying cowboy outlaw Cole Cassidy, beforehand named Jesse McCree, getting the gang again collectively. The character had been renamed in October, as Activision Blizzard eliminated references to builders and workers within the wake of a sexual harassment and gender discrimination lawsuit.
There was additionally the 2020 Tracer comedian, with a cute supporting forged, made by an artist I actually love. Nevertheless it’s too late! There’s solely so lengthy you possibly can bang on the pot with a ladle promising me the nice slop, solely delivering spoonfuls, earlier than I’m going and discover one other trough.
Overwatch’s lore has been in stasis for therefore lengthy, and its fandom has been so prepared to make a meal out of the crumbs sprinkled out over time, that I really feel just like the followers’ model of the forged is extra concrete than the precise canon. A Reaper brief story got here out and I used to be simply type of vaguely bemused all through. I don’t know who this man is, however he’s not Reaper to me.
It’s doable that Blizzard will have the ability to recapture the magic with Overwatch 2’s updates and upcoming PvE campaigns, and it’s additionally doable that the prepare has left the station. There was a quick, shining second in my life wherein I actually beloved Overwatch. Now, I simply really feel vaguely annoyed in direction of the franchise. There’s solely so lengthy you ask gamers to attend and see earlier than they only quit altogether.
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