The story of Overwatch is finally moving forward with the announcement of Overwatch 2 at BlizzCon this past weekend. When exactly the Overwatch 2 release date will be though is still up in the air.
The official story on the Overwatch 2 release date
On stage at BlizzCon, Jeff Kaplan said, “Overwatch 2 still has a ways to go.” He explained that a lot of the content that was shown at BlizzCon is still subject to change, like the new Push mode. Kaplan urged fans to be patient by saying, “Just let us make it great. That’s what we care about more than anything.”
It was also said that Blizzard would go dark on the game after BlizzCon, so we don’t expect to hear anything about it for a while. In a separate interview with VG247 at BlizzCon, Kaplan said that they aren’t trying to keep the Overwatch 2 release date a secret. Rather, the development team genuinely doesn’t know when the game will be ready for release.
He said, “I know it’s a lame answer, I’m super sorry, and it’s not like this top-secret thing that (is) the last thing we want to tell players. It’s just that we don’t know.
“What’s important to us at Blizzard, on all our games, is that the game is awesome and the players are like ‘Yes, this is ready and now’s the time.’ I don’t have a date, It’s not this year, that’s a pretty safe answer. I have a feeling we’ll be talking about Overwatch 2 again next year at BlizzCon. If that helps.”
The world needs new heroes
It’s already been confirmed that Sojourn will be joining the roster of heroes in Overwatch 2. There’s a lot of speculation about Echo, the flying omnic we see in the “Zero Hour” cinematic, being released at the same time. Jeff Kaplan has said that there will be multiple characters at launch, but not 21 like there were with Overwatch. He thought that was “excessive” and “disruptive” to the game.
This leaves Overwatch in a very awkward position. No new heroes or maps are coming out until the new game launches. So, players are going to have to entertain themselves with what they have in the game right now. Is that going to be enough to sustain them until the unknown Overwatch 2 release date?
