I really did love Overwatch for a long time. It released right at the end of my junior year of high school, and I played the everliving shit out of it. It was the very first shooter game I actually felt compelled to play - I especially loved playing as Genji and D.Va, but the gameplay was intoxicating, like nothing I'd played before, as someone whose bread and butter was Pokémon, Zelda, and Fire Emblem. I got proficient, though I never really got good at, like, a competitive level. I cheered the cinematics and voraciously consumed all the content I could get my hands on. I really loved the Sombra ARG, especially when it culminated in her hero cinematic!
Still, I felt something was missing. PvP matches were fun, but the real draw for me had been the story. I wanted to play as these characters in a campaign mode, something that let me dig into the narrative; see, for all the cinematics that were releasing, not a lot had actually happened storywise. All the cinematics were backstory, not a plot advancement. I wanted a story, and the cinematics were like tantalizing bits of story on a string. I was hooked, and yet unsatisfied.
When the first Blackwatch Archives event dropped, I played it for as long as I could, until it went away at the end of the event. Slowly, the PvP began to grow repetitive, and I realized I wasn't having much fun anymore, just playing to earn my daily lootbox quota. So, imagine my excitement when they announced that they were, in fact, working on a PvE campaign mode! It seemed like everything I could want out of the game! So, I waited.
And I waited.
And I waited.
Until at last, Blizzard announced... that the PvE mode would be in a sequel, rather than a patch for the original game. Suffice to say, I was not exactly pleased. By the time the Blitzchung controversy rolled around in October 2019, I'd realized I wasn't enjoying the game anymore, I was only playing for the dopamine rush of loot boxes. So, I stopped. I figured if Overwatch 2's PvE looked good, I could always pick that back up. Besides, they said the two games would be interplayable, so if I got the hankering for PvP, I could just boot the base game back up.
So, this already isn't really a good look, is it? You promise an exciting feature will be added to the game, then announce that actually, it'll be its own game instead. It's not great, it's essentially paid DLC at that point, as opposed to an update.
In the run-up to the sequel's release, I started to get excited again... until the ABK scandals dropped. They're not really the point of this page, but they are why I uninstalled the base game. Nevertheless, I still kept a critical eye... and watched as they announced that Overwatch 2 would be a free-to-play game with a battle pass, the same predatory monetization system as Fortnite. In addition, they announced, the PvP would be different... and they'd be shutting down the original game's servers.
This was not ideal.
Nevertheless, 2022 came around, and the venerable Overwatch servers, which we had been promised would remain up for interplayability, were shut down. The original game I had fallen in love with was no more. Perhaps understandably, I was a little skeptical as Overwatch 2 launched... without the PvE mode. It was essentially just the first game, but worse, with the purely cosmetic loot boxes of the first game replaced with playable characters locked behind the battle pass. At this point, I was genuinely getting pissed off at what had happened to a franchise I genuinely cared about, and I wasn't alone. The playerbase was furious. Blizzard assured angry players that PvE was on its way, but patience was running thin... until it finally happened.
No, not the long-awaited PvE mode to advance the plot. No, Blizzard announced that the PvE mode was to be scrapped. It wasn't happening, and the most we would get was more Archives missions... in the battle pass. At this point, I had to wonder... what was even the point of making a sequel, then? Why not just keep updating the base game? There are two possible answers to this. The first is that there were genuine plans to make a PvE game, but the loss of key talent due to ABK's hostile work environment devastated the game and reduced it to the mess it is now. But if that were the case, and if PvE was the reason for making the sequel, they could have canceled Overwatch 2 and just kept updating the original game.
The other possible answer is that the PvE wasn't the real motive for making Overwatch 2, the battle pass was. That's not to say they were lying about the PvE, but rather that it was never their real priority like it was ours, so when it became infeasible to make, they just kept going. This, I think, is the true motive. Every strange pivot, from creating a sequel in the first place, to changing their minds on interplayability, to outright shutting down the old servers, to scrapping the PvE to focus on the battle pass, speaks to executive decisions to sacrifice art and story in the name of making money hand over fist.
Every response I've seen to this decision has been negative. Excitement for Overwatch 2 is completely, entirely gone. So, congratulations, Blizzard. You played yourself.
Not that they care, because they still raked it in from the battle pass.