As players encouraged T.W.O., the mode’s robotic companion, to push his barricades through winding streets, they took fights seemingly everywhere. Players emerged from tunnels to trade blows on stairwells or split up and rolled into a set of archways to cut off the enemy team. It was clear from the footage we saw that the era of obnoxious, fortified choke points appears to be over.
More understandable UI and gameplay
While Overwatch seems intuitive for those who have been around for years, parts of the game can be downright confusing for new players. Various additions to the user interface (UI) of the game, as well as new map and sound cues, should allow players to pick up Overwatch 2 more quickly. 먹튀검증
On the Push map, progress can be tracked using a bar at the top of the screen, much like in base Overwatch. This tracker, however, clearly shows the direction the “payload” is being pushed and who is in the lead. Checkpoints are evenly spaced out instead of placed at random spots on the map, making the mode feel more intuitive.
We got a lot of looks at individual UI screens of players that have updated images and notifications. If a player is being healed or damage boosted by Mercy, for example, an icon will show her status and her location relative to the receiving player. Elimination notifications are smaller in the center of the screen to detract less from gameplay.
Sound design is also crafted for a more player-friendly experience. When a teammate is eliminated, a chime now plays, an effect taken directly from elimination arcade modes and PvE events in base Overwatch. This allows you to tell, without even looking at the kill feed, how quickly the fight may be lost. It’s a small change that will immensely help new players.
Damage-heavy fighting
“For me, it felt like every character was a DPS,” said Los Angeles Gladiators tank Indy “SPACE” Halpern during the Watchpoint pre-show. After seeing the exhibition match, that assessment seems to be correct.
Every hero, from supports to tanks, appeared to dive directly into the fight in Overwatch 2. In base Overwatch, many heroes tend to hang back for fear of elimination; in this iteration, players like Jung “Closer” Won-sik of the Washington Justice turned Mercy into a devastating dealer of both healing and death. Even sneaky Sombras consistently ended up on the payload fighting it out instead of gingerly trying to eliminate supports in backlines.
Fights also happened more consistently and more chaotically, at least in the Push mode we saw. “We were just going at it, respawn after respawn,” SPACE said. “[We had] nonstop battles.”
Tuning not included
When mere mortals and developers showed off PvP modes during a February livestream, some of the new hero reworks seemed balanced and fair for everyone involved. Now that professionals have taken a crack at some heroes, it’s immediately obvious that intensive tuning needs to be done before Overwatch League starts up again in April.
