It’s likely you’ve heard of Overwatch, the arena shooter that became a hit last year thanks to its colourful cast of characters and addictive multiplayer action. And it seems that Blizzard is nowhere near done adding content to the game, as game director Jeff Kaplan recently appeared in a video to tell us a bit more about what’s coming to Overwatch in 2018.
And one thing we can expect is for Blizzard to hold another event such as last year’s Year of the Rooster, which likely was popular with Overwatch fans worldwide. This means you’ll have an opportunity to get new gear and skins for your in-game character when Blizzard launches this year’s Lunar New Year event (the “Year of the Dog”). It also appears that last year’s lore-based Uprising event will be returning in some form this year as well.
Although players who fear they might end up missing any of these events, Jeff Kaplan says the game’s loot boxes are going to be overhauled so that these include “a ton of new content”. This extra loot box content will be available all the time and not only during Overwatch events such as the Year of the Rooster, meaning all players will be able to get hold of these in-game items this year.
Other content coming to the game in 2018 includes new maps such as the theme-park based map Blizzard World, which will be available in the game pretty soon according to Kaplan. Those who enjoy hunting for Easter eggs are likely to love this map, as Overwatch’s director says it is filled with tons of these, and also that this will be “a really fun and competitive hybrid map”.
Also, Blizzard is looking to continue Overwatch’s story this year, meaning more cinematic videos could be on the way, and hopefully these will be as great as earlier ones such as those for characters like Tracer and Reinhardt. And speaking of characters, Overwatch director Jeff Kaplan also teased that a new character (hero 27) is currently undergoing internal testing. This means it’s likely we will soon be able to play as this new character, which Kaplan says is “much needed”.
This means hero 27 (whoever he or she is) will likely address some of the game’s current imbalances and make Overwatch more fun to play for both casual and more serious players too. Actually, those who enjoy competitive play will be happy to know that Blizzard will be tweaking and improving this aspect of Overwatch in 2018 as well.
Overwatch fans have a lot to look forward to this year then, and it’s clear that we can expect Blizzard to support their multiplayer shooter for a long time to come as the company has done with their earlier games like StarCraft, Diablo and others in the past.