In a recent developer live stream, Game Director Aaron Keller and Executive Producer Jared Neuss announced that the PvE mode of Overwatch 2 is canceled.
Overwatch 2 was launched as a free-to-play experience that brought in a bunch of balance changes, the most notable of which is the shift from 6v6 to 5v5 matches. Aside from some minor systematic differences, the main selling point of the sequel to the award-winning Blizzard hero shooter multiplayer game was the inclusion of a coop PvE mode with hero talent trees and long-term progression. Blizzard just confirmed that it won’t be coming anymore.
“We can’t deliver on that original vision for PvE that was shown in 2019,” said Neuss. He further explained that the team struggled to put in all the effort to develop the content with the “Blizzard-quality experience” that fans have come to expect.
“There really is no end in sight or defined end date” with development… So what that means is that we won’t be delivering that dedicated hero mode with talent trees, that long-term progression…those things just aren’t in our plans anymore,” said Neuss.
Moving forward, rather than a dedicated PvE release, the Overwatch 2 team will be including co-op experiences as part of the live roadmap with future updates. This includes story-based events, limited time modes (LTMs), and Hero Mastery Missions. “We want you to be able to experience it more often, and with more variety than we had originally announced,” Keller said.
For now, Overwatch 2 players can look forward to Season 5 which will be coming on June 13. This will bring in a new Questwatch event and Summer Games.
The first set of PvE story missions will be released on August 15 alongside Season 6. A new support character, map, and Hero mastery missions will be included. Season 7 will be bringing in a bunch of balance changes for Sombra and Roadhog alongside a brand-new tank hero.
This announcement is for sure a massive disappointment to fans. With the cancellation of the main PvE mode, Overwatch 2 has really solidified its infamous reputation of being just a glorified balance update that changed the monetization system into a much worse state.
Nevertheless, Overwatch 2 is still one of the most fun and tightly designed multiplayer experiences today. It runs great on consoles and is optimized near perfectly for PCs. It also has crossplay and is free to play. There’s no reason to not try it. Just ignore the fact that there’s a “2” in the name.