Tag Archives: Blizzard Entertainment

New Overwatch 2 Heroes Will Be Easier To Unlock For Free

Image: Blizzard / Kotaku / Pablo Wilson (Shutterstock)

Free-to-play shooter Overwatch 2 is launching Season 2 tomorrow and with it a brand new tank character, Ramattra. And like last time, you can either buy the premium battle pass to unlock the new hero instantly or you can grind the free path to eventually gain access to him. But this time, following complaints from players, Blizzard is making that second option easier.

Released earlier this fall, Blizzard’s hero-based competitive shooter hasn’t had a great first few months. Between server issues, bugs, characters being removed from the game, pricey skins, and issues with crossplay and support mains, well it’s been a giant mess.

One of the most controversial issues involved Kiriko, a new support character added in the game’s first season. If you bought the battle pass, you got the new hero instantly. However, for players who didn’t buy the pass, you’d have to grind to level 55 to unlock her. Considering how much of a slog it was to level up the battle pass, not many were happy about this. Leveling up the pass took a long time, and involved playing a lot of matches and completing boring or specific challenges—like pin five enemies with Orisa’s spear—that didn’t pay out much XP. Now, ahead of Season 2’s launch tomorrow, Blizzard is promising an easier path to unlocking its new tank for free.

Blizzard

On Twitter, Overwatch 2 game director Aaron Keller tweeted that Blizzard had reviewed data from Season 1 and decided to move Ramattra from tier 55 to tier 45 in the battle pass. And some challenges will be made “easier” to complete.

“Hey, all! Quick update on some changes coming to Season 2,” said Keller. “After reviewing data for Season 1, we’re moving Ramattra into Tier 45 of the Battle Pass and making a few more weekly challenges easier to complete. Excited for you all to see everything new in Season 2 starting tomorrow!”

This is part of Blizzard’s ongoing efforts to make progression in the shooter “more rewarding.” Of course on Twitter, players were mixed. While many seemed happy about the change, others were still upset that the hero was locked behind such a high tier of the pass, suggesting a lower tier would be better.

Now, it should be noted that unlike in the original Overwatch—which added all characters for free for all players with no restrictions—Ramattra will still be locked behind a paywall unless you grind. But at least now the grind will be less terrible and once you hit 45 you can stop focusing on challenges and the battle pass and just enjoy your new character. Well, unless Blizzard removes him like Mei or Bastion for a few weeks.



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Blizzard Hears Fans On Overwatch 2 Battle Pass Complaints Slug

Image: Blizzard

One of the most contentious things about Overwatch 2 has been the beloved hero shooter’s shift from paid game to free-to-play download supported by grindy battle passes. Blizzard now says it wants to address those concerns moving forward, ironing out the game’s progression in future seasons so that players feel “more rewarded just for sitting down and playing.”

“For Season 3 and beyond, we’re looking at a mix of Battle Pass changes, more interesting Challenges to pursue, and more exciting play-focused progression systems for you all to dig into. We’ll be able to talk about some of these changes soon, but other changes may take more time to lock-in,” recently hired executive producer, Jared Neuss, wrote in a new update.

In the meantime, Season 2, which starts on December 6 and adds Ramattra, will see each new dedicated event introduce its own unique skin that can be unlocked just by playing. Twitch drops, which give players access to new cosmetics by watching their favorite Overwatch 2 streamers, will continue as well. I don’t think this will satisfy the game’s most vocal critics immediately, but it’s at least an acknowledgement that the status quo isn’t sustainable.

Read More: 7 Tips For Overwatch 2 Beginners Determined To Win

Since the game launched, players have been frustrated by new heroes being locked behind the paid battle pass, the length of time it takes to rank it up, and the high prices of all the skins. The current state of affairs has even had some players pining for the loot boxes from the first game. And all of this has only been compounded by broken characters, delayed patches, and random bugs like a recent glitch that kept some players unable to progress in ranked play.

For now, Blizzard is working on awarding support players more XP to incentivize them to pick that role and help alleviate queue times. Overwatch 2 is also currently handing out Sojourn, Junker Queen, and Kiriko highlight intros for those who log in during certain time periods over the next week. Blizzard has even turned on crossplay aim assist for console players in all modes except competitive because the alternative was a “bad experience.”

“Players who’ve stuck with us, players who’ve returned, and players who are just now jumping in the fun—thank you for playing Overwatch 2,” Neuss wrote today. “We have an incredible community, and I hope that by opening up about what we’re thinking more, we can keep growing together.”

     

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Overwatch 2 Players Are Asking “Where is Mauga?” After Blizzard Announces New Tank

Since Blizzard confirmed earlier this week that they would be announcing Overwatch 2‘s new hero this week during the Overwatch League Grand Finals, many players assumed that the previously teased character Mauga would finally be joining the roster. Teased in the past by developers as being in the works (the early kit development being considered for Mauga ended up becoming Sigma and his abilities), and appearing throughout the Baptiste short story “What You Left Behind” including in art,” fan hype for a Mauga reveal was off the charts. Then Blizzard revealed the new tank would be none other than Omnic leader Ramattra.

After years of teasing, and plenty of theorizing about what Mauga would bring to the world of Overwatch, fans were gifted with the news that their expectations were incorrect all along. Despite teases of Mauga in the past, no confirmation that the character was on the way was ever teased, but that hasn’t stopped Overwatch 2 players from asking where Mauga is at and posting some hilarious memes about how they were expecting the character all day. We’ve collected some of the best reactions to the news that Mauga wasn’t the new tank below.

All that we know about Mauga is that he was originally conceived as a tank, and we can only assume that he will still be one when he eventually is added to the game. In the Baptiste short story Mauga refers to himself as a “big dumb brute” with the support character calling him “like a demon.” In the previously released art of the two Mauga appears to be in the Heavy Assault armor, appearing alongside Baptiste during his Talon days. A new piece of dialogue between Baptiste and Sombra in Overwatch 2 confirms that Mauga is still alive, setting the stage for his eventually release in the game.

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Server Errors Plague Overwatch 2 Players During Halloween Event

I’m sorry, player, I’m afraid I can’t let you play this game.
Image: Blizzard / Kotaku

Right now there’s a Halloween event running for Overwatch 2, but a fair amount of players are facing a different kind of terror: A previously known server error with the code “LC-208” appears to be disproportiantely hitting players after the most recent update.

While server and connection errors often happen for online games, “Overwatch 2 Console Error LC-208” is currently plaguing a large number of players on console, preventing them from connecting to servers and playing the game. Blizzard has its own steps for working around this issue, as it’s been around since the launch of the game, though not in such numbers. Until Blizzard issues a broader statement or additional fix, players have been discovering quirky, unexplainable ways to fix it, involving signing in on PC first or loading into the game’s firing range and quitting before hitting matchmaking, though these aren’t necessarily bullet-proof prescriptions.

Kotaku has reached out to Blizzard for comment but didn’t hear back prior to publication.

Since yesterday’s Halloween update, search results on Twitter, Reddit, and even Overwatch 2’s own forums have started turning up countless reports of players not being able to enter the game. The problem, given the error code’s info, seems to hit console players only. Anecdotally it seems to be hitting PS4 and PS5 players the most, though many Xbox players are reportedly facing the error as well.

A main thread for the LC-208 issue in Blizzard’s official forums, with nearly 300 replies and over 2,500 views, starts with “LC-208’d after the Halloween event update. Never had an issue with this before. Can’t get into the game.” “I tried everything to fix the Login Error LC-208” Twitter user Phish (no, not the band) says. “I have signed out of my battle net account, restarted my [router], restarted my game, used a different wireless connection, tried using ethernet, and redownloaded the game and I am still getting LC-208.”

They’re not alone, as countless tweets and Reddit threads read similarly. Some have found non-optimal workarounds. Twitter user hatsune niiku reports bypassing the LC-208 error on console by entering the game’s firing range on PC, closing the game, and then logging in on console. “Worked for me just now,” they say.

Sadly, not everyone has a gaming PC at the ready to try this out, nor is it an actual fix for the problem. Blizzard recommends the following steps for solving LC-208 error. Hopefully it will work out for you:

If your console account is linked with your Battle.net account, you need to have a BattleTag. If you have a BattleTag but your accounts are not linked, follow the connection steps linked below to resolve the error.

Note: If your Battle.net account is connected to your console account, disconnecting it and reconnecting can resolve the error.

1. Check your network configuration to find any issues with your firewall, router, or port settings.

2. Reset your network devices to make sure your router hasn’t become flooded with data.

3. If you’re using a wireless connection, optimize your internet connection to rule out a connection issue.

4. Run your console’s built-in connection test (Playstation 4) (Xbox One) (Nintendo Switch).

5. Use your console’s internet browser to run a Looking Glass test. This will help determine if the problem is between your console and our servers.



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Overwatch 2 Apologizes For Launch With Free Reaper Skin & More

Screenshot: Activision Blizzard

Last night, after many players found themselves unable to access a dozen or more members of their Overwatch 2 rosters, and following a week of non-stop issues, I saw angry fans demanding that Blizzard make it right by rewarding them for their wasted time. And Blizzard acknowledged just a couple of days ago that the developer knew the launch period for the hero shooter was “frustrating” for many. In an effort to ease these ongoing tensions, Blizzard has now issued both a status update and will be giving out some free goodies on top of that.

The developer continues to work on stabilizing the game, Blizzard says, and a patch for Overwatch 2 should be hitting sometime later this week. No specifics beyond that, but based on conversations I’ve had with other players, it seems that things like account merging, and connection issues continue to hurt the game. Some are even getting banned temporarily from ranked modes because of the disconnects, while others are seeing their games crash after getting achievements. And, as of this writing, characters like Torbjorn and Bastion still aren’t available in all Overwatch 2 modes as Blizzard tinkers with their bugged abilities. There’s a lot going on.

The game is in a much better place than before, of course, when it wasn’t even possible to log into the game at all. But the list of issues players have encountered since launch is impressive. Perhaps this is why Blizzard is feeling generous right now, compared to how stingy the general Overwatch 2 Battle Pass is.

Here’s Blizzard on what you can expect if you’ve logged into the game anytime between launch and October 25th:

We apologize for any issues players experienced around the game’s launch. To help make up for any lost time, we’re planning to run several Double Match XP weekends: we will confirm the specific dates for these soon. We’ll also be giving all players who log in from October 25 through to the end of Season One an all-new Cursed Captain Reaper Legendary skin and a Health Pack Weapon Charm. These items will become part of your collection from the first time you log in during that time window.

So if you log in and suddenly get bombarded with some gifts, this is why! Tough shit, anyone who doesn’t play Reaper. Let’s just hope nothing unfortunate happens this time. Making a live service game is no easy thing, and I don’t envy the developers who are likely pulling long nights right now. So far, though, it seems like any time Blizzard tries fixing something in Overwatch 2, something else gets borked. For now, though, take a peek at the health pack that you can use as a charm on your guns without having to drop any money on those microtransactions:

Screenshot: Activision Blizzard

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Overwatch 2 Is Buggier Than Blizzard Is Admitting

Illustration: Activision Blizzard

After a very rough launch week, Overwatch 2 seems to be finally finding its legs. Big issues such as server stability, SMS authentication, and automatic skin purchases have been improved, fixed, or are in the process of getting adjusted. However, there are still tons of individual issues with Overwatch 2 characters that have gone unaddressed. Some of them are frustrating. Others are hilarious, and I hope that Blizzard never fixes them.

Understandably, Blizzard is focusing its resources on addressing the major errors that affect the broadest swath of players. And I’ll eat my shoes if their QA testers hadn’t already caught most, if not all of these major bugs before launch. But it still would have been nice if Blizzard at least acknowledged some of these gameplay issues on their pinned post of known bugs and issues. So instead of finding out from Blizzard, I found them on social media. Let’s go over them.

Damage-dealer Mei can create an ice wall, which she can use for cover or to platform her way to higher structures. Unfortunately, jumping on top of these structures in Overwatch 2 will cause her to rubber band. For those not in the know, rubberbanding refers to a lag that occurs between the game server and your local software. This can give the impression that a character is teleporting instantly from one location to another. Overwatch players have been uploading videos of Mei teleporting instantly on top of her ice wall after a brief delay. Players have also found that her wall behaves inconsistently. It allows her to fall out of bounds, and Mei players have reported being able to phase through it.

Since Mei is a less popular character, fans feel slighted by Blizzard’s unwillingness or inability to fix her ability before launch. The bug felt especially disappointing because her old freeze ability had been removed, which was an important aspect of her play style.

Bastion mains on the other hand, are having the time of their lives. Within the span of his ultimate ability, he allows you to spam artillery at his opponents when you right click very fast. The buff will likely be nerfed in the near future. For now, Bastion mains will still be able to rain terror on their opponents.

There’s also been other unresolved issues outside of gameplay. Ashe players report that she T-poses when sitting or wearing a specific skin, though it’s possible that sitting in general is bugged right now. And Cassidy’s victory pose looks a lot more suggestive when he’s twirling the air instead of his pistol. It’s less that any one of the issues is catastrophic than it is that, alongside the other wide issues and a more sparse game overall (like in the post-match results, or the number of maps that are gone now), it’s left some players calling Overwatch 2 more of an “early access” or unfinished experience than anticipated. Even minor details, like the UI, are being picked apart for not being perfectly flush right now. Other issues, like players getting booted from games or having their game crash entirely after earning achievements, have persisted since last week.

Sit tight: Blizzard will likely get to character-specific bugs once it’s done with putting out server-wide fires or bugs that affect every player in the game. For now, we can still laugh at Overwatch 2 players getting absolutely obliterated by Bastion’s infinite missiles.

Update 7:40 p.m. EST: Blizzard has announced that both Bastion and Torbjorn will be taken out of the game temporarily as the developer addresses “a few bugs” in their ability kits. Presumably, this is in response to the reported issues with Bastion’s infinite ult, though in the case of Torbjorn, it seems to do with his Overloaded ability, which reportedly could be used twice in succession. Bastion won’t be available at all during this time, while Torbjorn can only be played in quick play (meaning, no ranked.)



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Overwatch 2 ‘Launch Experience Has Been Frustrating’

Image: Activision Blizzard

Overwatch 2 has not been having a good time. After undergoing two attacks by external parties that made it nearly impossible to play, the hero shooter came under fire for its bad cell phone policy. Then, many had issues trying to play Overwatch 2 with friends. Blizzard worked to ease these pains, axing the phone requirement outright and allowing more players to experience the sequel as the week went on, but not before some extended downtime on Thursday night. By Friday, fans had discovered a chat bug that randomly spent their real-world money on the shop. Now it’s the evening, and to kick the weekend off, Blizzard has another update.

In a new status update post, Blizzard expressed gratitude that fans have been “patient” through this entire saga, and while there are some welcome improvements now, the game’s larger status update is still kind of a mixed bag.

Effective immediately, console players who have a linked Battle.net account since June 9, 2021, along with any PC players with tied accounts, won’t need a cell phone, Blizzard announced in the status update. In an email, a Blizzard spokesperson clarified that totally new players to Overwatch 2, however, would need a phone number still, so the requirement isn’t totally gone.

While Blizzard says that it is making progress on things like account merging issues, along with players unable to access their purchased Watchpoint Pack on consoles, the developer states that some may still experience hiccups. There’s still a queue for the former problem, and in the case of the latter issue, PlayStation owners in particular may not see the product in their inventories. A fix is reportedly set to roll out later tonight. Some may still experience those pesky login issues, too, but Blizzard made it sound like this is now a much smaller stumbling block for the game.

Perhaps the most ironic bullet point in the status update is what has replaced the login issue. Here’s Blizzard, explaining how by improving one thing, players might now see a worse experience elsewhere:

Now that we’ve increased capacity and have a higher player concurrency, matchmaking systems are being affected, which means you may be seeing a wait before being placed in a match. We are changing configurations within this system today and hope to somewhat shorten that wait throughout the day. We will continue looking into the matchmaking queues through the weekend to identify any additional improvements we can make.

At least you can be inside the game while waiting, though.

Blizzard knows that fans might be frustrated after the week that’s just transpired In the send-off to this update, after thanking players and acknowledging that the game has undergone a tough launch, Blizzard wrote:

We deeply appreciate your patience and thank you for your support, and we are laser focused on improving the Overwatch 2 experience for all players.

For now, it seems as if Overwatch players will have to hang tight until next week to see more meaningful changes beyond the ones slated to hit the game later tonight.

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Overwatch 2 Chat Bug Is Randomly Buying Skins From The Shop

Image: Blizzard

Though Overwatch 2’s wait times have seemingly improved after maintenance on the game’s servers last night, you still might want to wait a bit if you’re looking for an entirely bug-free experience—especially if you don’t like bugs that might be spending premium currency on hero skins without your consent while using the in-game chat.

Though it’s not clear how common the issue is, it seems to have been hitting users since launch, if not earlier. The underlying issue appears to be that, while using the chat in a menu, the game keystrokes are still registered by the other menu options, meaning you could navigate your way to the store and end up buying a skin while you’re text chatting with friends. Posts about this on the game’s Bug Report forum go back to May, calling attention to it during the beta. Other posts have gone up since the game’s official release, and a rising post on Reddit is seeing others chime in with tales of their accounts also inadvertently buying premium hero skins.

Approaching 1,000 upvotes on Reddit, user Dracyoshi’s post lays out the issue directly. “I was chatting with some friends while browsing the hero gallery when the game unexpectedly began unlocking Junker Queen’s Plutonium skin,” they said. They go on to speculate that text typed into the chat is “occasionally misinterpreted by the game [as] an input for navigating the menu.”

Though they followed up with Blizzard support on the issue, there’s no indication that refunds or changes are on the way. Dracyoshi told Kotaku that, since posting, Blizzard still hasn’t resolved the issue and maintains that it won’t issue refunds for purchases made with in-game currency as far as this case is concerned.

Scrolling through the thread on Dracyoshi’s post reveals other players echoing the same issue. “My friend was a victim of this bug,” reads one comment, “accidentally purchased Kirkos legendary for 1900 credits while trying to chat.” “Oh my god this happened to me twice,” reads another, “I thought I was going crazy.”

For now, it seems like best practice is to follow Dracyoshi’s advice and not “use the in-game chat while in the hero gallery until it’s fixed.”

Kotaku has reached out to Blizzard for comment.

 

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Blizzard Announces Free Kiriko Amidst Battle Pass Controversy

Image: Blizzard

Blizzard just announced that the new (and widely leaked) ninja character Kiriko will be free for all Overwatch 2 players who already own a copy of the original Overwatch. While that seems like cause to celebrate, the controversial, free-to-play sequel’s move to lock access to most future characters behind a battle pass system has been less well received. In new comments being reported today, Blizzard leaders explained why they think the new system will ultimately prove acceptable.

“What we actually see in the data is that a majority of players in Overwatch have a majority of their play time on two or fewer heroes.“ Jon Spector, a VP of Overwatch, told assorted press during a media call. “And you can get to 99.9% of play time for a majority of our players with 12 or fewer heroes.”

So that’s the official line on why Blizzard feels justified transitioning from the original Overwatch’s model of giving every character to all players to a system that locks new heroes away behind a battle pass: Original Overwatch players didn’t play enough different characters, so they probably won’t miss them.

But there’s a bit of mixed messaging going on. The characters are still the core of how Blizzard is monetizing the new game. Overwatch’s general manager Walter Kong told the press at an event that, “Heroes are the single most engaging content that we have in the game…We want to be able to continually invest in this live game service. From the perspective of the business, this isn’t free.”

To be sure, there will be some starter freebies for both new and returning players. The new heroes Sojourn and Junker Queen will be free unlocks for all season one players, and the ninja support character Kiriko will be free to players who own the original Overwatch.. But new players who want to try Kiriko will either have to pay $10 for the premium battle pass or grind the free one all the way up to level 55. At least they’ll still be able to play all 32 characters from the original roster.

Read More: Everything Shown During The Overwatch 2 ‘Reveal’ Event

Kiriko is a healer who can deal decent critical damage and support her allies in the midst of a shootout, and she’s been described as a “battle healer” for Genji mains. This hints at a major change in how Blizzard will be designing new heroes, in that it’s actively trying to prevent situations in which any one character can act as a “hard counter” to another.

“We’re trying to take some of those really hard rock, paper, scissors interactions out of the game, and [replace] them with more player choice,” game director Aaron Keller told Polygon. “We’ve buffed our support heroes to make them more survivable.”

While lessening how dependent Overwatch is on counters generally sounds like a positive move, locking an ever-increasing proportion of the hero roster behind battle pass tiers, free or premium alike, feels like a step backward for player choice.

Overwatch 2 will be released on October 4 this year.

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Fan Spends Six Years Remaking Never-Released Warcraft Game

Gif: Blizzard / DerSilver83 / Kotaku

Years ago, a never-officially-released Warcraft point-and-click adventure game developed by Blizzard in the late ‘90s was leaked online. While the game was completely playable back then, its cutscenes were low-quality, highly compressed, not perfectly synced to the audio, and a few were even just straight up missing from the leak. Now, after years of working on it, someone has remastered all the cutscenes, fixed them up, and made it easier to experience this bit of video game history.

As spotted by Indie Retro News and PC Gamer, modder DerSilver83 recently released the finished 1.0 release of WACRP (Warcraft Adventures Cutscenes Remastered Project). The mod contains 20 completely remastered cutscenes, including two which didn’t actually exist in the initial leak but appeared later on via a different DVD leak.

You can see an example of what this mod and its improved cutscenes look like in the video below:

DerSilver83 / Blizzard

A lot of work went into this release, according to the modder and the project’s website. Apparently, DerSilver83 hand-removed all the compression artifacts from all of the cutscenes. The modder also used Photoshop to painstakingly redraw entire frames and assets, frame-by-frame. Continuity issues have also been fixed and some new transitional scenes have been created entirely from scratch. All audio was also synced and everything now runs at the correct 12fps.

All told, DerSilver83 says they have been working on this mod for about six years, and this latest 1.0 release represents the end of the project. They explained in a post on July 31 that they have done all they can in what they call a “reasonable timeframe” and are happy with the end results.

“I want to remember this project as something fun before it transforms into some kind of a burden,” said DerSilver83 on the project’s site. “So this is it. The final release of my Cutscenes Remaster Project and I hope everybody who uses it can enjoy it as much as I do. I always wanted to create a substantial mod for a game I love and I can finally say that I have achieved (or at least tried) that.”

To actually play this, you’ll need to do some searching around the internet to find the appropriate files needed to play the full game, as this mod only contains the remastered cutscenes and nothing else.

In the meantime, you can read more about Warcraft: Lord of The Clans via this great story from our own Luke Plunkett.

 

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