Blizzard’s Upcoming ‘Overwatch 2’ Is Rolling Out Big Changes to First-Person Shooter Game

Brett Molina

The sequel to Blizzard’s popular first-person shooter “Overwatch” is going to look quite different.

On Thursday, the video game studio released details on “Overwatch 2” during a livestreamed event, and the most notable change to the video game is switching from teams of six players to five-person teams.

In the first “Overwatch,” players could run two of each of the game’s character types: Tank, Damage or Support.

In “Overwatch 2,” players will be limited to one tank per team. How they play will change, too. Instead of focusing on protecting teammates capable of dealing more damage, Tank characters will serve more as brawlers.

“Overwatch 2” is also dropping Assault game modes from Competitive playlists. In Assault, one team attempts to attack and capture two points on a map, while the other team defends it. Instead, Competitive playlists will feature a yet-to-be-revealed new game mode.

Currently, “Overwatch” has Arcade playlists for a more casual game, and Competitive playlists to allow players to “rank up” based on how well they play.

Specific heroes will receive changes as well, including Mei, whose icy blaster can slow down opponents, but will no longer freeze them in place. Also, Blizzard said Bastion, the charming robot that can transform into a deadly turret, is being “reviewed and reworked from the ground up.”

The game doesn’t have a firm release date yet. In a February quarterly earnings call, Activision-Blizzard said “Overwatch 2” is not going to launch this year.

Launched in 2016, “Overwatch” became one of the company’s most popular games, even spawning its own Overwatch League with professional esports teams representing cities worldwide.