Overwatch 2 review – a heroic shooter sequel

metro.co.uk:

Blizzard’s team-based FPS has gone free-to-play, with new maps, characters, and the dreaded battle pass – but is it a change for the better?

There’s an understandable undercurrent of anger running throughout the Overwatch community at the moment. Players are displeased that, despite paying good money for their Overwatch games, the original has been officially disabled and is now inaccessible. Some fans of the series, under the impression that the game would be around forever, had purchased it for more than one platform and now find themselves with several useless game discs lying around the house.

Does it matter that Blizzard has said that if you paid for the original Overwatch, you will automatically unlock all the heroes in Overwatch 2? To some diehard fans it might not make a difference, they’ve still been locked out of content they purchased once upon a time, in good faith that it would remain around for years to come.

To others, this is a meaningful and important gesture. They don’t have to grind to be able to select their favourite heroes from the original game, and that brings with it a level of satisfaction but also of superiority. ‘I was here before you,’ the veteran players will cry. The community is, at best, toxic and, at worst, just outright nasty and the new player experience in Overwatch 2 does nothing to close that gap, but rather it segments the ‘originals’ and the ‘newbies’.

Overwatch 2 has broadly the same gameplay and game modes as its predecessor, wrapped up in a shiny new package. Its first person shooter mechanics have never been unusual in themselves, even if the original did coin the phrase ‘hero shooter’, to describe the fighting game style designs and set-ups for its characters.

The former 6v6 modes