Overwatch 2’s PvE Hero Mode Has Been Cancelled to Focus on Live Game

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Overwatch 2's long-awaited PvE Hero mode has been scrapped. During a developer livestream detailing the roadmap for the game, executive producer Jared Neuss confirmed that the work on the PvE Hero mode — involving talent trees and long-term power progression — is no longer in their plans. Understandably, it's disappointing for the fans since that PvE mode, announced in 2019, was the main draw for the switch to Overwatch 2 — in addition to the adjacent multiplayer casual and competitive modes. The former was meant to push Overwatch's lore forward by having players team up with others and partake in various missions — akin to the Uprising and Retribution events in the first game.

The advertised PvE Hero mode was supposed to be an always-available mode that would let players gather XP through repeated playthroughs, granting a player's choice of hero special buffs, by way of an RPG. Some of those abilities were never even present in Overwatch at the time because overpowered abilities had no effect on online matchmaking — it was restricted to PvE only. Following that, Overwatch 2 suffered multiple delays, with Blizzard confirming last year that the Hero mode will be available at a later date, and going forward with shipping the game with a robust online play system.

“Development on the PvE experience has not really hasn't made the progress that we have hoped,” Neuss said in the live stream. “There's brand new enemies that are super fun to fight and some truly great and ridiculous hero talents. But unfortunately, the effort required to pull all of that together into a Blizzard-quality experience that we can ship to you is huge, and there really is no end in sight or defined kind of end date where we can put that out into the