Overwatch 2 will lock new heroes behind its battle pass, leaked details say

polygon.com:

Overwatch 2 will seemingly make a major change to how Blizzard Entertainment rolls out new heroes for the game, according to leaked details about the sequel’s battle pass design. Instead of being available to all players immediately when they launch, new heroes will be available to premium battle pass owners on release, while other players will unlock them by progressing through the free battle pass track — or outright paying for them.

Those leaked details also include the name of Overwatch’s next hero: Kiriko, a support-class character who has previously been teased in trailers for Overwatch2. Blizzard has not officially announced Kiriko, but has committed to adding a new support character for Overwatch 2’s launch in October.

New details about Overwatch 2 and its battle pass plans come from a description on Blizzard’s own website for the game’s Watchpoint Pack, a paid version of the free-to-play game that includes cosmetics, the season 1 premium battle pass, and other perks. Here’s a portion of that description, which Blizzard has since removed:

With the Season One Premium Battle Pass you can unlock over 80 tiers of rewards including Mythic Cyber Demon Genji, Legendary Hinotori Kiriko, and more. In addition, as a Season One Premium Battle Pass owner you will automatically receive access to Overwatch’s latest hero Kiriko!

Upon learning that new heroes might be locked behind the battle pass, fans expressed concerns about the change to how characters would be rolled out for Overwatch 2, pointing out that it runs contrary to the game’s design — switching heroes and counter-picking heroes mid-game is built into the game’s design, and all players not having access to all heroes would impact gameplay. That was the reasoning