A Partial Analysis on why Overwatch was always a bad game.

[Echo]

The original Overwatch was already a bad game, and it never was a good game to begin with. The majority of people are just tired of Triple A devs being hacks, and Overwatch at least has style, which is enough for most bored gamers to enjoy.

Unfortunately for Blizzard, a bad game with a good paint job is still a bad game.

Let's talk core game design.
6v6 games with a roster of 20+ characters to choose from was stupid in MOBA gaming, and it's stupid here.
Team Size directly correlates to how important each team member is. If 1 player dies in a 2v2, that's half your team; in a 10v10, that's only a tenth. This importance puts extra pressure on players to perform optimally, which segways into the next part about team size:
Specialization Vs Generalization.
The ability to excel in many situations will always win out over specializing in a specific role, so long as the team sizes are small. When every player counts, you need to be able to quickly adapt to the situation, which is impossible if you've gimped yourself by picking a hyper-specific character.
(That's why everybody hates Hanzo, btw)
Meanwhile, larger team sizes afford enough of a buffer for players to specialize, which often makes teams even more effective when done properly.

Overwatch... completely and utterly fails to understand these concepts, and that incompetence bleeds into player frustration.
The fact that Overwatch had problems with [The Meta™] even before the reboot should've been a red flag. You could not play a casual game without forcing yourself to abide by what is optimal instead of fun, or you would be banned due to excessive reports.

This problem isn't even exclusive to Overwatch.
6v6 TF2 is straight up an inferior game for the exact same reasons, despite its classes being far more flexible. The only reason it's even remotely respected is because the base game is 12v12, so only competitive players have to deal with the flaws of 6v6.

One of the only games I've seen that get low team sizes right is CS:GO, and that's solely because nobody is tied to a specific class. Yes, the weapons can influence how you play the game, but you're not restricted to them in the slightest. It's just you, your team, and your enemy.
The other game I've seen pull this off well was the now defunct Magicka Wizard Wars. Every player had access to eight magical elements they could mix together for various effects and dueling with your magic was purely a test of skill, because you had access to the exact same tools as everyone else.

Everything regarding Blizzard's inability to "balance" the game, or their lies about PvE... it means nothing.
Overwatch itself was doomed to suck from the moment Blizzard chose 6v6, and they killed any hope for the game when they made it 5v5.
Overwatch SHOULD have been a massive 10v10 brawl at the smallest. It'd be a clusterf#ck, but it'd also force the Special Effects department to not just vomit neon colors everywhere and call it a job well done.

[Echo]

Originally posted by ()_T_N_T_)----*:

Sorry but calling ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ on the getting banned thing. I casualed harder than most on some cheese characters when i felt lazy after a day's work. Never got banned.. I've been muted plenty. Never banned.

So you must have done something during that time you just won't be a big enough person to admit it.

I did not use my mic, and rarely ever used chat. My only "sin" that I can even identify was trying to play Torb and Symmetra in casual lobbies, because I would get screamed at for "throwing" all the time.
Even when I swapped to Rein and did a fine job, I would get flamed.
That's it.

This community is too toxic for its own good. I may be an outlier, but I am not the only one dissatisfied with the game.

[Saana]

Your argument is basically pointing at games that succeeded with higher player count and lower roster per match than Overwatch. i could point at games that succeeded with lower player count and higher character roster such as Super Smash Bros franchise. Ironically, its also a highly competitive game, with little room for casual play.

What You forgot to incorporate in Your theory is the game design. BattleBit Remastered was designed to be cluster vs cluster. Super Smash Bros was designed to be 1v1, up to 4 players matches in any combination. Overwatch was designed to be a 6v6 game.
Lets say we put a 30v30 mode in Super Smash Bros Ultimate. Who knows, maybe that would be fun. But the maps are too small to fit 60 players at once, and the game would be a complete mess.
Similarly, if we put more heroes in an Overwatch match. it ends up becoming too difficult to gain control of the objective, as there will constantly be bodies on it. Before You finish all 30 players off, the first player who died would've probably respawned and be on the point again. The last thing You want is a perfect stall strategy due to an endless loop. Moreover, there would be very broken combos like 10 D. Va's timing Defense Matrix and absorbing almost all damage.
This example actually highlights why Overwatch failed. If You played in a 30v30 lobby, and had 10 D. Va's chaining Defense Matrix, You simply could not play a DPS character (except Symmetra who has a beam). You'd have to play a tank hero as a DPS. This design of forcing players to pick X hero to counter Y hero is just bad. This is why starting season 10, when Brigitte was released, the game quality declined rapidly. If they had a Brigitte, You physically could not play Genji or Tracer. In fact, most DPS could not do much against a Brigitte anyways. If they had a Sombra, You could not play a hero like Wrecking Ball. If they had McCree, You could not play Doomfist. If they picked double shield tanks, You had to play either Bastion + Symmetra, or Doomfist + Reaper.
Again, as i showed, going to more player count would not help this issue. In fact, i believe it would have made it even worse, as i have shown in this reply but also in previous reply.

Overwatch was designed to be a mix of an FPS and a MOBA. The hope was to unite Dota/LoL 2 and CS:GO/CoD players. But the game ended up being neither. In the GOAT and double shield META, hardly any hero required aim skills. So it was not an FPS. It lacked abundant mechanics and details that MOBAs were renowned for. Ultimately, it alienated both sides.
i could not say the same about the dive META. Most heroes required aim, even healers like Zenyatta and Lucio. FPS players were able to find a place in Overwatch, and some even argue that it is harder to aim in Overwatch than in CS:GO or Valorant. In the latter games, You can get far by just pre-placing Your crosshair. Overwatch is usually too dynamic to be able to even do that. If You blink as Tracer, or dash as Genji, there goes Your crosshair placement. Heroes can show up from the sky like Pharah, or from nowhere like Sombra. Some heroes have extremely high mobility like Lucio. Etc.
Overwatch also had the counterpick element that MOBAs were renowned for. The essential distinction between the dive META and GOAT/double shield META was that when You were countered in dive, it did not mean You had to switch or else You were griefing. For example, Widowmaker countered Pharah, but Pharah could've tried to evade Widowmaker's line of sight or do some other tricks so that the matchup was playable. In GOAT META though, if their team had a Brigitte, You realistically could not play Tracer, unless You were several dimensions above the Brigitte player. You realistically could not play Wrecking Ball if they had a Sombra. Etc.

i will come back and discuss the casual part another time.

[[Unintelligible]]

The guy roleplaying as Mercy with a cowboy hat on his Steam account will never read any of this. And he's behind like 30% of the shill accounts on this hub. Consider saying all of that in less than 10 words for him, thanks.

[Echo]

Originally posted by Saana:

Map design will always have a role to play in how the game feels, but drawing a comparison to FPS games and Fighting games feels like you're reaching.

The whole appeal of fighting games are the combos and maneuvering. The community-made Smash Fortress experimented with an FPS take on this, and it was... mixed.
Some game modes are just not meant to be mixed, or very tricky to do so correctly.

MOBAs are already a highly niche genre, only ever attracting the most tryhard players. The fact that it's the most popular "Esport" but one of the least popular casual games is honestly a pretty big detriment to Esports as a whole.

Real sports, like Soccer (the world's most popular sport of all time) can still be played casually 1-on-1 or even in large groups.
Meanwhile entire leagues are made for them with several government-recognized sanctions.
The difference between a real sport and an "Esport" is that toxic players can simply be benched or kicked out IRL. Esports? That only works if there is a proper distinction between casual and competitive, otherwise the people who play to win and those who play to play will constantly butt heads.

The fact is, Blizzard is ONLY concerning themselves with the competitive side with zero concern for the casual side. MOBA mechanics are already a pain in the @ss when done right. Why make the barrier of entry even harsher than it has to be?

[()_T_N_T_)----*]

Personally loved what I paid for back in the day that's now gone. I enjoyed 6v6. I enjoyed 2 tanks at once even as dps having 2 tanks separated people that have learned to get good from needs to get good. Enjoyed DPS doomfist.
List goes on for days why I enjoyed it. People who tend to say ow1 sucked were people who couldn't really compete cause they lacked imagination at engagement/tactics.


I enjoyed meis freeze, tbh not much was wrong with ow1. Really enjoyed Hammond. Wish the servers would have never went down.

Played my last day on the servers when everyone was "so excited" about it shutting down.. only thing going through my mind was "I know blizzard, they're just one big disappointment. If ow2 works better it will be a miracle"

Sure enough ow2 is worse, p2w, and a 💩 show not worth scraping my shoe on.

[Varenvel The Festive Dinosaur]

Originally posted by Saana:

Your argument is basically pointing at games that succeeded with higher player count and lower roster per match than Overwatch. i could point at games that succeeded with lower player count and higher character roster such as Super Smash Bros franchise. Ironically, its also a highly competitive game, with little room for casual play.

What You forgot to incorporate in Your theory is the game design. BattleBit Remastered was designed to be cluster vs cluster. Super Smash Bros was designed to be 1v1, up to 4 players matches in any combination. Overwatch was designed to be a 6v6 game.
Lets say we put a 30v30 mode in Super Smash Bros Ultimate. Who knows, maybe that would be fun. But the maps are too small to fit 60 players at once, and the game would be a complete mess.
Similarly, if we put more heroes in an Overwatch match. it ends up becoming too difficult to gain control of the objective, as there will constantly be bodies on it. Before You finish all 30 players off, the first player who died would've probably respawned and be on the point again. The last thing You want is a perfect stall strategy due to an endless loop. Moreover, there would be very broken combos like 10 D. Va's timing Defense Matrix and absorbing almost all damage.
This example actually highlights why Overwatch failed. If You played in a 30v30 lobby, and had 10 D. Va's chaining Defense Matrix, You simply could not play a DPS character (except Symmetra who has a beam). You'd have to play a tank hero as a DPS. This design of forcing players to pick X hero to counter Y hero is just bad. This is why starting season 10, when Brigitte was released, the game quality declined rapidly. If they had a Brigitte, You physically could not play Genji or Tracer. In fact, most DPS could not do much against a Brigitte anyways. If they had a Sombra, You could not play a hero like Wrecking Ball. If they had McCree, You could not play Doomfist. If they picked double shield tanks, You had to play either Bastion + Symmetra, or Doomfist + Reaper.
Again, as i showed, going to more player count would not help this issue. In fact, i believe it would have made it even worse, as i have shown in this reply but also in previous reply.

Overwatch was designed to be a mix of an FPS and a MOBA. The hope was to unite Dota/LoL 2 and CS:GO/CoD players. But the game ended up being neither. In the GOAT and double shield META, hardly any hero required aim skills. So it was not an FPS. It lacked abundant mechanics and details that MOBAs were renowned for. Ultimately, it alienated both sides.
i could not say the same about the dive META. Most heroes required aim, even healers like Zenyatta and Lucio. FPS players were able to find a place in Overwatch, and some even argue that it is harder to aim in Overwatch than in CS:GO or Valorant. In the latter games, You can get far by just pre-placing Your crosshair. Overwatch is usually too dynamic to be able to even do that. If You blink as Tracer, or dash as Genji, there goes Your crosshair placement. Heroes can show up from the sky like Pharah, or from nowhere like Sombra. Some heroes have extremely high mobility like Lucio. Etc.
Overwatch also had the counterpick element that MOBAs were renowned for. The essential distinction between the dive META and GOAT/double shield META was that when You were countered in dive, it did not mean You had to switch or else You were griefing. For example, Widowmaker countered Pharah, but Pharah could've tried to evade Widowmaker's line of sight or do some other tricks so that the matchup was playable. In GOAT META though, if their team had a Brigitte, You realistically could not play Tracer, unless You were several dimensions above the Brigitte player. You realistically could not play Wrecking Ball if they had a Sombra. Etc.

i will come back and discuss the casual part another time.

only if overwatch would be moba , but its hero shoter. but i think thats more of blizzard foult , overwatch is game who wants to be other games and has a bit identity crisis

it wants to be skill based but includes ultimate who are basically "i win buttons" or "kill most of team" , if you look for any skill based games who have skills most of them dont include even half bs overwatch has

it wants to be fps , but overwatch foam and attack you like rabbid animals when anyone calls it fps(who it is)

it wants to be team oriented team based game , but in its core it plays like many other hero shoters who put emphasis on "players" and "team" but overwatch says it does that but then forgets the players part and cares only about team , and lots players kinda hammer it down with raports of "unfit players and your not good enough for our team so we raport you"

Reason tf2 was always so reguarded is amount of players to classes available , as a team you were alweys balanced and player skill was alweys more important

overwatch reminds me old WoW 40 man raids where you ether do what team wants or your one getting -25dkp (et game for try hards who think its skill based game)

[Saana]

i said i would come back to touch a bit on the subject of casuals.

There is a crucial difference between competitive players and casual players. Neither is right or wrong, they are just different.
Casuals look for content, generally quantity. They want as much new maps, heroes, skins, game modes, etc. It does not matter if they are balanced, they just want to experience new things. If the puzzle gets solved and people understand the META, they just jump on to another game.
Competitive players generally look for quality. They would not mind playing the same hero on the same map with the same ruleset for the 2000th time. Its just the hero matchup needs to be good. The map needs to offer diverse possibilities. The gameplay should focus on skills, strategy, teamplay (in case of many vs many), etc.

Casuals were attracted to Overwatch because it has a good lore. The graphics and hero, as well as their skins, are gorgeous! Its very easy to get into. Matches are pretty short, especially Quick Play, compared to other games like CS:GO or Dota 2.
What should Blizzard have done to keep the casual players invested? What they did well in the first 2 years or so of Overwatch is making events game modes. Think about Junkerstein, Mei Snowball, etc. These game modes with the achievements and new skins gave the casuals a breath of fresh air to come back and play Overwatch.
The last 3 years or so of Overwatch, however, they kinda stopped releasing event games, or the games were very boring such as that Yeti Hunt game mode.
The blunder Blizzard did was trying to make the main game that they promised would be competitive, appeal to casuals. The entire design of hard counters, picking X hero to deny the entire existence of Y hero, allows casuals to enjoy ranked Overwatch more. If they had not practiced enough and lost a Genji vs Genji or Widowmaker vs Widowmaker duel, they could switch to Brigitte to hard counter the Genji, or to Sombra to counter the Widowmaker, and still have a good chance of winning. It sounds good on paper. But at what cost?

[Saana]

Originally posted by Varenvel The Festive Dinosaur:

it wants to be skill based but includes ultimate who are basically "i win buttons" or "kill most of team" , if you look for any skill based games who have skills most of them dont include even half bs overwatch has

Ultimates got stronger over time. Most ultimates of the early heroes had decent amount of counter play.
Pharah remained immobile during Barrage, and was easily dispatched of by about any DPS.
Mei's Blizzard had a significant cast time upon which it could have been deleted by D. Va, reflected by Genji, and most heroes could use their mobility skill to just get out of the AoE and prevent getting frozen.
Reaper was quite predictable since his Shadow Step had a significant cast time. You could see him coming to use Death Blossom and have things ready for the storm.
Even Zarya's ultimate, Graviton Surge, could be absorbed by D. Va or reflected by Genji. But even if it wasn't, teams were usually not stacked as there were many flanks occuring. As such, it was very uncommon to get 3 or more heroes caught in a Graviton Surge. But with the release of Brigitte and the forced 6v6, Graviton Surge's utility skyrocketed. Now its very easy to get 4 or more heroes in it. Paired with Dragon Strike, You essentially have the "I win button".
Ana's Nano Boost had a risk as the targeted hero could've gotten bursted. Now it heals by 300 HP, making it almost impossible to burst the target, and thus having almost no counterplay.
Lets not talk about the other heroes' ultimates like Sombra post-rework, season 10 Brigitte, Sigma, Baptiste, etc.

[Rhila]

Saana always post helpful comments about the game.
we need more like Saana here.

[CaptNickelsWorth]

Originally posted by Butcher:

Originally posted by Echo:

Latin is the trademark of a child who likes to pretend they're smart, or a med student who wants to pretend their education isn't hell.

It is up to you to elaborate your claims, like a rational adult.

"I said good day, sir!"
-Axe from videogame DotA2

Winner...THE BUTCHER!!!

[Froog]

idk bro it's pretty fun to shoot people while screaming helpful coms like a caveman and watch rank number go up

[Rhila]

Originally posted by itzDerrio:

Originally posted by Rhila:

Saana always post helpful comments about the game.
we need more like Saana here.

and u post ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ and bad takes

i don't speak gangsta, try to speak normal English next time.

[Rhila]

Originally posted by itzDerrio:

Originally posted by Rhila:

i don't speak gangsta, try to speak normal English next time.

lol what’s the matter i intimidate you , i’ll try to speak goat next time

i knew you are just another furry, this forum is full of them.

[Echo]

Originally posted by Saana:

i said i would come back to touch a bit on the subject of casuals.

There is a crucial difference between competitive players and casual players. Neither is right or wrong, they are just different.
Casuals look for content, generally quantity. They want as much new maps, heroes, skins, game modes, etc. It does not matter if they are balanced, they just want to experience new things. If the puzzle gets solved and people understand the META, they just jump on to another game.
Competitive players generally look for quality. They would not mind playing the same hero on the same map with the same ruleset for the 2000th time. Its just the hero matchup needs to be good. The map needs to offer diverse possibilities. The gameplay should focus on skills, strategy, teamplay (in case of many vs many), etc.

Casuals were attracted to Overwatch because it has a good lore. The graphics and hero, as well as their skins, are gorgeous! Its very easy to get into. Matches are pretty short, especially Quick Play, compared to other games like CS:GO or Dota 2.
What should Blizzard have done to keep the casual players invested? What they did well in the first 2 years or so of Overwatch is making events game modes. Think about Junkerstein, Mei Snowball, etc. These game modes with the achievements and new skins gave the casuals a breath of fresh air to come back and play Overwatch.
The last 3 years or so of Overwatch, however, they kinda stopped releasing event games, or the games were very boring such as that Yeti Hunt game mode.
The blunder Blizzard did was trying to make the main game that they promised would be competitive, appeal to casuals. The entire design of hard counters, picking X hero to deny the entire existence of Y hero, allows casuals to enjoy ranked Overwatch more. If they had not practiced enough and lost a Genji vs Genji or Widowmaker vs Widowmaker duel, they could switch to Brigitte to hard counter the Genji, or to Sombra to counter the Widowmaker, and still have a good chance of winning. It sounds good on paper. But at what cost?

You're describing FOMO, Fear Of Missing Out.
It is a cheap marketing tactic, not a substitute for substance.

TF2 recently hit an all-time player peak by just adding a funny seal and officially adding a game mode the community already pioneered.

Something is fundamentally different about TF2 that is able to consistently draw attention from casual and competitive players despite being incredibly old.

That is the gameplay.

Transplanting MOBA/MMO ability systems into any game requires a fundamental restructuring of the entire game.
Small team sizes force the game to become more competitive than it needs to be.
The ridiculous character models and special effects are an eyesore in actual gameplay.

It's the little things that add up to make an objectively bad experience.

TF2? Just pay attention to where you're getting shot at and you'll get 90% of the needed information just by looking at your enemy's silhouette and the context they're in.

[Echo]

Originally posted by itzDerrio:

Originally posted by Rhila:

i don't speak gangsta, try to speak normal English next time.

lol what’s the matter i intimidate you , i’ll try to speak goat next time

Just because you share my opinion doesn't mean I endorse your behavior. Be better.