In summer time 2023, Blizzard debuted Overwatch 2’s Flashpoint, a mixture of Management and Assault the place groups race to occupy a sequence of territory factors. Flashpoint was the primary new map sort for the sequence because the unpopular Push launched alongside Overwatch 2, and type of a giant deal. It was additionally type of a catastrophe.
Nearly instantly upon launch, Reddit stuffed up with complaints concerning the mode’s map designs. Quick ahead to Overwatch 2 season 17, which kicked off on Tuesday, with a set of redesigned Flashpoint maps and it’s a a lot totally different story. Blizzard’s extra relaxed method to letting folks play Overwatch 2 the way in which they need has turned Flashpoint into a good time.
Two years in the past, the Overwatch 2 design workforce stated in a sequence of roundtable interviews forward of the mode’s launch that they wished line of sight to play a key position in Flashpoint. They hoped that gamers would create avenues of fight — road fights, mainly — on the way in which to the target. Nicely, it didn’t work out like that. Gamers obtained misplaced on the overly lengthy routes to every flashpoint, matches have been boring and predictable, and on the heart of all the issues was a set of actually lengthy hallways.
The unique Suravasa and New Junk Metropolis have been rigidly designed so that you simply needed to take one in every of a number of monotonous paths to the identical location, and the looks of selection was largely an phantasm. One choice at all times ran close to the opposing workforce’s spawn level, whereas one other was often extra circuitous or might even lead you within the flawed path.
Skilled gamers adopted the optimum route each time, and any stragglers that went a unique means have been virtually assured to get obliterated or be of no assist in any respect within the combat happening what felt like miles away. Even when the motion lastly broke out on the flashpoint itself, it was predictable and little totally different from taking part in Management. The enemy workforce would at all times method from the identical path for worry of time working out or getting bulldozed in the event that they strayed too near your spawn level. This was what Blizzard wished, so this was the way it needed to be executed.
That received’t be the case after the mid-season 17 replace. Routes are shorter in Suravasa and New Junk Metropolis’s redesigns, for one factor, however they’re additionally peppered with totally different buildings to cover in and shortcuts to different areas that make these random road fights Blizzard initially envisioned more likely to occur. It’s much less like having a sequence of islands linked by lengthy corridors and extra like a large polygon with a sequence of twisting, interconnected alleyways and break up ranges to mess around in.
The redesigns permit for extra creativity in how you employ your hero’s particular skills, too, and you may already see that within the new Aatlis map. Flying characters can keep away from chokepoints fully or hold unfortunate opponents trapped in a constructing. Genjis and Widowmakers can plan assassinations by hiding in watch for the unwary, whereas flankers like Echo and Tracer have so many extra choices for taking enemies without warning. Flashpoint went from being the weakest mode to the one which performs like a pure extension of the philosophy behind hero perks and Stadium mode. You’ll be able to play it the way you need with the hero you favor and doubtless even give you methods the builders by no means meant.
It helps that Blizzard gave among the precise Flashpoint places a redesign as nicely, making them extra visually distinct and simply extra enjoyable to play. Suravasa’s temple, for instance, beforehand had two principal areas, with the central goal accessible by way of an extended staircase that just about at all times led you into the road of fireside of all the enemy workforce. Now, it’s obtained a center and a decrease layer you possibly can work round, and the staircase results in a small platform the place you possibly can extra successfully maintain your floor. New Junk Metropolis’s Junkyard, the map’s most boring goal location, has extra avenues resulting in the flashpoint and fewer bottlenecks so battles by no means play out the identical means twice.
These and dozens of different little enhancements — new sight blockers, greater entryways right into a flashpoint, extra areas to maneuver in when you’re on the purpose — make Flashpoint really feel a lot freer and extra unpredictable. So spare a thought for Flashpoint if it exhibits up within the pre-round map voting roulette. It’s simply Overwatch 2’s greatest mode now.
