Overwatch 2: all the changes for Season 9

The competitive esports scene is quite popular and games are always trying to reinvent themselves and consolidate themselves in this market. And after announcing a total overhaul of its competitive scene, Overwatch 2 is preparing itself for more changes.

Since Overwatch released its sequel and became a free-to-play game, the Blizzard title has been undergoing constant changes, whether in the characters’ abilities or the game itself. And now, for Season 9, which starts on February 13th, Overwatch 2 enters a new phase, with several significant changes that should shake up the game.

The competitive scene of Overwatch 2

After the end of the Overwatch League, Blizzard announced the Overwatch Championship Series, a complete overhaul of the game’s esports scene, with regional and global events, culminating in the championship’s grand final and the crowning of the Overwatch 2 grand champion.

And changes will also come to the game’s competitive matches, presenting more clearly when and why a player’s rank changes after a series of matches. Transparency in ranking has always been something requested by Overwatch 2 players.

Additionally, positioning matches return to the 10 format, also known as MD-10. Now, the player will have his initial rank defined after 10 matches, regardless of wins and losses.

Positioning matches continue to be separated by character role: Damage, Tank and Support.

The changes in competitive also bring new features: a new rank, called Champion, and a new weapon skin, Jade, which can only be purchased with competitive points.

These points even become competitive legacy points after the end of the competitive year, allowing the player to acquire the desired golden weapons.

Significant gameplay changes

The news in Season 9 of Overwatch 2 doesn’t end with the competitive game and Blizzard announced several general changes to the title’s gameplay, which affect the game as a whole, whether in casual or ranked matches.

The first of these is the HP of the heroes, which increased between 25 and 100 points, depending on the total HP they had before Season 9.

Another change affects characters who attack with projectiles, whether from firearms or other types. Here, the change, according to Blizzard, was to make the experience of those using these heroes in game a little more satisfactory.

The changes affect the size of the projectile and range from +0.05 meters to +0.15 meters.

New passive skills

Other new features that will arrive in Season 9 of Overwatch 2, starting on February 13th, concern the characters’ passive abilities. Now, each hero role has received new passive abilities, in addition to the self-healing ability for all heroes, a new feature that has been met with mixed opinions among players.

Now all heroes heal for 20 HP per second after 5 seconds without taking damage. For support characters, self-healing starts from 2.5 seconds without taking damage.

Heroes considered Damage, when hitting enemies, reduce the healing received by the target by 20%.

As for tanks, the new passive ability reduces the knockback received in addition to having less ultimate ability charge generated by healing and damage received.

The changes make heroes live longer so that supports can help with healing and prolonging team fights.

So, what did you think of the changes in Overwatch 2?

Gamohol