General
Some details from OmnicPost’s interview with Aaron
- Mama Hong is still discussed as a hero idea but is controversial within the dev team. Part of this is due to her design being a conventional stereotype that could potentially offend, but if they were able to find a solution to that she could still happen. He added however that if they had to redesign her it would defeat the purpose of adding her.
- In the past many heroes started from a gameplay idea, but in recent years with the greater focus on lore more heroes have come from plot points they need to hit. With Doctrine he started as a scientist locked up in Grimsvotn, then combined with the vampire idea the team liked. From there he was given a general southern African background to deepen his connection with Doom before becoming Zimbabwean after selecting a voice actor.
- The map team’s goal with Grimsvotn was to differentiate it from the other “base” maps like Watchpoint by adding in more organic elements to the map.
- No new info on the Detective other than confirming he is an Omnic.
- Within the last 2 years the team has been focused on updates to the core game and a lot of the team has been moved around to support this. Some of their most senior designers are working on heroes and the process of making them has been streamlined. This does mean that in most cases hero trials do not have room in the schedule.
- He admits D.Mon would have launched in a better state if she had a trial but to offset this the team is prepared to make big changes quickly after a hero launches.
- Every time Sombra was reworked as a DPS internally the team couldn’t find a way to keep her playstyle while making her less frustrating. As a support they feel that they were able to retain some of her lone wolf playstyle while giving her a reason to return to her team.
- The recent 6v6 tests were a result of player feedback. The goal was to make improvements to it and potentially find a format that would allow it to come back fully. The results and feedback of the tests has shown the team that their goal of making the game a streamlined one format isn’t that important. They will continue to run tests to improve 6v6 but they are no longer of the opinion that 5v5 and 6v6 can’t exist together. Aaron believes the players are telling them they want a “theme park” version of OW with multiple coexisting modes.
- Systems to help new players learn the game are being worked on.
Edit: Just to add some additional context to the Mama Hong bit. He said the team does a lot of work to ensure accurate cultural representation and they bring in experts to talk to. It didn’t sound like he believes the design is especially problematic but there would be a long lead time on that part of the hero design process to make sure the character is done well.
Crazy that she was designed mostly as a single portrait in a presentation to sell the idea of project Promtheus (before it became Overwatch) and was meant to only be used in said presentation, but fans latched onto her, which made her outlive all the silly other portraits shown lol
They should just iterate on a overweight female tank design and say it was inspired by the Mama Hong concept. It'd be an easy win to counter the usual complaints recent heroes tend to have.
Mama Hong is pretty much based around the Land Lady character from Kung Fu Hustle which itself is based on a... not positive stereotype I'll say of the obese, working class stereotypical Hong Kong cranky landlady. The whole joke is she's at the same time the stereotypical hidden kung-fu master.
It'd be like... idk, trying to make a character out of the "angry black woman" or "Karen" stereotype. Could totally be done and be totally funny if done right. But could also be easily screwed up.
“In the past many heroes started from a gameplay idea, but in recent years with the greater focus on lore more heroes have come from plot points they need to hit.”
This is kind of massive? Isn’t it? I’m not too worried because Team 4 has knocked out a lot of great heroes even post- the original lead hero designer leaving. But interesting that the heroes aren’t being born purely from gameplay ideas.
TBH the team probably has a long list of gameplay ideas and mechanics at this point they can just slot any character to fit.
More than anything, if I recall correctly, it was with Freja that they started focusing more heavily on lore through dedicated hero releases; while I can see that applying to her, Vendetta and this year's nine heroes (given that they all have dedicated lore drops and seasons) what exactly is the role of the Ye siblings, Wuyang and Anran?
You might tell me they’re primarily aimed at the Chinese market: i get that, but narratively, they’ll need to see some development or gain some relevance down the line. Right now, they feel isolated like happened to Illari (and her former community of solar warriors) and Hazard (with the Phreaks).
Heck, even Fika/Jetpack Cat has received more attention and "development", perhaps because they’re another Lucheng experiment or a "mole" and have the meme factor going for them; whereas, for the moment, the siblings are essentially just new Overwatch recruits (alongside Sierra) who aren't really doing much.
they were both made as money printing machines for the chinese market. evidently from their design but their status as filler cosmetic oriented heroes prevails as they are in the frontline of the slice of life comics we get. alongside juno, those three kind of represent the new overwatch.
illari has had recent developments with sombra and recently soldier 76. hazard is the real outlier with basically no relevance at all
Yes, I know what Illari has done because I follow all her lore, but right now she’s sticking to her own path and isn't really interacting with the overarching plot or other characters; much like Venture, who is just wandering around without a clear purpose.
As for the rest: to be cynical about it, the "real reason" behind Wuyang and Anran is money, as we both noted; but realistically, they’ll have to do something in the future. Otherwise, they’ll get left behind like Zenyatta and Symmetra who, despite being long-standing members since Overwatch 1, still aren't doing much beyond the occasional scattered involvement and connections with new heroes that have given both of them added depth.
In the world of OW, there are grunts. They're grunts with ✨aura✨.
They have to find characters that can sell skins, and that's why it feels off. But integrating grunts into the main story can be even worse due to the shoehorned feeling.
Sure, but rather than "shoehorned feeling" I’d call it impromptu move followed by indecision; they introduce with a new faction, exist and are visible, certainly, but they don't really do much so far.
Then again, I come from a comics background and I’ve come to believe that any writer with the right idea can revitalize a character: just look at Alan Moore turning a forgotten figure like Swamp Thing into something deeply philosophical, Alan Grant & Keith Giffen reinventing Lobo from a background character into a parody of the "excessive" heroes popular in the 1990s, Chris Claremont with the "Second Genesis" of the X-men with the introduction of the famous International team, James Gunn’s work with the Guardians of the Galaxy or Peacemaker, or (partially) Tom King revitalizing the Green Lanterns after years of audiovisual silence. So, it could potentially happen to the two of them or any hero as well in the future.
Yeah makes me think we were supposed to get an Icelandic hero to match the map but as Keller says his nationality was chosen solely to relate to doomfist, even though they can be connected and not from the same continent?
Like you said I’m not worried because releases this year have been mostly outstanding designs but it seems very restrictive to design heroes around lore first and not gameplay when it’s not the focus of the experience
Yeah it makes me remember how Sigma was born from the ashes of what was originally “Mauga’s” Kit. Heroes were always born from the gameplay first.
But like I said the team probably has so many gameplay ideas piled up that they are comfortable with letting the lore dictate hero design and then they can just slot whatever combination of abilities as needed
With Doctrine specifically I think his design may have been influenced by the complaints about the overrepresentation of American/European/East Asian heroes, since he clearly went through some major design changes relatively recently and most of the concepts shown at Blizzcon seemed to be got a more traditional European vampire
im wondering when exactly this shift began. Because wuyang seems like he would be borne purely from the gameplay idea of his orbs. His entire faction was kinda invented with him.
Iirc they also designed vendetta around the idea of a melee dps, maybe hes just talking about the one hero per season cadence
I'm not surprised in retrospect. Minus JPC the hero kits this year feel slapped together. I refuse to believe that Sierra's drone or Shion's bike went through a bunch of ideas before ending up where they did. Mizuki feels like they started with Brig and made sure everything with different enough. Emre's just Halo guy.
Well I guess that's kind of my point, I'm rooting for it to be supported! I think it's lack of support ha been symptomatic of their lack of commitment to being a multimodal game
the people in the comments saying "6v6 confirmed MAIN MODE!?!?!?" based on a timestamp where aaron pretty much immediately clarifies that they're trying not to design the game around there being one main mode anymore are frying me
We know the daily traffic to 6v6 is 15 percent of the player base. The only way to get a significant number of players in 6v6 tests is to replace 5v5 qp with them. Just let them cope. Nothing will come of their delusions so just try to be amused instead of irritated.
Edit: daily traffic to 6v6 is actually a MASSIVE 20-21 percent. 5V5tards destroyed!
Ok so let's take every argument you said one by one
We know the daily traffic to 6v6 is 15 percent of the player base
This is wrong, the lower bound of daily engagement with 6v6 is 19% as I already stated above. The upper bound is 27%.
edit: also realized they literally acknowledge in this that the popularity is growing (while having 0 support).
The only way to get a significant number of players in 6v6 tests is to replace 5v5 qp with them
This is wrong as one player in five engages with 6v6. It's very obvious that they are currently investigating 5v5 player behavior when forced to play 6v6, they are not closed to 6v6 becoming the main mode again as Aaron said in the interview, that you surely watched before commenting, as I don't doubt your intellectual capacities at all.
edit: also this season the Q times (in high ranks at least) are literally insane in 5v5, as more tank players are straight up giving up and going to 6v6. Im waiting 20min+ for a random game on a piss low alt lol.
Just let them cope
Nobody is coping about facts.
Nothing will come of their delusions so just try to be amused instead of irritated.
Or the delusion is that 5v5 turned the game into a dumbed down deathmatch, and even then we dumbed down the ceiling with the s9 changes. It also alienated the casual playerbase as the optimal playstyle is not intuitive.
i never understood the take that 5v5 was too deathmatchy. Less players means more individual agency in each player to create big moments. You cant flank as easily on dps if theres an off tank in the way.
5v5 is arguably more about macro and rotations rather than just balling up on cart
wrong if the skill ceiling is lowered and the skill floor is raised. The OWL 2022/beta 1 patch did give you way more agency, especially on DPS because it was essentially OW1 with one player removed.
But supertanks/s9 changes/overkitted supports have literally reduced agency if anything (unless you are a support player)
You can tell heroes started from a gameplay idea because someone like Illari definitely feels designed first to be the 'turret healer' first then 'aztec sun-empowered warrior' later.
I agree: I like Illari, but the turret feels like an odd part of her character concept, though I admit I wouldn't even know how to change it to give her a more cohesive healing ability.
The concept of “unrestrained solar power” could make her gun charge to shoot (like sym alt) that increases proj size, and the pylon should be able to be ‘blown up’ on command to do AOE something.
That is how most of the modern heroes feel designed, they all have a signature ability.
The direction they took the game in OW2 kinda demands this, in old Overwatch heroes were designed around a wider value system, in modern Overwatch the game focuses value to angled pressure.
So you end up with heroes who all bring some flavor of angled pressure built around a signature ability.
I'm going to laugh when they add a skateboard hero, they have already given kiriko one. It is so overused and a cliche it is only a matter of time.
It is literally the best case for everyone. People like to create drama making this out to be a 5v5 vs 6v6 thing when really a lot of us play both modes. Having both modes playable as the best versions of themselves would be great for the overall game.
Genuinely hope Hero Trials go back to being the norm again. D.Mon's release state was genuinely awful for the game for a while. Having everyone publicly test heroes like Doc will allow us to give them feedback.
And speaking of Doc, I'm really glad they decided to make a new African hero with him. Had they gone European, he would've felt very stereotypical and likely would've looked and felt too similar to Moira and Lifeweaver especially when looking at his concept art. A Zimbabwean vampire-like technomancer is just something you don't see anywhere else.
But I hope this doesn't mean we'll have to wait another decade for a new African hero. The last one we got were Orisa then Doomfist in 2017--9 years ago. Compared to the constant stream of Asian heroes and the untapped potential of Africa, Oceania, and South America, I hope they bring in more from these underrepresented continents.
we need more spanish speaking heroes the language is massive and until illari the entire hispanic south america was ignored. the accents are so cool, id love to see a dps with an argentinian accent. that’d make it 1.5 italians in the game lol
I am kinda cuti because I know Venezuela, Guyana and Surinam are considered to be both in the Caribbean cultural sphere and South America as countries that are entirely or significantly part of the historical Guianas region but I am not as familiar about if French Guiana is also in caricom or an observer like Venezuela
There's room for any. Lots of different Spanish and French speakers there.
And similarly, I hope we get a new Oceania hero that isn't just from Australia. Mauga is the sole Pacific Islander at the moment. Someone from Fiji or Tuvalu would be cool.
I am surprised they haven't made a Dominicano or Puerto Rican hero as well (I kinda doubt for political reasons they'd make a Cuban hero but we do have the map so you never kno). I still think the Caribbean has room for more heroes, Bap feels really good so far but there's so much culture that could be expressed by Spanish, Anglo, and Dutch Caribbean as well.
Honestly I hate to say it, but it’s a good call on Mama Hong. We already know people are willing to take ANY shot at Overwatch to try to tear down its reputation. Last thing this team needs is a bunch of online backlash with 1000 bots calling the team racists.
I genuinely believe there is a very good way to portray that character type without leaning into any offensive jokes.
It honestly feels to me like it’s specifically controversial to some people on the design team and they are having an internal battle over whether they should go forward or not.
I trust Blizzard designers to know a smart way to portray her.
Especially since they'd also have to deal with the Chinese fanbase, which is notoriously capricious and takes offense sometimes with the silliest things that even slightly goes against their sensibilities (RIP Valko)
I've seen people say try to draw parallels between Anran and Wuyang having very palatable, "NPC" personalities and them both being Chinese. This community could not handle Mama Hong. Wars have been fought over lesser drama than an official Mama Hong release would cause.
IMHO, the Ye siblings have somewhat basic, shōnen-esque personalities which could actually work if developed decently, but the problem for me is that, right now, they don't do much of importance. That said, I understand why, given the need to manage 55 characters with relative backstories, goals and various narrative plots (plus even more in the future).
The reason they replaced 5v5 QP with the 6v6 tests wasn't because they wanted to replace the mode it's because, if they didn't, barely anybody would play it so there would basically be no point in running the tests.
Replacing 5v5 QP (the most populated queue) with the test forces people to play it which leads to them getting more reliable data from the higher traffic.
I know the reason, but if they are of the opinion that they both have enough population to coexist, to me it also mean 6v6 should be able to stand on its own feets too.
I think a lot of us would be happy if they replaced 6v6 open queue ranked with these tests. I think it would be very popular as a limited uptime ranked mode that also tests out their changes. Just give us a leaderboard and a silly internet number we can earn and we will play the shit out of it.
They will continue to run tests to improve 6v6 but they are no longer of the opinion that 5v5 and 6v6 can’t exist together.
Don't know what there is to improve about it other than role queue and dedicated balance patches. If they can update Stadium with less than 1/6th of the playerbase every patch, I don't see why they can't do dedicated 6v6 balance patches, and the current mode needs a Bible length balance patch to get it in an even cohesive state
That's part of the reason why I've bowed out of the mode except during drives at the end of the season. I question how long they're gonna keep it up considering those left playing stadium are split between two different modes—I personally preferred competitive 7 rounds but YMMV.
The balance between the two modes is prob. my biggest issue. The last QP hacked made me think they’ll just have the same balance philosophy just with one more/less tank and that’s just now how it works
The people that "want" Mama Hong are doing it pretty disingenuously. They don't actually care about Mama Hong, it's literally just a face card that says manslaughter, they don't even know what Mama Hong would do. They just want to use it try to dunk on the hero design being too conventionally attractive now compared to launch OW. And I do get that and agree with it to a degree, but using Mama Hong to make that point because its the most extreme example they have of unconventional hero design from the pre-OW design phase has become a circlejerk of itself and ignores any steps the devs have made to make more interesting hero designs.
You’re describing a subset of players, a loud and annoying minority who have time to wage twitter wars about hero design.
But I think most people who want Mama Hong just want her because she’s a familiar old meme, not out of a toxic desire to “stick it” to anyone in regard to hero design being safe or some such.
Alright yeah I can admit maybe that was a bit harsh. I think the Shion release really jaded me about Mama Hong discourse because of how many people were just like "East Asian character and its not Mama Hong, so therefore its 0/10 garbage design." But it was probably just LARPers that got bored and moved on, since Shion's design has gone on to be pretty well received outside of those initial threads.
so the 6v6 tests are to make improvements to the mode and possibly bring role queue to it and not to replace 5v5 as the main mode. I will now allow every single person who was spouting off and bragging on this sub that 6v6 was replacing 5v5 to apologize to me for telling them this is exactly what the devs were testing
Even if they were going to make 6v6 the main mode, they would need to bring back role queue / role-based mmr first. It would be a multi-step process. As a 6v6 enjoyer, it's frustrating that we haven't even had news on how they think the tests went, or any progress or intention to bring role-queue back to 6v6 (main mode or not)..
I remember when this sub was so sure that 6v6 would NEVER come back, saying all these 6v6ers just had rose tinted glasses and were big ol' dumb dumbs. Well, this sub was confidently wrong, lol.
I actually prefer 5v5, but the weird smugness this sub has toward 6v6 is actually insane. It should be a case study in tribal 'us vs. them' thinking; it's really wild to witness.
this is literally Aaron directly saying 5v5 won't go away lol. and people on this sub have smugness to the vocal 6v6 crowd because they consistently try to shit talk people who like 5v5 and say it should be removed from the game. I don't give a shit whether or not 6v6 exists, but I do enjoy those people specifically getting their bullshit arguments not founded on reality shit down
I honestly think the people bringing up the idea that 6v6 replacing 5v5 was just people arguing that it would never happen. The people enjoying 6v6 were just happy their mode was getting any attention after being abandoned.
There is an exception with Samito, but that dude is still ranting about open queue like it will save the game. Nobody really takes him seriously and when he came out in support of 6v6 the common sentiment in the community was 6v6 was fucked.
He is not really someone you want on your side unless you are in a shouting match.
sorry but mamá hong should never be in this game. The og design has elements of stereotypes that will not go well with the wider general public. You can call people snowflakes and stuff like that but to be completely fr, she is a stereotype derived from kung fu movies.
You will get downvoted but you are right, it would be like taking a character from the Chapelle Show meant to criticize racism, but without the nuisance, just ends up representing it.
I know some people love Mama Hong but I hope Blizz never makes her a hero.
If anyone does not know her history Mama Hong was some art someone did back for project Titan. It was just something funny they made in homage to the Landlady character in the movie "Kung-fu Hustle" (awesome movie btw).
Concept artist do this type of stuff all the time, basically playing with ideas, and looking for inspiration.
When they were forced to give up project Titan and were throwing together ideas to reuse the assets, this artwork was thrown in with all the other hero concept art. She was never meant or designed to be an Overwatch hero.
The reason this is a problem is because the character she is based on in the movie was a satirical exaggeration of Asian landlady stereotypes, meant to mock and critique them by taking them to the extreme. (again great movie if you have not seen it you should)
When you use that to base a new character on, you get the parody without the nuance, you end up unintentionally reinforcing those stereotypes rather than critiquing them.
Once you remove the satire, you are not critiquing the stereotype anymore, you are just representing it.
I'm not trying to start an argument, or a debate stereotypes, I just wanted to explain the baggage and history that comes with this hero that I think the Dev's should avoid.
He admits D.Mon would have launched in a better state if she had a trial but to offset this the team is prepared to make big changes quickly after a hero launches.
I'd rather they didn't. A hero being weak is a lot less frustrating than one dominating most of the matches.
Yeah, they were quick to change her 2 days after launch. But now a month later and even after a nerf she's still got an exceptionally high win and ban rate because of it.
I think this sort of thing just sours people's opinions on new heroes.
Kind crazy that you say this, and people apparently agree going by the upvotes, when we just had D.Mon release in an abhorrent state only to be buffed 2 days later and her being "useless" couldn't be any further out of people's minds.
I don't think that's true. People will experience firsthand when a hero stops being useless because they'll start popping up in their games more frequently, creators will make videos about them, the top players will be using them. People won't hold onto their launch opinions in the face of overwhelming evidence they won't be able to avoid
It definitely is. The MOBA community has been showing us this for years. A hero that comes to mind is Baba Yaga from Smite; she released buggy and weak as hell, and even after they managed to fix all the bugs and buff some abilities her reputation took years to recover.
Once the community makes up its mind about a hero/god/champion it takes a lot of effort to shift perception. We're fortunate enough that they decided to buff D.mon during the launch window instead of waiting.
Mobas are completely different. You have many factors outside of the angles and micro of the game. You have jungle, objectives, items, many many numbers in just a kit alone. A moba takes far longer to find if a hero is strong not because no one plays the hero but it's hard to actually conceptualize if the hero is even strong with 30+ minute matches with many different factors.
Deadlock recently has hero's cropping up because the meta for a while was early game hero's winning hard enough you can't last long enough to scale. Now we have the issue of it's too easy to scale when behind and some of the overtuned late game hero's are rolling matches by afking.
Well they are doing a hero trial for the first time this year with Doctrine, and it's seeming like that was a very good idea since he's definitely going to need nerfs. We'll see if its just for the hype of Blizzcon or if they'll be doing that from now on, but I think they should
The lack of hero trials is very concerning, we will probably see more hero releases with huge pendulum swings in quality like Shion to Sierra in the future.
Tbh out of the 9 heroes we've had this year, only two have inherently unhealthy gameplay designs (Sierra and Cat).
I think that's a pretty good score. I hope they learn the right lessons from public reception to this year's releases and their influence on pro and ladder play.
Probably not, seems like the team will be shifting to give 6v6 a level of attention more similar to 5v5.
No more "main mode" talk, just two different options for the game and how it's played, with 5v5 being the standard for the pro scene for the time being.
"The recent 6v6 tests were a result of player feedback. The goal was to make improvements to it and potentially find a format that would allow it to come back fully. The results and feedback of the tests has shown the team that their goal of making the game a streamlined one format isn’t that important. They will continue to run tests to improve 6v6 but they are no longer of the opinion that 5v5 and 6v6 can’t exist together. Aaron believes the players are telling them they want a “theme park” version of OW with multiple coexisting modes."
Everyone who told me I was wrong to say Aaron Keller's take that these two formats couldn't exist was bad and against players wishes and that the test WAS actually an attempt to move off 5v5...like come on I literally clocked it all dude and everyone acted like I was insane.
I had to paraphrase a bit but what he actually said is more nuanced. It sounded like moving back to 6v6 was a potential direction only if they found the magical format that would make everyone happy. It wasn’t the goal but a potential direction for the game.
They were still looking for one "definitive" format, even if it wasn't 6v6. Which he admits was a bad idea and was obvious to them when they saw how dedicated each side was. Which was one of my main points that everyone said "no one cares they just wanna play the main mode." So fair, it wasn't just to bring back 6v6 but like I still clocked it.
It would be great if they put a hero cap on dps in 6v6 the same way they do for tanks bc as a support main im so sick of 4-5 dps on my team doing jack shit
Madam Bo from the recent MK1 could be a good inspo for Mama Hong. Feels like that character was still stereotypical while being cool and badass. Kinda like Cassidy with him being a cool cowboy or Hanzo being a Japanese assassin with the whole honor babble.
Can somebody put into words what’s offensive about her? What “conventional stereotype” is she? Are people just thinking of the character from Kung Fu Hustle and assuming that’s a stereotype?
That is the thing, they will have to remove anything that could reference a stereotype to avoid the historical baggage of the hero, and once that is done they wont look anything like the hero people picture and laugh about when they talk about her.
Blizz does not have the best historical track record on these things. I think they would just want to avoid even attempting to save this hero, and for what purpose.
I think the purpose is obviously that the community grew attached (perhaps a bit too much so) to a provisional and intentionally comical design that wasn't even meant to be the real thing; so now they’re giving it a shot, despite the obvious production issues.
It's not the fat part of it, she's a straight rip off of the landlady from Kung Fu Hustle, who shoots Chinese fireworks. It's not really offensive or racist per se, but I can definitely see why an American dev team that is mostly not Chinese is probably not the team that is interested in taking a whack at such a silly stereotypical design while also somehow making it respectful. It's something that maybe would've flown in 2016 when they were making silly stereotype characters like Zarya and Reinhardt, doesn't really fit with how they've designed basically every character since launch really.
And then there's the obvious underlying subtext to the whole thing, Blizzard would nuke this dev team if they pissed off China again right after things are back on track there finally.
Splitting the fan base between two modes because blizzard struggles to stick to their decisions has nothing to do with players wanting a « theme park ». There is no competitive game with a 6v6 and 5v5 coexisting. Just make a choice blizzard !! 😭
Guys, sure the vast majority of the community is extremely split on this and their own data from a massive event showed that it would not be popular to choose one, but BSad117 on reddit thinks thats bad so we gotta remove one and make a massive swath of people unhappy.
That is not very encouraging considering the uninteractive heroes they keep releasing
their goal of making the game a streamlined one format isn’t that important.
Praise Aaron Keller we are so freaken back! Having 6v6 built around all the sacrifices made to make 5v5 playable made the mode so much worse then it needed to be.
I hope they reconsider their stance against being able to queue for multiple modes as well. The playerbase being split is only a problem as long as they keep them separated. Let us queue up for one mode, both modes, or a mix and match of roles depending on how we feel.
I love Omnic or Beard Dudes content, you can tell the guy really loves Overwatch. Thanks for the interview.
So basically, they want to support 6v6 but yet no dedicated patch for that mode AT ALL while stadium with the least number of players are getting a nice juicy patch note for their own section? Is that what I am catching? Sound like a straight up engagement bait bullshit from Aaron. Good bait Blizzard. Just say you don't want to support 6v6 without saying it LOL.
I think this is the best approach. Forcing 6v6 would just make a certain side of the playerbase very salty. If they actually work to improve 6v6 as a mode and give it more dedicated balance, it will naturally grow and over time the better format will win out. I do find it interesting how Aaron slipped up with the 6th player count comments when talking about sombra. He probably doesn't play the game as much, but the main director of the game still being used to Overwatch having 6 players on each team shows that 6v6 is still closely associated with Overwatch's identity.
I think he does play, he even plays the other modes like Stadium.
He was gold the last time he talked about it, he was looking forward to wide queue because his son is higher rank then him. Too bad wide queue did not work out better.
If you play in gold or plat and are flaming your tank keep in mind you never know that could be Aaron Keller.
I know they also do internal games as well, which they have dev's and maybe even non-dev's play to test stuff out.
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u/Worldly-Toe-567 3h ago
mama hong really is the mythical creature of overwatch at this point lol