A somewhat shocking reveal today, with Blizzard announcing that they are going to be shifting away from the iconic Battle.net launcher as the exclusive gateway to their games – with a ‘selection’ of their games jumping across to Steam, starting with Overwatch 2 on August 10.
The message is one of accessibility – going so far as to openly state that Blizzard “want to break down the barriers” and make it easier for players everywhere to find and enjoy their games.
Mike Ybarra, President of Blizzard Entertainment, makes it clear that they have no intention to ditch the Battle.net launcher outright – speaking of a proper partnership with Valve to make this happen:
While Battle.net remains a priority for us now and into the future, we’ve heard players want the choice of Steam for a selection of our games, starting with Overwatch 2 on August 10th. We’re happy to work with Valve to make that happen.
Early August also stands to be quite a good launching point for the game, with the Invasion content looming as part of its next seasonal content set – as well as a new core PvP game mode.
This is echoed in a comment from Gabe Newell, Valve’s president – speaking of the benefit for both gamers and developers with Overwatch 2 coming to the Steam platform:
“Gamers and developers are both going to benefit from Overwatch 2 coming to Steam. Gamers will have another platform where they can play a beloved game that utilizes the capabilities of Steam, and developers will benefit from the effects of having the talented team at Blizzard helping us evolve our supported features and functionality for Overwatch 2.”
Players accessing the title will of course still need to register a Battle.net account – it’s pretty fundamental to Blizzard games – however they do make mention that the full gamut of iconic Steam features will be present, such as Steam achievements, their Steam friends list, and the ability to invite them to play in-game.
It’s a pretty far-out development, and quite hilariously timed with the amount of fun hack-y methods people had been cooking up to play Overwatch 2 on their much-lauded Steam Deck console – which will now simply have a native option. For some, it could be seen as a move to elevate the player pool by knocking down a barrier for entry; a highly polished F2P title is right at home on Steam.
The curious part will be watching the news as we come to discover what other titles are to be included in the ‘selection’ of titles that are coming across from Battle.net – will we perhaps see World of Warcraft as a native Steam option?
Far more importantly: Can we please get some Team Fortress 2 cross-over skins for Overwatch 2.
The Overwatch 2 Steam page is live now, and is available to wishlist.
Are you excited to see Blizzard games spreading their wings? Let us know in the comments or on social media.
Known throughout the interwebs simply as M0D3Rn, Ash is bad at video games. An old guard gamer who suffers from being generally opinionated, it comes as no surprise that he is both brutally loyal and yet, fiercely whimsical about all things electronic. On occasion will make a youtube video that actually gets views. Follow him on YouTube @Bad at Video Games
