'Overwatch 2' Map Changed To Be More Progressive Following Fan Request
The benches in Overwatch 2's New York-inspired map have been changed, following complaints about them being anti-homeless.
We’re now only a few months away from the full release of Overwatch 2. It feels like we’ve been waiting for this one for some time - first announced in 2019, we went without any solid updates for ages before everything seemingly sprung into action this year.
The first beta period launched back in April, and although most of the feedback given then probably went towards the gameplay itself, as reported by Kotaku, one user brought attention to an issue in the design of the game’s New York-inspired map. The good news is though, with the launch of the second beta, the problem has already been fixed.
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The issue in question was the inclusion of hostile architecture. The benches in the fictitious version of Grand Central Terminal were originally clearly inspired by benches which are made to prevent homeless people from sleeping on them: “Been thinking about this since the beta so I’m just going to say it since no one else has,” Twitter user @ClearTogether wrote last month. “The anti-homeless architecture of the benches in Midtown makes me super bummed. Benches like this are designed specifically to make homeless miserable. Overwatch being an ‘aspirational universe’, I just find it depressing at worst and out-of-place at best.”
Thankfully though, things have changed for the better in the current beta. “Thank you SO much to the Overwatch team for deciding to change this,” @ClearTogether wrote in a follow up tweet. “[It’s] honestly overall a small change but it goes a long way. You guys rock.”
What’s more, the lead narrative designer and writer for Overwatch directly responded: “This was great feedback,” he wrote. “Also, we decided early on in the map story development that Overwatch’s NY offers free, safe housing for people. Some of this is in the map VO, with further details planned for later. ‘How we hope the world will be’ is a big part of our story dev.”
So, that’s uplifting! The game is set to launch completely free-to-play on 4 October this year, so there’s not too long to wait for it.
Topics: Overwatch, Blizzard Entertainment, Activision Blizzard, Activision