Notch up another victory for Valve, as after years of resisting, Blizzard has announced their games are coming to the ubiquitous Steam PC gaming platform. Blizzard was one of the pioneers of online multiplayer with their Battle.net service, and they’ve stubbornly refused to release their PC games on anything else. Well, that ends next month as Overwatch 2 will land on Steam (the game’s Steam page is already up).
Blizzard president Mike Ybarra had the following to say about the move…
“It’s our goal at Blizzard to listen to players and try to exceed their expectations in everything we do. 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 . We’re happy to work with Valve to make that happen.”
While Blizzard tries to put a happy face on this, the move to Steam comes as Overwatch 2 has begun to bleed players. Activision CEO Bobby Kotick also recently described a 2018 decision to make Call of Duty: Black Ops III exclusive to Battle.net on PC a “resounding failure.” While Battle.net is still being propped up by the likes of World of Warcraft, it seems the higher ups don’t see much value in having their own proprietary launcher and online service anymore, even as they offer platitudes about it being a “priority.”
Those who access Overwatch 2 via Steam will still need to sign up for a Battle.net account, which will allow for crossplay. That said, they’ll also be able to take advantage of features unique to Valve’s platform, including Steam achievements and their Steam friends list.
No word yet on what other Blizzard games will come to Steam, but Diablo IV and Diablo II: Resurrected seem like obvious candidates. Of course, the big question – does Blizzard bite the bullet and put World of Warcraft on Steam? We shall see.
Overwatch 2 arrives on Steam on August 10. What do you think about this? Is it a smart move? Are you excited to have Blizzard games on Steam? Or will playing on anything other than Battle.net just be too weird?
