Rachel Schaffner – Staff Writer

rls6117@psu.edu

Photo Credit: Blizzard Entertainment

Since the release of “Overwatch 2” back on Oct. 4, 2022, the game has received a lot of criticism, especially with the new game characters introduced. These new characters are Junker Queen, Sojourn, and Kiriko. Most fans praise the two characters out of the three, Kiriko and Sojourn. On the other hand, gamers criticize Junker Queen’s abilities or as they put it, lack thereof. 

As a Junker Queen main myself, she was the easiest character for me to pick up after not playing the series for almost three years. While some of her abilities are harder to use than others, such as landing her knife on enemies and pulling them toward her, some prove to be easier. 

However, with the release of Season 2, on Dec. 6, 2022, it meant “Overwatch 2” would be getting a new battle pass along with a new hero. Another tank for players to try out, Ramattra proves to be another upsetting addition to the game. 

While most tank heroes can take damage better than other tanks, such as Roadhog and Sigma, Ramattra, unfortunately, falls into the same category as Junker Queen. Both tank heroes are what is known as squishy. In “Overwatch” terms, “squishy” refers to how quickly they can be eliminated by enemy players. While most DPS, damage per second, heroes are squishy, such as Tracer, surely a tank hero would be much harder to eliminate? That is the case with heroes such as, once again mentioned, Roadhog and Sigma.

The most upsetting feature of Ramattra is his poor excuse for a shield. While most shield heroes, Reinhardt, Sigma, and Winston, their shield is meant to last for a long period. Unfortunately for Ramattra, as soon as the shield is placed, it goes away in five seconds, giving no coverage in a short amount of time. However, it does prove useful to Ramattra when he goes into a form called Nemesis. Instead of a shield, it is replaced with a block that now validates why Ramattra is in the tank position. He has proved that he can tank D.Va’s self-destruct bomb, which is notoriously known to grant players play of the game if D.Va can wipe out the entire enemy team. 

Along with the addition of a new character, Season 2 brought a new battle pass for players to grind through and gain rewards. Unlike Season 1’s battle pass, the new hero, Kiriko, was placed at level 55 for players to unlock the new hero if they did not buy the battle pass. Buying the battle pass not only grants players instant access to the new hero but more rewards than the free version. It is also a sick cash grab for Blizzard since they made the game free to play. 

Moving back to the battle pass, Season 2 offered Ramattra at level 45 for players who did not wish to buy the battle pass. Unfortunately for me, I bought the battle pass for the reward at the end of level 80 being a mythic skin for Junker Queen. With Season 2’s battle pass being centered around the theme of Greek mythology, it got players ready for the highly anticipated new game mode Blizzard had showcased in their Season 2 trailer. 

For a limited time and running from Jan. 5 to Jan. 19, an eight-player free-for-all game mode was implemented in the arcade section of the game known as “Battle For Olympus.” In this new game mode, the stakes are high as players get to play as Zeus Junker Queen, Poseidon Ramattra, Cyclops Roadhog, Minotaur Reinhardt, Medusa Widowmaker, Hades Pharah, and Hermes Lucio to prove their character’s worth. At the end of the event, Blizzard would tally up which character got the most final blows and reward them with a statue of said character in all of the Ilios maps in the game. Since the event has come to an end and the winner was revealed, Zeus Junker Queen claims the statue for herself as she tallied up a whopping 40+ million final blows with Hades Pharah being 3 million away from claiming the statue. 

The premise of “Battle For Olympus” runs as follows: eight players choose which hero they wish to be and are fighting against seven other people. The first to twenty eliminations or until the ten-minute timer runs out wins. Along the maps, there are two different kinds of packs for the players to gain: armor and charge packs. Armor packs provide more health to the player while the charge packs help charge up the ultimate ability. Each hero has the same ultimate ability as they normally do, but with a divine twist to it. 

Zeus Junker Queen can add in lighting damage during her ultimate. Poseidon Ramattra’s vortex sends players upwards instead of downward and his ultimate power throws powerful water blasts. Cyclops Roadhog now shoots boulders instead of his normal barrage of bullets. Minotaur Reinhardt can now pin up to three people in his charge ability and can wall-slam enemies. Medusa Widowmaker can turn enemies to stone if she is scoped in and enemies look at her. Hades Pharah can move while she uses rocket barrage. Finally, Hermes Lucio can stun enemies when launched into a wall and his speed is boosted. While most of these heroes’ ultimate abilities can last for normally five seconds in a normal game mode, these abilities can last from fifteen to twenty seconds now. 

Overall, Battle For Olympus was the best in-game event Blizzard has produced since the start of “Overwatch 2”. For Halloween, they brought back the Junkenstein event, but with a twist called Wrath of the Bride. For Christmas/winter, they brought back the Winter Wonderland event. For new players, it was something new for them but for returning players, it was the same old same old. With the addition of Battle For Olympus, it was the most fun event they had put in the game. It was mostly due to the stakes there were and the fact that having more than one of the heroes ensued chaos. 

A major backlash from the fans is the removal of loot boxes from the original game. However, in recent news, they are looking to fix the monetization system in Season 3.

Speaking as a Junker Queen main, Junker Queen is already a chaotic character by herself in normal game mode. Adding in three to four, possibly up to eight in total, just adds more chaos to the game mode. This can be true for the other characters that were in the Battle For Olympus game mode, but as I played as Junker Queen for the entirety of the event, the chaos she brought to that event was astronomical. Players would hear her commanding shout ability everywhere since there was more than one. Many knives and axes were thrown as well as fists for melee-ing enemies. 

While most players did not enjoy the “Battle for Olympus event,” this was the one event I looked forward to ever since the Season 2 trailer. Along with many other things from the trailer, such as Battle For Olympus and the Zeus Junker Queen skin, I found myself enjoying “Overwatch 2” more than I have since I picked it back up. However, with many more seasons to come, Blizzard can learn from the fans what to do and what not to do. [Bring back the loot boxes!] With Season 2 coming to a close, there is a lot more in store for “Overwatch 2. I cannot wait to see what they have in store for Season 3.