Overwatch Gameplay Review

Welcome back agents!

As promised, this week I want to talk about the series of gameplay previews posted on the Overwatch youtube page over the past two months. We have previews for all of the currently known heroes as of this past Thursday, and now it's time to analyze a bit. I recommend watching the videos if you haven't to this point. Most of them are entertaining to watch, although a couple characters have this issue of being somewhat dull to watch without having hands on experience. Keep in mind as we go that I don't have a ton of experience with team based shooters so take my my thoughts with a grain of salt.

First I want to talk about the base UI. These videos are the first time we see a version of the in game interface. As with anything there are some things to like and some things to be improved upon. This is a pre-alpha version of the game obviously, but that doesn't mean that we can't critique and provide feedback on what we are given.

He we have the base UI for Tracer out of combat before the game starts. The targeting reticle is a small circle at the center of the screen. The bottom left side of the screen has the player health bar in white, and armor in blue and the current total health amount larger next to the hero portrait. The bottom right side tracks the current ammo count and cooldown for your on use abilities. Shift usually controls your movement speed ability (in Tracer's case her Blink), and E controls a secondary ability that varies from character to character (her Recall ability). The blue arrows at the center of the screen depict the number of charges of Blink available. And finally the bottom center of the screen tracks progress toward your hero's ultimate ability. Throughout the action you will see the ability charge up based on damage done, damage taken, and for some heroes, damage absorbed or healed. Overall I think the UI is ok for this stage in the game. Vital information is all readily available, and the UI itself helps to explain how the character plays right from the start. I am a fan of a minimalist approach to user interface for most games, but I'm sure there are people out there who want more information. There are a couple of things worth noting. As you can see in the videos, once the game actually starts the timer at the top of the screen lets you know if capture points are currently being taken, and in the case of payload maps, how far along the payload is to a checkpoint, and how many players are actively escorting it. The other is the gun icon at the bottom right, depicting Tracer's Pulse Pistols. This may be nothing of importance, but it may suggest that different weapon types may eventually become available at some point. This could simply be an old aspect of the game that has yet to be removed so it may be nothing, but I think it's worth drawing attention to.

Of course there are also some issues with the UI that may not be as apparent from Tracer's point of view.

Here we have screenshots from Zarya and Winstons perspective. One of the issues that is present throughout these videos is the amount of screen real estate that the character and guns take up. In Zarya's case, Her Particle Cannon and left arm take up nearly a third of the screen and can take even more when she is firing as a beam. Winston meanwhile, has a Tesla Cannon that takes up a decent amount of room, but he also has a left arm that comes into view every step that he takes that blocks vision on that side of the screen. Don't get me wrong, I love the attention to detail that Blizzard is taking when integrating these characters. This is in line with how a gorilla would run so it fits for you to see it in front of you to maintain the fantasy of playing as a giant rage-ape from the moon. However, one of Blizzard's own values is "Gameplay first" and the character models taking up that much of the screen hurts the gameplay in my opinion. There have been countless posts on the Overwatch Reddit with complaints and requests for a field of view slider as is typically present in present day shooters. They have listed issues with nausea and headaches resulted from a FOV that is too small, and as of now the only response we have heard from Blizzard was that they wanted to have a locked FOV in order to create an even playing field for new and experienced shooter players. I understand Blizzard's desire to keep UI aspects consistent among all players, but at the same time I can sympathize with players being concerned about actual medical issues as a result of the current state of things. We have evidence, especially lately with what happened in World of Warcraft surrounding flying, that Blizzard is willing to compromise. I think a fair compromise would be to increase the field of vision, or at the very least scale back the size ratio of the character models, and then lock the FOV and weapon size there.

Some aspects of the combat UI can also feel cluttered once the fighting begins.

Both of these screenshots show both sides of Mercy's channelled ability to empower her targets attacks. From Mercy's point of view, we have a huge health bar in the the center of the screen obviously meant to give information and urge you to switch to her healing channel if your target starts coming under fire. The problem is that the bar appears directly in the center of the screen where your eyes naturally go as you move around the battlefield. As I watched the gameplay video for Mercy I couldn't help but feel like that aspect of her UI was too prominent and distracted from what was actually happening in the fight. It's similar to how players new to healing in WoW can tunnel vision their player frames and end up standing in the fire and dying themselves. I understand this shouldn't be a problem for experienced players, but it could present a problem for new players intrigued by the prospects of healing in a shooter. The second screenshot shows the same power-up being provided to Pharah. It's hard to tell from a still image, but the blue arrows on the outside of the screen scroll by continuously while you are being channelled on. I think the one central blue arrow next to your targeting reticle is enough to let you know you are being powered up. The outside ones are almost a distraction to me. I could be being overly critical of this but it's just another thing on the screen in a fight that I don't think needs to be there.

Outside of the UI, I think there is a lot to be excited about from these previews. The game length seems to be between 7 and 12 minutes depending on how close the game is. This is great for a couple of reasons. First, games that are roughly 10 minutes long lend themselves to short game sessions really well. One of the things that turned me off of League of Legends was playing for 45 minutes to an hour only to lose. The fact that I can log into the game on a lunch break or quickly before I head out for the day and get a few games in is really exciting. Secondly, the 7 and 8 minute games are pretty one sided where one ream doesn't capture the first point or reach the first checkpoint with the payload. Everyone has been in one of those games where you are just getting steamrolled. They aren't fun and if they last too long they can turn people off of the game. The fact that the games are designed to be short makes it easier to shake off a bad loss and also makes the closer games last longer so you have more chances to make plays to come out on top.

The maps themselves are really well designed as well. From what I can tell, there are tons of narrow halls and choke points that lead to a lot of interaction from the start. And Blizzard has done a really good job making the maps seem vertical as well to take advantage of difference heroes mobility. Widowmaker and Hanzo have no shortage of places to set up shop above the fight using their grappling hook and wall climb. Likewise, Torbjorn and Bastion have plenty of places they can strategically set up turrets and siege mode to "safely" hold off the other team. Given my limited shooter experience, there could be some shortcomings I'm missing with these maps that more experienced players can see, but so far I'm very impressed.

If these videos were meant to get me even more excited for Overwatch then it definitely succeeded. Selfishly I am worried that Wednesday will come and we will have nothing else to view or analyze on this game, but that's what is great about it. This world is all new to us, and every tidbit we get will be brand new. With all that being said, feel free as always to comment with your thoughts or hopes for Overwatch.

Thanks for reading as always,

Chris