Author: Game Infliction

Blizzard has officially scrapped Overwatch 2’s long-awaited PvE Hero mode, but the game’s creative leads are assuring fans that PvE is still a focus for the game moving forward.

On a Twitch stream detailing Overwatch 2’s content roadmap, executive producer Jared Neuss explained the decision to cut the PvE content.

“Development on the PvE experience has not really hasn’t made the progress that we have hoped,” Neuss said. “The team has created a bunch of amazing content so there’s awesome missions that are really exciting. There’s brand new enemies that are super fun to fight and some truly great and ridiculous hero talents. But unfortunately, the effort required to pull all of that together into a Blizzard-quality experience that we can ship to you is huge, and there really is no end in sight or defined kind of end date where we can put that out into the world.

“And so we are left with another difficult choice. Do we continue to pour all that effort into PvE, hoping we can land it at some point in the future or do we stick with this set of values that we have aligned on and focus on the live game and focus on serving all of you? With everything we have learned about what it takes to operate this game at the level that you deserve, it’s clear that we can’t deliver on that original vision for PvE that was shown in 2019. What that means is that we won’t be delivering that dedicated hero mode with talent trees, that long-term talent power progression. Those things are just not in our plans anymore. And we know that this is going to be disappointing to many of you which is why we wanted to bring it up before we talk about the road map. And to be perfectly honest it’s been really difficult for many of us and a lot of folks on the team that pour their heart and soul into that stuff.”

Another big change to Overwatch 2

Overwatch 2’s PvE mode was supposed to be a big differentiating factor between the original game and its sequel. In 2019, we got to go hands-on with the PvE, which was set to have new hero abilities, co-op attacks, and a level progression system. But, when Overwatch 2 launched, the long-awaited PvE mode wasn’t a part of it. Instead, Blizzard promised that Overwatch 2’s PvE would come sometime in 2023 as seasonal content.

Even though the original vision for the PvE mode has been cut, there is still a lot of content in the Overwatch 2 pipeline. On Twitter, the Overwatch account shared an image detailing plans for Overwatch 2 Season 5, Season 6, Season 7, and beyond. It’s confirmed that story missions are coming to Overwatch 2 in Season 6, alongside a new support hero. So while the ambitious PvE mode isn’t a part of Overwatch’s future, maybe the story missions can help fill that void for players.

#Overwatch2: A Look Ahead ✨

Join us as we share more details about everything we have planned for 2023, including new events, PvE, new Heroes, new maps, & more.

? https://t.co/FEyTC2p7eL pic.twitter.com/lGd1uABbfN

— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) May 16, 2023

In an interview with GameSpot, Overwatch 2 director Aaron Keller explained some of the PvE additions coming to Overwatch 2 in lieu of the ambitious Hero mode.

“We have a lot coming out this year, and even if you look at Season 6, it’s the biggest season we’ve ever launched in the history of Overwatch,” Keller said. “We are running a PvE event that season. We have a whole new type of PvE content that we’re releasing with our single-player Hero mastery missions… So I hope that players can see that we are still committed to PvE and we are doing more with the story than we’ve ever done before. We’re just doing it in a different way than what we originally talked about.”

Neuss expanded on that, saying Blizzard isn’t walking away from Overwatch 2 PvE entirely.

“We know that if we get into the seasonal cadence, we can release things during seasons in a way that we can plan for effectively and that we think is going to be really exciting to players,” Neuss said. “That, more to the point, gives us time to adapt to the next thing for players before you release it, and I think moving away from that idea of this one big singular PvE release moment and into a, ‘No, we’re going to do PvE stuff all the time.’ We have all these plans. Season 6 has three different flavors of that, and we have a bunch of other versions of that coming up and seasons after that.”

We called Overwatch 2 great in our review, saying the sequel, “breathes new life into what was once the sharpest multiplayer shooter around, before it had its edges severely dulled by Blizzard’s attention shifting away.”

Logan Plant is a freelance writer for IGN covering video game and entertainment news. He has over seven years of experience in the gaming industry with bylines at IGN, Nintendo Wire, Switch Player Magazine, and Lifewire. Find him on Twitter @LoganJPlant.

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom builds upon the groundbreaking open world design of 2017’s Breath of the Wild, and the creative leads behind the sequel have seemingly confirmed that the Zelda team will stick with this formula for future entries.

In an interview with Game Informer, Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma and Tears of the Kingdom director Hidemaro Fujibayashi discussed the future of the Zelda franchise, saying the open world format — or “open air” as Nintendo liked to call it in 2017 — is here to stay.

“With Ocarina of Time, I think it’s correct to say that it did kind of create a format for a number of titles in the franchise that came after it,” Aonuma said. “But in some ways, that was a little bit restricting for us. While we always aim to give the player freedoms of certain kinds, there were certain things that format didn’t really afford in giving people freedom. Of course, the series continued to evolve after Ocarina of Time, but I think it’s also fair to say now that we’ve arrived at Breath of the Wild and the new type of more open play and freedom that it affords. Yeah, I think it’s correct to say that it has created a new kind of format for the series to proceed from.”

Aonuma’s new comments mirror what the longtime Zelda producer said back in 2017. Just after Breath of the Wild’s launch, Aonuma said, “From now on, this will probably be the standard form.”

The open world standard doesn’t mean we’ll never see other types of Zelda games again. In the years between Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom we saw a Musou-style Breath of the Wild prequel, a rhythm spinoff, a 2D Zelda remake, and a Skyward Sword remaster. Surely, Nintendo will continue to release other types of Zelda experiences while the next open world game is in the oven.

Nintendo has definitely struck gold with the open world Zelda format. We awarded Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom a pair of 10s, saying of Tears of the Kingdom, “Nintendo has followed up a triumph with a triumph, expanding and evolving a world that already felt full beyond expectation and raising the bar ever higher into the clouds.”

And for help with everything Tears of the Kingdom, take a look at our Tears of the Kingdom Walkthrough and Guide about making your way through Hyrule. In fact, you can start here:

• 16 Things to Do First in Tears of the Kingdom
• 14 Things Tears of the Kingdom Doesn’t Tell You
• How to Uncover the Full TOTK Map
• How to Expand Your Inventory in TOTK
• PSA: Your Old BOTW Save Unlocks Something Cool in TOTK

Logan Plant is a freelance writer for IGN covering video game and entertainment news. He has over seven years of experience in the gaming industry with bylines at IGN, Nintendo Wire, Switch Player Magazine, and Lifewire. Find him on Twitter @LoganJPlant.

Following a “challenging” year of losses and few releases, Ubisoft is preparing to pump resources into the Assassin’s Creed franchise to secure its future. It will include a restructure that will increase headcount on Assassin’s Creed title development by 40% in the coming years, following a rash of layoffs that reduced the company’s global headcount below 20,000.

In its full year earnings today, Ubisoft reported that in a fiscal year in which its only major releases were Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope, Just Dance 2023, and Rocksmith+, its net sales were €1.81 billion ($1.97 billion) down 14.6% from last year, and it overall reported an operating loss of €500 million ($543 million). While Ubisoft has previously stated that Sparks of Hope and Just Dance specifically underperformed, other live service games kept money flowing in, with the Assassin’s Creed franchise in particular reaching a new “record active users” despite no new game releases. Ubisoft reports that not only does Assassin’s Creed Valhalla now have 44% more players life-to-date than Origins and 19% more than Odyssey, it’s bringing in more money per player than either game.

Ubisoft is going big on Assassin’s Creed

This likely explains why Ubisoft is gearing up to go hard on the Assassin’s Creed franchise in the coming years. Assassin’s Creed Mirage is still set for release in 2023, and three other major games are on the horizon alongside an additional VR game and a mobile game in the franchise.

Ubisoft has stated it intends to increase the number of people working on the franchise across the company by 40% in the coming years to “fuel its ambitious expansion”, though it seems likely much of this will come from promised “targeted restructurings” as ongoing cost-cutting measures have dropped the company’s global headcount below 20,000 from a September total of over 20,700. Ubisoft tells investors that it plans to continue “tight control on recruitments” and to divest “non-core assets,” meaning we’re likely to see Ubisoft continue to reduce the overall number of games it takes on at once (a process it has already begun in earnest) and spend more time, money, and person power on Assassin’s Creed.

That doesn’t mean that Assassin’ Creed is literally everything, though. Unlike a number of past earnings reports and announcements, this quarter’s announcements did not come with any game delays or cancellations. Ubisoft’s coming fiscal year (ending March 2024) still promises to include not just Mirage, but Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, Tom Clancy’s The Division Resurgence, Rainbow Six Mobile, The Crew Motorfest, Skull and Bones (which has been delayed six times now), XDefiant, and “another large game” that has not yet been named. Ubisoft expects to say more about these games in an upcoming Ubisoft Forward event on June 12.

It’s also worth noting Ubisoft’s stated interest in generative AI. In its earnings report, Ubisoft calls itself “uniquely positioned to lead” the charge on a purported “transformation” of creative industries by generative AI, which it claims was demonstrated at the recent Game Developers Conference 2023 in March. “Internally, early adoption is fast, with creators and developers of all levels experimenting with the technology and taking advantage of the booming Generative AI landscape,” the press release states. “With them, Ubisoft is shaping a responsible framework with talent management and fair use at heart.”

While several major companies have come out in favor of experimenting with generative AI, this is a notably emphatic statement of interest from Ubisoft in generative AI integration with game development. The impacts of that use have yet to be seen, but Ubisoft has previously discussed potential uses, such as NPC pathfinding, through its R&D division Ubisoft La Forge. IGN has previously examined both the benefits and concerns around generative AI during our recent AI Week.

Ubisoft’s outlook for the coming year expects an income of €400 million ($435 million) – which would mark a significant jump from its €500 million loss over the past year.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.