‘Overwatch’ Anniversary Event Ends With Double Experience Over The Weekend

With less than a week remaining in the Anniversary event for Overwatch, players will be able to earn even more loot boxes before the celebration ends. A double experience event starts on Thursday, June 8, in the first-person shooter. The bonus experience will last until June 12 when both the Anniversary event and the double experience boon will end.

Players can earn double experience on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. According to the official site, the double experience buff will apply to most sources of experience gain within Overwatch. Experience is doubled for experience earned for spending time in a match, finishing a game, winning a game, completing consecutive matches, backfilling into a game, and earning post-game medals.

“This bonus experience period begins in all regions across all platforms on Thursday, June 8 at 5:00 p.m. PDT (or Friday, June 9 at 00:00 UTC) and ends on Monday, June 12 at 11:59 p.m. PDT (or Tuesday, June 13 at 06:59 UTC).”

The double experience will not apply to the First Win of the Day which will continue to provide 1,500 experience points on the first win of each day. Players should also note that the double experience benefit from the event will also stack multiplicatively with the bonus experience provided for playing in a group. Over 100 Anniversary items are up for grabs in Overwatch loot boxes right now. These items, like other event items, will be retired when the event ends. Players will need the extra experience to get as many items as possible before the event ends.

Although many players wanted permanent items from the first anniversary of Overwatch, the event is like every other event. Items are randomized in loot boxes with one event item guaranteed to be included. The pool of Anniversary items includes 11 legendary skins, 24 epic-quality dance emotes; one for each character, and 74 other event items as noted on the game’s website.

Double experience will surely aid players in attaining a few more of the more desirable cosmetic items like the emotes before they are no longer obtainable. Like all Overwatch events, the Anniversary event items can be purchased during the event for in-game currency. They cost triple the amount of credits when compared to the cost of permanent items. For instance, each dance emote is 750 Credits rather than 250 Credits.

The legendary event skins cost 3,000 Credits. Skins for Bastion, D.Va, Genji, Hanzo, Lúcio, Mei, Pharah, Solider: 76, Symmetra, Tracer, and Zarya can be looted now from Anniversary boxes. Of course, these legendary skins and the emotes are rarer than the other event items. Not to mention, there are just 35 of those items versus the 74 sprays, player icons, and voice lines.

Earning loot boxes twice as fast will help with finding a few more of the rarer items before the Anniversary event ends. No matter how someone plays Overwatch, the experience earned will double across the entire game. During the last days of the event, players should be able to earn several boxes before the event concludes.

Overwatch and Blizzard Entertainment continue to provide events every other month alongside balance patches and fixes. A new map is coming to the game soon, too. As reported by the Inquisitr, an assault map on the moon is coming soon to the game. The Horizon Lunar Colony is a map with low gravity and integrates heavily into Winston’s story.

Earn DOUBLE XP this weekend on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One!

The time to act begins June 8: https://t.co/rIHXwTcEmE pic.twitter.com/IVbpIK65so

— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) June 7, 2017

Although the lore behind the Horizon Lunar Colony mentions a missing research specimen named Hammond, there is no word on whether or not a new hero is being released alongside the map. Typically, a hero is released independent of a new map debut. Ana, Sombra, and Orisa all released separately from new maps like Eichenwalde and Oasis. Even if a new hero is not immediately coming to Overwatch, it is likely that a new one will release sometime after the Horizon Lunar Colony moves from the public test realm to the live server.

[Featured Image by Blizzard Entertainment]