Blizzard World Comes To ‘Overwatch’ Test Servers

Blizzard Entertainment introduced Blizzard World to Overwatch fans at BlizzCon 2017 just two weeks ago and has already pushed out to be tested by the online shooter’s community. The new map was released to the Public Test Realm (PTR) servers on the PC Monday along with a handful of bug fixes.

Blizzard World is a new Assault/Escort map set in a theme park built around various other games from the Blizzard Entertainment library of titles. This means franchises like World of Warcraft, Diablo, StarCraft, Heroes of the Storm, Lost Vikings, and Hearthstone. It is essentially Disneyland based on Blizzard instead of Mickey Mouse and friends.

Structurally, the map is built much like the other maps that support the Assault and Payload game types. However, there are tons of details scattered throughout the maps that Overwatch players are already in the midst of finding. For example, Reddit user maFfre998 discovered a vendor stall where you shoot the balloons free and watch them float into the air. Popping a balloon also creates a shower of confetti.

There is no official date yet for when Blizzard World will be officially released on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. Creative Director Jeff Kaplan simply pegged early 2018 as the release date at BlizzCon.

The recent addition of Moira to the roster of heroes also means she is the one that will be fixed the most. The official patch notes do not list any major balance changes to her abilities and only bug fixes like her eyelashes becoming detached and displaying Biotic Grasp animations when using Biotic Orb.

Reddit user Rawflax does claim Moira’s alternate Biotic Grasp attack does require the player to aim more accurately than before. An area more immediately around the opposing player is required to target them with the beam whereas before you could have the reticle away from the enemy’s body.

Other notable changes include Mei’s Cryo-freeze ability clearing the healing debuff from Ana’s Biotic Grenade. This is one that has been around for a while, so it is nice to see if fixed.

There are also a couple of Overwatch performance fixes. One issue was caused by repeated use of Doomfist’s Seismic Slam while the other was caused by shooting at the gold coin piles in the last Defender spawn of Junkertown.

[Featured Image by Blizzard Entertainment]