We Made It to the Merge! Our community has worked hard to make Overwatch feel welcoming to players of all different backgrounds. In the last few weeks alone, Blizzard has shown a lot of effort to combat racism and sexism in Overwatch. And now, we've made it! Overwatch is fully gender balanced, and now features 3,736 unique voice lines. There's still more work to be done, but that's a big step in the right direction. If you haven't tried Blizzard's new voice-pack for Overwatch, you can get it for free today. Overwatch Voice Packs are available on PlayStation, Xbox, and Origin, and support male and female characters. It's great to see this progress in Overwatch, and we're happy to see players of all genders get to enjoy the game. We're Making It Easier for Heroes to Play Together. At GameBlast 2016, we played a cool new "team formation" game to represent the next big thing in competitive Overwatch, and we’re not just making a few changes for fun. You’ll see an overhaul in the Competitive Play Lobby, and you’ll soon get to enjoy it with your friends. While competing, you can easily swap between heroes in your lineup using the new "Swap Hero" button, you’ll be able to set up game alerts for your teammates, and you’ll get an option to invite friends to your Competitive Play Match Parties. The Competitive Play Lobby will also have new player icons that include male and female models. Our art team has been hard at work creating an alternate models for men and women, and now these new characters will join the cast! You can even preview our new team formation maps over on our Public Test Realm. If you don’t see them just yet, we’re just starting up our testing and the map roster isn’t final, so it will change in the future. We’ll be making additional changes in the future to continue bringing Overwatch’s social aspects into the competitive world. We’re looking forward to seeing you on the competitive scene! We've Seen the Future of Overwatch in VR. We’re building the future of play and interactive experiences at Blizzard, and we’re showing it off at GameBlast and OC5. At OC5, you’ll be able to take part in our VR experience. Here’s a taste of what you’ll get: Live multiplayer action from PC VR in one of the most popular games of 2016 Watch how an artist can use VR to design and share their works Get an up-close view of the latest technology used in making the Overwatch universe Come check out the future of play and immersion in the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, and Sony Morpheus headset. We’re excited to see you at OC5! Overwatch is Making Some Major Improvements. Overwatch is a game built for community. So many of our passionate fans have given us feedback about a multitude of topics and features that they’ve wanted to see in the game. Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback and suggestions, and we are making a few changes to reflect your desires. Your suggestions aren’t just changes that we can implement quickly, they’re major overhauls to how Overwatch works. Take back control of what you want to do in the game. In the future, players will no longer be able to select their hero by picking gender. All characters will be available for male and female players to pick. We want to give players the choice of which hero to play as and we’re bringing in this change to make sure you’ll have the most choices available to you. We’ve also heard your concerns about Overwatch on console, and we’re making a number of improvements to the platform’s playlists. Before, Overwatch on console wasn't in the right place. Now, we're giving you a much better way to enjoy Overwatch on console. Starting today, Xbox Live Gold subscribers will be able to enjoy Overwatch's Heroes of the Storm event on the Xbox One and PlayStation 4. If you're looking for a completely different Overwatch experience, you can play some cool new PvP maps and modes in Heroes of the Storm instead! And if you just love to play Overwatch, you can get into our quick play game where you can queue with up to five friends and dive into the action. We’re listening to the community and we’ll continue working on improvements that everyone can enjoy. Thank you so much for your time and for giving us your feedback! Let’s get Overwatching! Nade’j, Overwatch’s game director, has taken the time to speak to the community to share the latest on Overwatch. Hello! It has been an amazing journey so far. I can’t believe it has been 6 months since we first launched. It feels like we've accomplished so much since then, but we’re just getting started. To celebrate our progress in the last 6 months, we've started releasing information about the future of Overwatch. Some of the features and updates you may see soon: Replay System The replay system is one of our primary goals on the development team right now. We’ve been working hard on Overwatch and can’t wait to reveal how Overwatch will provide players with tools to share their stories and replay moments with others. This will be a huge step in enabling players to capture their experiences and share them with the community. The replay system is one of our primary goals on the development team right now. We’ve been working hard on Overwatch and can’t wait to reveal how Overwatch will provide players with tools to share their stories and replay moments with others. This will be a huge step in enabling players to capture their experiences and share them with the community. Console Updates We’re excited to expand the reach of Overwatch on consoles with support for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 players! Overwatch on console will play differently than it does on PC, but it will also offer a great opportunity for players on console to interact in a different way with Overwatch. We’re really looking forward to the release of Overwatch on console, and we're working to make sure that all our players will have a fun experience no matter what platform you prefer to play on. We’re excited to expand the reach of Overwatch on consoles with support for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 players! Overwatch on console will play differently than it does on PC, but it will also offer a great opportunity for players on console to interact in a different way with Overwatch. We’re really looking forward to the release of Overwatch on console, and we're working to make sure that all our players will have a fun experience no matter what platform you prefer to play on. New Map Overwatch has new maps in the works! As we are focusing on the game experience first, the maps are on hold until the next update. As we get closer to the release, you will see that some of them have made their way back into our playtests. I can’t wait for you to see what we have in store for you! Overwatch has new maps in the works! As we are focusing on the game experience first, the maps are on hold until the next update. As we get closer to the release, you will see that some of them