For as a lot flak as Battlefield 2042 caught final yr for launching with out a traditional scoreboard, this has been enterprise as typical for the final six years of Overwatch. The Overwatch rating display screen helps you to see your individual efficiency stats, comparable to your kill and dying counts, however obfuscates the stats of your teammates and enemies. Properly, obfuscate no extra: Overwatch 2’s new PvP beta has an actual, honest-to-god scoreboard, and it is placing me on edge.
There’s nothing inherently scary a couple of colourful spreadsheet, in fact, however I am skeptical that this one will make Overwatch 2 extra enjoyable. At worst, the brand new scoreboard may make Overwatch 2 much less enjoyable, particularly for solo gamers.
Tensions run excessive in aggressive shooters, particularly in video games like Overwatch, the place a single teammate underperforming may be the distinction between the workforce profitable or shedding. There’s plenty of stress to carry out properly—if to not win the match, then a minimum of to spare your self from being harassed by different gamers in textual content or voice chat.
Having your whole stats laid naked, as they’re in CS:GO, Valorant, and Rainbow Six Siege, offers each teammates and enemies ammo to ‘again up’ abusive feedback or different usually crappy conduct. Overwatch 2’s scoreboard is not uncommon, however a part of Overwatch’s enchantment has been that it would not attempt to be similar to different workforce shooters, so I am unsure why it’s now.
Common Overwatch forgoes a traditional scoreboard for a medal system that was truly designed to curb the toxicity of stat-obsessed teammates. Your particular person stats can have gold, silver, or bronze medals that let you know the way you’re stacking up in opposition to your workforce—when you’ve got a gold medal in harm, as an illustration, you have dealt essentially the most harm of your workforce. Silver is second-most, bronze is third. Medals are an efficient approach to know the way you are doing at a look with out getting a definitive peek at your teammates’ numbers, however that hasn’t stopped gamers from weaponizing them in opposition to one another. It is common for gamers to make use of their medals as proof that the remainder of the workforce is doing poorly. On this manner, obfuscation can typically result in misguided accusations or function camouflage for judgmental teammates. That cocky Genji boasting about his gold medals will naturally miss the half the place he died eight instances and sucked up all of Mercy’s revives.
When medals aren’t sufficient, nosy gamers peek at teammates’ Profession Profile pages to see earlier season ranks or what number of hours they’ve performed their present hero. “Lmao at this sh*tty 12-hour Mercy,” a teammate of mine as soon as remarked. Profile prodding has turn into so intrusive and abusive that almost all Aggressive gamers these days have their profiles set to personal.
So, no, Overwatch’s present methods aren’t a silver bullet for toxicity, however a totally clear scoreboard would not clear up the issue both. At greatest, having a better context for a match is useful for explaining what went proper or fallacious. In a pleasant surroundings, that may be constructive. But when helpful stats are the objective, then Overwatch 2’s scoreboard is already missing.
It is placing that in Overwatch 2, an objective-based sport, not one of the stats on the scoreboard must do with the target. Okay/D ratios and therapeutic values aren’t every thing. A top-fragging Solider can damage the workforce by not defending his helps. A Mercy complaining about shedding after therapeutic 10,000 harm may’ve underutilized her harm enhance. In the meantime, the medal-less Ana who pushed the payload whereas all people ran forward will get zero props on the scoreboard. At worst, Overwatch 2’s scoreboard means jerks now have extra instruments with which to be jerks. Sadly, these video games entice plenty of jerks, so the cons are outweighing the professionals in my eyes.
Having spent years in Rainbow Six Siege lobbies, I might readily quit detailed stats if it might get its gamers to relax out. I actually do not want an informal match of Overwatch to incorporate my Okay/D ratio being mocked by the enemy workforce’s Cassidy. It may be enjoyable to match stats with my mates although, so possibly a pleasant compromise could be to solely present my stats to my occasion.
Blizzard has been clear that nothing within the Overwatch 2 beta ought to be thought of closing, so it is attainable the scoreboard will look completely different by the point it is out.
