Revealed recently, the Year of the Rooster event is now live in Overwatch, and with it, the new wave of changes and fixes. Here’s what all you can expect:
In addition to a horde of character skins, cosmetics, victory poses and highlight intros, there is a new mode called Capture the Rooster, a tweaked version of the age-old Capture the Flag mode. The update also bring the balance changes previously in PTR – the long awaited Hook 2.0 (sorry Roadhog), major nerfs to Ana and D.Va, and a teeny-tiny buff to Sombra.
Starting off with D.Va, the hottie-drive MEKA’s health is still the same (600), but now only 200 of it is now armour, dropping from the initial 400. Her guns have also been nerfed, now dealing only 2 damage per bullet, but the bullet shots have been increased from 8 to 11. Blizzard said, “D.Va’s armor often made her feel like she had no weaknesses, even against heroes that are often effective against bigger targets (like Reaper). The changes to her Fusion Cannons will result in a small overall decrease in damage, but they should feel more consistent now.”
Ana’s Biotic Grenade has been made much, much less powerful, the healing boost being reduced by a massive 50%. “The healing boost from Ana’s Biotic Grenade was providing too much healing,” according the developers, “especially when used on targets with large health pools.” The effect of the grenade has also been reduced to four seconds from the initial five.
As far as Roadhog’s hook is concerned, there will no more hooking around corners or behind walls (geddit?), as the targets will now be able to free themselves from the hook if they are able to break Roadhog’s line-of-sight before getting pulled. Also, the targets will now be pulled directly in front of Roadhog, instead of straight to him as was the case before.
Sombra, the hacker who’s rarely seen in games these days has received a small buff that decreased the time it takes to hack an enemy from 1 second to 0.8. The cooldown of the ability has also been reduced to eight seconds, from the initial 12. According to Blizzard, “Sombra often had difficulty hacking enemies, even when she surprised the target. This change should help her execute hacks more easily.”
There are other small gameplay tweaks as well. The kill feed now displays headshots and hero abilities, and crouch now has a cooldown. There is a new emote wheel as well, which allows players to equip up to four emotes, voice lines and sprays, in addition to minor bug fixes.
The Year of the Rooster event will last from 24th January to 13th February.
Register with us for the best in gaming, and join us for video game discussions on our forums.
