Overwatch, now pushing five years since its original release, has received updates from Blizzard on a regular basis, adding characters, maps, game modes, and presumably tools that can be used to create pornography of the game’s characters. A recent addition has sparked controversy, however: a “period-accurate” map of Hiroshima after the detonation of a nuclear bomb.
“What’s really fucked up is Overwatch is set in the future, right,” says avid and only Overwatch League fan, Bryce Taylor. “So this is actually a second nuke. In the lore, it’s called ‘Big Boy,’ and that’s not even all that clever, so all in all, I’m really disappointed in Blizzard for this.”
The map, which is less of an arena for a team hero shooter and more of a smoldering wasteland that forces you to take a hard look at humanity and the destructive nature of mankind, contains a control point that both teams must fight for. The team that ultimately wins must then face the reality that no victory could be worth this much bloodshed.
“Honestly, we don’t know how to please folks anymore,” says phone owner and Overwatch map designer Marissa Lafayette. “I mean, we let them play on the moon and in cities across the world, but the second we try to shake things up a bit and have them duke it out in a wasteland where not even the soul of humanity can survive, everybody freaks out.”
Almost every person interviewed for this article expressed that they wished Blizzard had seized the opportunity to at least make the new map an “escort” map, where one team escorts a payload to a certain location, the payload usually being a bomb.
“Anyway,” Lafayette interjected before we wrapped up our interview. “You guys want to see what I’m working on now? The map is just the Amazon Rainforest, but just completely bulldozed to the fucking ground.”
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