General Overwatch Discussion

Baby_Yoda

So, Activision just announced a partnership with Lego to produce sets based on Overwatch. All anyone knows is that we're getting sets at a variety of price points, which I would guess rules out Brickheadz and perhaps reduces the chance of Constraction. You can find the proof here, if you haven't already heard (article in English).

For those who aren't aware (there are many members of this forum who are particularly... mature) Overwatch is a video game for computer, Playstation and Xbox that pits teams of players against each other at random in online matches. Each player selects one of a variety of characters to play as, each with their own distinct appearance, abilities and play style. The teams fight over a mobile objective known as a "payload" by, you guessed it, shooting at each other.

Now, a major aspect of the game that has contributed to its immense success is its colourful trivialisation of such combat. The characters are cheerful and comedic; the weapons are fantastical, often ridiculously so; the violence is deliberately unrealistic and filled with everything but gore. Mind you, this description comes from me having observed and very rarely played the game but never purchased it.

I've seen quite a bit of popularity surrounding it as both a casual introduction to the first-person shooter genre for young people and a dynamic system of play for adult competitors.

While it obviously lacks the insane universal popularity of Minecraft (a game both appropriate for young children and engaging for adults) I can see why it could benefit Lego. Looking back, nearly all licenses have been designed to appeal to one of Lego's two already established fanbases of children and adults.

My guess is that this is designed to fill the gap between them. I have a few (teenage) friends who have already told me that this announcement is sufficient to convince them to get into Lego. The biggest reason teens stop buying Lego (i.e. enter their Dark Ages) is because they feel that sets are too childish or, occasionally, that AFOL sets are too nerdy. I think Overwatch is "cool" enough to overcome both of those misconceptions simultaneously.

But I didn't create this thread to ramble. I want to see what others think. Is the idea too adult? Too childish? Too niche? What do we expect to see? What do we want to see? Will it be the next Galidor or the next Star Wars?

Note: While other Blizzard properties (namely Starcraft, Warcraft and Hearthstone) have been produced by Mega Bloks and later Mega Construx, it seems Overwatch is the only game now to have construction sets planned at all, if the aforementioned article is trustworthy. Mind you, Activision titles Destiny and Call of Duty are still in with Mattel. R.I.P. You also might want to take note of the disclaimer at the bottom of the article.

Bumblepants

I wouldn't rule out Brickheadz, there will probably be some. Just other stuff as well.

Legolis

I think it's great. We play Overwatch a few evenings a week and all the sets will be instabuys. I really don't see the violence in Overwatch as anything worse than what appears in Star Wars. The worst thing about Overwatch is the likelihood that you're going to have some preteen screaming insults at you down the mic. :D The game itself is rather tame in comparison. The theme could make a great CMF series. 

MaffyD

My youngest son is obsessed with this game even though he cannot play it due to the rating (and because we don't have a current generation console). The rest of my children are aware of it. There are countless YT videos showing gameplay etc. and some have collected millions of views. It is well-known.

I think Lego is trying to expand beyond the core demo it usually sells to and hopefully avoid the Dark Ages teenagers tend to drop into. There is certainly a market for it, based on other franchises and toy ranges (McFarlane toys for one, Diamond Select and Kotobukiya are others). Minecraft is becoming increasingly like Lego in that the core audience is younger children and adults. It is no longer cool for teens.

Regarding 'multiple price points': Brickheadz, CMF and Constraction. Those are 3 price points all by themselves. BH already has different prices for single and double packs (and I imagine there will be a third when the 'big plus little fig' sets are out) and there are multiple price points for Constraction as well (Scout Trooper & Speeder Bike compared with any other figure). I wouldn't necessarily get your hopes up for actual sets. Or anything other than BHz at this point.

And finally, if people don't know what Overwatch is (or any other term, to be honest) is it really that hard to type the word into Google or Bing and hit return? Is it harder to do that than to make a post stating that they don't know what it is? Is it somehow helpful to tell everyone, without explaining why you are telling everyone?  I was reading some comments, and I didn't know immediately what TF2 was referring to, but there were a lot of mentions so I presumed it was well-known by most of the commentators, so I selected 'TF2', right clicked and chose "Search with Bing". Team Fortress 2. Done. You don't need to know everything about the game to understand where it might fit into Lego's toy lines, and it's a little early to start speculating anyway.

Overall, I like the idea that Lego is trying new and different things. If they don't work, at least there will be interesting parts and colours we can use in something else!

Bumblepants

^I thought it was Titanfall 2. Huh.

CCC

I imagine it might be to try to keep the original fans of the LEGO Minecraft sets now they are five years older and thinking the new Minecraft sets are a bit lame as the game is out of date (for them).

I hope they don't go down the route of CMF though. They have always been aimed at all age groups, both young and old, and also based on very popular franchises when licensed. There might be a big group of people into playing Overwatch, but is there enough overlap of that group with the LEGO fanbase to get them to buy CMFs in enough numbers to justify them?

gmonkey76

Had no idea what overwatch was, so I had to Google it. Saw a couple of images that could make useful figures/sets for me, but I won't hold my breath. Saw what looked like to be WW2 U.S. Soldiers, but if they're made like the "German" Soldiers from Indy my hopes are not to high. Saw what looked to be like a Battletech/Robotech Mech that would interest me, but that woud depend on how or if they were made. I guess I will just have to wait and see. Maybe there will be some good parts, and Minifigures, if not it will save me some money.

MaffyD

^ I don't know CCC - I don't collect these minifig ranges (although they are on the increase in my house so Lego must be doing something right) but I think you're right to worry about the Venn diagram of Overwatch|CMF buyers.

If they do go for actual sets, I sincerely hope that Lego can do better than these:

https://mcfarlane.com/search/?s=construction

CCC

I think any LEGO set will always be way better than any McFarlane set ... for LEGO fans.

Those McFarlane sets are good for what they are. They are highly detailed display style diaramas that can normally be put together in one way and that is it. The construction part is minimal and essentially there as a way to get the diarama into a smaller box.


It may just be that this is testing the waters for WoW, or maybe there is still some blackout period as MegaBloks previously had that license, and so they are doing this instead.

CCC

Mark Stafford has commented that he is involved in the design of the sets, so they should be good designs.

MaffyD

^ Is he known for Brickheadz, CCBS or CMF designs? If not, then that's pretty good!

CCC

No. https://brickset.com/sets/list-5289

Power Miners, Atlantis, Alien Conquest, Ninjago, Chima, Nexo, etc

Proper sets. Even if you don't like the themes, the vehicles and so on are decent builds.

Bumblepants

Mark Stafford is also a gamer. Matched against him in Destiny before so he probably knows Overwatch really well.

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA

I wonder how the Belgian and Netherlands markets will see this range considering the loot box finding?
 As a parent of a teenage Overwatcher, whose watched far too much gameplay, you'll never convince me this license is a good fit for TLG.
  The game at its core level is who can talk the most smack while shooting everyone in the face the quickest... 

NicksBricks

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA said:

I wonder how the Belgian and Netherlands markets will see this range considering the loot box finding?
 As a parent of a teenage Overwatcher, whose watched far too much gameplay, you'll never convince me this license is a good fit for TLG.
  The game at its core level is who can talk the most smack while shooting everyone in the face the quickest... 

While that might be what the community is at its core, as is with most competitive online games, that is not what the actual game is. The game is a very diverse group of characters with in-depth stories attached to each. 

leetshoe

As an avid gamer, l hate this game. It promotes the worst kind of anti-consumer lootbox microtransaction crap that is ruining modern games. And it's also the type of game that would not make good LEGO sets. It's an entirely small scaled multiplayer class-based shooter. First off, LEGO doesn't like guns. But the game doesn't have "realistic" guns so l guess that's ok. But it's all multiplayer. That means there's not a distinctive location, vehicles, or setpieces in the game that can be turned into sets. Halo is a similar game known for its multiplayer, but it has a large scale single player campaign that'd lend itself to LEGO sets more than this game.

l am a fan of LEGO sets and if the sets are good l'll get them regardless of my feelings on the game, but my initial reaction is surprise. l COULD see brickheads or a CMF line for the game. And it'd probably have nice minifigs (even though the characters are all either racial stereotypes or sex objects). 

CCC

leetshoe said:

It promotes the worst kind of anti-consumer lootbox microtransaction crap

That makes it sound perfect for them to try out a CMF style range that cannot be felt through the bags. (Although Unikitty may have beaten them to it.) :-)

akunthita

I'm cautiously happy about this news. I love the look and feel of Overwatch, but I think it is a much better fit for Mega. The Mega Construx Destiny characters are absolutely amazing, and the sets are very good too. As Overwatch is quite similar in look and feel to Destiny, and Blizzard has had a long term relationship with Mega, I wonder why they choose to work with LEGO this time.

LEGO simply can't recreate the diverse size and shape of Overwatch characters without loosing their special features. The fact that Mark Stafford is working on the sets gives me hope though that at least we will get some awesome mechs/vehicles or something like that.

If it turns out that LEGO doesn't do well with Overwatch, Mega may still pick up the license. They have passed licenses between themselves several times. And I'm happy to hear from the press-release that Mega will continue with Destiny 2 and Call of Duty. Those and the Halo sets are their best. 

Shib

This was a choice that I was surprised by. I wonder if the move to computer game licences might also be partly as a result of Dimensions, I get the feeling that Portal and Sonic might have been some of the bestselling Dimensions packs. 

While I've never played Overwatch I hope the theme does well enough to at least make LEGO consider other computer game franchises...

(obligatory I'm still just wanting Nintendo LEGO comment) 

curious

leetshoe said:

It promotes the worst kind of anti-consumer lootbox microtransaction crap that is ruining modern games.

They are being targeted with legislation and other efforts to stop the lootbox nonsense, Overwatch has been mentioned as particularly problematic because of its targeting of a teen audience for gambling. If that means they look to traditional extra income streams like toys and they pick LEGO I think thats a positive outcome. Although I would be against these sets coming out if lootboxes are still not dealt with by then. It would be especially bad for LEGO if the lootbox gambling came to a head during the sets release window.

leetshoe said:

But it's all multiplayer. That means there's not a distinctive location, vehicles, or setpieces in the game that can be turned into sets

I expect we will see things like the carts that carry Doomfist's gauntlet and designs from some of the more interesting levels like the throne room in Eichenwalde.

Pumpkin_3CK5

It's no surprise they announced this yesterday since it's the start of their second Anniversary event. Game's pretty fun; I play Junkrat mostly cause he crazy. I'm in Platinum and I haven't experienced much toxicity; that's usually at diamond - grandmaster, so if you're a casual gamer it shouldn't be that bad lolz.

Hopefully Overwatch gets actual sets and not just brickheadz. Maybe a D2C Watchpoint: Gibraltar with a Winston bigfig, Soldier, Ana, etc. Maybe variants of the minifigs in sets based on events like Junkenstein's Revenge and Omnic Crisis. Maybe a few escort the payload sets. I'd love to see sets of the giant vehicles that serves as spawn points/home base. Buy two of those and you have a complete game! Ah, wishful thinking. 

Baby_Yoda

Bumblepants said:

Mark Stafford is also a gamer. Matched against him in Destiny before so he probably knows Overwatch really well.

Coincidentally, I was just against someone called something like "MarkS" in Iron Banner. What's his PSN?

leetshoe said:

As an avid gamer, l hate this game. It promotes the worst kind of anti-consumer lootbox microtransaction crap that is ruining modern games. And it's also the type of game that would not make good LEGO sets. It's an entirely small scaled multiplayer class-based shooter. First off, LEGO doesn't like guns. But the game doesn't have "realistic" guns so l guess that's ok. But it's all multiplayer. That means there's not a distinctive location, vehicles, or setpieces in the game that can be turned into sets. Halo is a similar game known for its multiplayer, but it has a large scale single player campaign that'd lend itself to LEGO sets more than this game.

l am a fan of LEGO sets and if the sets are good l'll get them regardless of my feelings on the game, but my initial reaction is surprise. l COULD see brickheads or a CMF line for the game. And it'd probably have nice minifigs (even though the characters are all either racial stereotypes or sex objects). 

I strongly agree with you on the loot box system, and I personally will be extremely hesitant about even spending money on a DLC. I believe that when you pay for a game, you should be able to play the entire game, and that parts should only be locked off by in-game requirements (e.g. gold). However, Overwatch is not the worst offender. The loot box system is purely aesthetic here (as far as I'm aware; correct me if I'm wrong) whereas EA's Star Wars: Battlefront II (for instance) infamously utilises the system for actual items that improve one's effectiveness in the game.
There is quite a bit of external media surrounding Overwatch that could easily form the basis of a few playsets.
I disagree with the last line. There are many sexualised characters (though not more than the majority of other games) and I was shocked to find how stereotypical others were. I wouldn't say all characters come under that banner, though. Tracer, for example, isn't exactly a stereotypical white person nor is she particularly sexualised - in fact, I was convinced that she was a he until a few months after the game's release!

Pumpkin_3CK5 said:

It's no surprise they announced this yesterday since it's the start of their second Anniversary event. Game's pretty fun; I play Junkrat mostly cause he crazy. I'm in Platinum and I haven't experienced much toxicity; that's usually at diamond - grandmaster, so if you're a casual gamer it shouldn't be that bad lolz.

Hopefully Overwatch gets actual sets and not just brickheadz. Maybe a D2C Watchpoint: Gibraltar with a Winston bigfig, Soldier, Ana, etc. Maybe variants of the minifigs in sets based on events like Junkenstein's Revenge and Omnic Crisis. Maybe a few escort the payload sets. I'd love to see sets of the giant vehicles that serves as spawn points/home base. Buy two of those and you have a complete game! Ah, wishful thinking. 

Wishful thinking indeed! I should imagine it will look something like the first wave of Minecraft in terms of spread (assuming they will in fact be playsets) but a CMF series, as others have mentioned, seems quite likely due to wide range of characters.

Bumblepants

^something like LegoNabii. He uses Nabii on numerous platforms like here, Flickr etc. so that is how I knew it was him.

Legolis

Just as a note as I've seen it mentioned in a few posts the lootboxes in Overwatch are indeed completely cosmetic (containing either sprays, skins, voicelines, victory poses, ingame currency or "potg" screens). You earn them by playing the game and levelling up, which will happen with just a few games a day. You can also earn them by playing all the arcade modes for extra boxes each week. If you get duplicate items in your boxes that rewards ingame currency that you can exchange for lootbox items of your choice.

So you don't even have to wait for the RNG to reward you, you can just save up by playing the game. I hate lootboxes in games but honestly don't mind the Overwatch ones at all. Of course you can exchange real money for lootboxes but I'm at a loss for why you would need to. I'm a fairly casual player and manage to afford the skins I want each event by just casually playing the game.

Bumblepants

There is a free weekend on PSN to try Overwatch starting tomorrow (25th) so I might give it a go. Always need more reasons to buy Lego!

BrickByBrick

I really hope there's no cmf series for this. Next year we'll have TLM 2 and series 19. I really would love to see a Disney series 2 and next fall would be the first available time slot. If it doesn't happen then....
I'll be very disappointed if overwatch takes the slot

Aanchir

Baby_Yoda said:

I disagree with the last line. There are many sexualised characters (though not more than the majority of other games) and I was shocked to find how stereotypical others were. I wouldn't say all characters come under that banner, though. Tracer, for example, isn't exactly a stereotypical white person nor is she particularly sexualised - in fact, I was convinced that she was a he until a few months after the game's release!

I'm a bit curious what characters you think are particularly sexualized. As far as the default skins go, I feel like Widowmaker is the only character who's considerably more sexualized than your typical spandex-clad superhero or supervillain. It's been really weird to me seeing complaints from AFOLs about the characters being too sexualized considering how I hardly ever see complaints from AFOLs about characters like Slave Leia or Oola from LEGO Star Wars, Wonder Woman or Storm from LEGO Super Heroes, etc.

Fauch

watching what I guess is the official site. there are way more heroes than I thought. also, funnily, they all sound severely imba, which I guess is a way to balance a game lol.

Pumpkin_3CK5

@Baby_Yoda I think the designers wanted Tracer to look tomboy ish cause she is in fact a lesbian according to their comics from 2016.

But yeah, what Aanchir said, apart from Widow maker, I think most character designs are tame. It's clear Blizzard wanted to appeal to kids of every age(and their parents), s'why it's perfect for a LEGO collaboration.

G'dang it, this whole topic is making me wish LEGO had the rights to Nintendo. Personally want a Wario bigfig and a Bowser Castle. Throw in some new molds for Goombas for good measure. 

FowlerBricks

^ I'd love a Link minifigure.

Powderfinger

40+ million players is a big enough market to make this line an absolute solid hit sales-wise.

Baby_Yoda

Aanchir said:
I feel like Widowmaker is the only character who's considerably more sexualized than your typical spandex-clad superhero or supervillain. It's been really weird to me seeing complaints from AFOLs about the characters being too sexualized considering how I hardly ever see complaints from AFOLs about characters like Slave Leia or Oola from LEGO Star Wars, Wonder Woman or Storm from LEGO Super Heroes, etc.

I do think that those examples are borderline themselves. Maybe my word choice was too strong. Sometimes it's just hard to believe that the designer's intentions were purely innocent. Gameplay seems to place a lot less emphasis on that stuff than promotional art. I would complain about Slave Leia, too, but it just never comes up.

Pumpkin_3CK5 said:

@Baby_Yoda I think the designers wanted Tracer to look tomboy ish cause she is in fact a lesbian according to their comics from 2016.

Now that you mention it, I remember hearing something about the game taking a "huge step forward" by revealing something like that for some character. Guess it was her.

I think video games generally receive more criticism because they put the audience in the seat of a character. Watching people pretend to shoot each other on TV, for example, is not quite the same as pretending to shoot someone yourself. Games are also still seen by most people as just that - games - and it's difficult for a game (such as The Beginner's Guide) to be seen as an art form in the same way that films are. As such, I expect to see some really passionate arguments for and against this partnership at best, and a salt mine at worst.

Baby_Yoda

Bumblepants said:

^something like LegoNabii. He uses Nabii on numerous platforms like here, Flickr etc. so that is how I knew it was him.

I see. I would definitely remember playing with someone with "Lego" in their name.

Fauch

Baby_Yoda said:

Pumpkin_3CK5 said:

@Baby_Yoda I think the designers wanted Tracer to look tomboy ish cause she is in fact a lesbian according to their comics from 2016.

Now that you mention it, I remember hearing something about the game taking a "huge step forward" by revealing something like that for some character. Guess it was her.

I'm under the impression that the game is just about online competition. is the game somehow story driven where the mention of her homosexuality is relevant?

Pumpkin_3CK5

Stories/lore are from the animated shorts and comics blizzard releases, and some are through character interaction/dialogue in game. 

NicksBricks

If you want an idea of how popular this game is, their Overwatch League streams average 100,000+ active viewers on Twitch alone. Those are big numbers.

Aanchir

Fauch said:

Baby_Yoda said:

Pumpkin_3CK5 said:

@Baby_Yoda I think the designers wanted Tracer to look tomboy ish cause she is in fact a lesbian according to their comics from 2016.

Now that you mention it, I remember hearing something about the game taking a "huge step forward" by revealing something like that for some character. Guess it was her.

I'm under the impression that the game is just about online competition. is the game somehow story driven where the mention of her homosexuality is relevant?

The story is mostly just to provide flavor or background info, much like the bios for characters in fighting games like Street Fighter or racing games like F-Zero X. It’s easier to care about the characters in these sorts of games if they have some kind of identity beyond their gameplay moves and stats. Also as @Pumpkin_3CK5 says, there are comics and animations used to help advertise the game that tell more of the story than you might see or hear during normal gameplay. Tracer’s relationship with her girlfriend was first disclosed in a holiday comic I think.

I definitely encourage watching some of the animated shorts. I’ve never played the game myself, but I always enjoy the shorts for their beautiful animation and emotional range. Here are some of my favorites:

https://youtu.be/FqnKB22pOC0

https://youtu.be/to8yh83jlXg

https://youtu.be/8tjcm_kI0n0

Legopassion8

Are people still playing Overwatch? I thought Fortnight was the new hotness. Shoot if Activision can cut deals with Lego, Id prefer Crash Bandicoot or Spyro the mf'ing dragon.

SumoLego

Powderfinger said:

40+ million players is a big enough market to make this line an absolute solid hit sales-wise.

Angry Birds did pretty well - so I'd expect this to sell.

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA

It might do twice as well.  
They're only half as late to the party...

Baby_Yoda

Legopassion8 said:

Are people still playing Overwatch? I thought Fortnight was the new hotness. Shoot if Activision can cut deals with Lego, Id prefer Crash Bandicoot or Spyro the mf'ing dragon.

Crash and Spyro are back in the spotlight and I would love to see Lego of them in the future. I think the decision of Overwatch over Fortnite (Fortnight?) specifically is that the latter has a very fragile player base that will likely move on to the next trend as soon as it comes up. This is no Minecraft; this did not slowly acquire a huge, consistent following over years even before release. This popped up and suddenly it was an easy way for normies (excuse my poor terminology) to game.

SumoLego said:
Angry Birds did pretty well - so I'd expect this to sell.

Did it? Is that sarcasm? I was under the impression it under-performed severely.

MAGNINOMINISUMBRA said:

It might do twice as well.  

Well, 0 x 2 = 0...

Legopassion8

Fork Knife*

My bads.  Anyways on on with da muppet show.

Legopassion8

Er..muppet as in Henson not the UK slang edition

MattDawson

I'm waiting with baited breath. I hope it's proper system playsets but I have a inkling it'll either be construction or Brickheadz figures.

Baby_Yoda

MattDawson said:

I have a inkling it'll either be construction...

I would hope so. We don't want to see another Galidor.

stlux

Having spent time with a bunch of Lego designers last week, I found that Galidor is actually rather popular with several of them. This includes some designers working on the Overwatch theme. One of them brought a very large bag filled with Galidor parts to one of the events...

So I actually would not be surprised one of them tried to design a Galidor style Overwatch set. I would also not be surprised that if so, it got shot down at the first review stage ;)

mafon

Mech Commander / Warrior would make great sets. Overwatch I just can't imagine as anything more than a brickhead.

CCC

MattDawson said:

I'm waiting with baited breath. I hope it's proper system playsets but I have a inkling it'll either be construction or Brickheadz figures.

I think system based on Mark Stafford's involvement.

stlux said:

Having spent time with a bunch of Lego designers last week, I found that Galidor is actually rather popular with several of them. This includes some designers working on the Overwatch theme. One of them brought a very large bag filled with Galidor parts to one of the events...

While I am not a fan of the story or sets, some of the parts used were actually pretty decent. Based on getting outbid on ebay, I think they are fairly popular on the secondary market too. Everyone makes out they are hated, yet people can pay quite a bit for them.

Aanchir

CCC said:

stlux said:

Having spent time with a bunch of Lego designers last week, I found that Galidor is actually rather popular with several of them. This includes some designers working on the Overwatch theme. One of them brought a very large bag filled with Galidor parts to one of the events...

While I am not a fan of the story or sets, some of the parts used were actually pretty decent. Based on getting outbid on ebay, I think they are fairly popular on the secondary market too. Everyone makes out they are hated, yet people can pay quite a bit for them.

Well, I think sets that don't sell that well on the primary market often do better on the secondary market due to scarcity alone. It can seem counterintuitive, but just look at how poorly Bionicle figures or City police stations (released year after year and bought in huge numbers primarily by kids) do in the secondary market compared to, say, Avatar: The Last Airbender or Orient Expedition (both far less successful themes that didn't last long enough to wind up with much repetition).

I would love Overwatch constraction sets just due to the sheer variety in the characters' body shapes, color schemes, and costume designs. But I think System seems to be more in line with current trends in what kids want and what's most economical from a production standpoint.

Baby_Yoda

Hate to bring this thread back from the dead, but we've got two updates regarding the Overwatch sets. Firstly, there's a mini-site up, although it can't be accessed by conventional menu navigation. Follow this link: https://www.lego.com/fr-fr/themes/overwatch and replace fr-fr with yourlanguage-yourcountry, if necessary. Secondly, according to Hothbricks, Target US has prematurely released set numbers and prices:
#75971 - $19.99
#75972 - $29.99
#75973 - $39.99
I've just looked on Target US and I can't find anything, so I'm assuming that they've been taken down since. I trust that Hothbricks wouldn't outright lie about something like this. Thoughts?

Bumblepants

^It was part of the Brickseek/Target inventory browsing leaks that revealed the stuff in the Leaks thread. I just didn't mention them as they were 'Overwatch 2', 'Overwatch 3' etc which doesn't do much for imagining what they will be. I don't play the game but I am looking forward to seeing these.