The rumours have been swirling for weeks, even before the last Uprising event ended, but we now have our first solid proof of the newest event to come to Blizzard’s Overwatch.
With Overwatch set to celebrate its one-year anniversary on May 24, Blizzard may be preparing a special event to commemorate the occasion.
There’s quite a bit of evidence floating around, all of it coming out of the Public Test Realm (PTR) after the latest update. A group of crafty YouTubers and Redditors dug through the game’s data to find some very interesting information, the most solid proof yet of an incoming event.
The latest PTR update added a host of changes to the game, including buffs to Genji and Hanzo, and nerfs to Orisa, Soldier 76 and Reinhardt.
Encrypted files included in the update are perhaps the most interesting thing to come out of the update, however, and it has the Overwatch community hyped about what’s on the horizon for the game.
Hammeh on YouTube stumbled across some interesting data. Under the Uprising event data is something called “Event_6”. Accompanying that is a stack of encrypted game files, pointing to new skins and sprays for each hero.
New skins are generally added alongside events, so that there’s an encrypted bunch suggests something big is on the horizon.
Perhaps most interesting is that Reaper is getting eight new items, the most of all heroes, with the rest of the Overwatch roster getting between 7 and 5 new items.
There’s also a sign of three new maps, although based on Blizzard’s past comments, these could be related to future updates beyond any upcoming event, with plans to release around six new maps throughout 2017. To get three specifically for an event would be unprecedented … although seeing as though it’s the game’s anniversary, we probably shouldn’t discount the possibility.
Check out the video below for an in-depth look at the data found. What are your thoughts?
