OVERWATCH PARTNERS WITH TALENTED MUSIC ARTISTS FOR THE SUMMER OF MUSIC FESTIVAL

 Music has always been an integral part of Overwatch. Unique soundtrack, lovingly crafted by the Blizzard music team, brings the atmosphere to life. We know that players are also very fond of music, listen to compositions of many different genres and styles, and even create their own.

The Overwatch: Cities & Countries music collection was recently released, as well as the in-game event, Sigma's Maestro Challenge. We would like to dive deeper into the atmosphere of this wonderful musical event with Overwatch, and therefore we invited incredibly talented artists from all over Europe to our Summer of Music festival .

We contacted music artists and asked them to create their own versions, remixes and covers of songs from the Overwatch: Cities & Countries compilation , as well as other well-recognized tunes from Overwatch, for our Summer of Music festival . Guests include a beatbox group, keyboard and guitar players, electronic dance music DJs, a multi-instrumental duo and an electromechanical quartet ... Artists from a variety of styles from around the world and with different creative approaches will create their own versions of Overwatch music. ... Find out more about all the talented contributors to the Summer of Music festival below.

Over the next weeks, performers will be posting Overwatch content to their channels, and we'll be updating this page as events unfold. Be sure to stay tuned to our website, the official Overwatch social media channels, and the artist's own channels.

Today we celebrate the start of the Summer of Music festival with a stunning performance by world-renowned beatbox band Berywam, performing their own overwatch track after winning the match. You can watch the video by following this link or below!

During our Summer of Music festival, you'll also be able to log into Overwatch, take part in Sigma's Maestro Challenge from July 14 to July 27, and earn exclusive Player Badges, Legendary Emote, and Sigma's Legendary Maestro Skin. You can also watch eligible streamers live on Twitch and get new graffiti.

Be sure to check out the Overwatch: Cities & Countries Music Collection , which includes songs from various in-game locations, at https://playoverwatch.com/en-us/media/#music .

MUSIC PERFORMERS PARTICIPATING IN THE SUMMER OF MUSIC FESTIVAL

Berywam

Berywam is a beatbox group that has won prestigious international awards. In 2016, its participants won the title of French beatboxing champions, and in 2018 they became world champions. They gained popularity all over the planet by taking part in the America's Got Talent television show in 2019.

Sophie Lloyd 

Sophie Lloyd is a London-based rock and metal guitarist. Her catchy compositions have a very interesting and unusual approach to sound. Sophie creates both her own music and shredded versions of popular songs, and sometimes covers of music from video games.

Amadeus eq

Amadeus is one of the world's most popular female quartets playing electromechanical instruments. The members of the quartet never cease to shine with ingenuity, combining elements of classical and modern music in their compositions, and have taken a place in the hearts of listeners as one of the most popular groups in the crossover genre. 

Davidlap 

Davidlap is a multi-instrumentalist from Italy; in particular, he prefers the guitar. His repertoire includes an impressive recreation of all kinds of sound effects, including those from video games. He also knows how to play bass with his feet while mastering the blues guitar solo.

Sountec

Sountec is a DJ and producer of electronic dance music from Austria. He regularly hosts live music performances with various DJs on his YouTube channel and impresses listeners with great mixing and real-time mashups every time. Sountec does not just select the soundtracks, but selects the correct parts, so that its music is always unique and precisely calibrated.

The video will be released soon!

French fuse

French Fuse are two multi-instrumental friends, Jerry and Ben, who decided to get involved in performing, producing and arranging electronic music. These guys in original hats and sunglasses have always loved to make mashups and remixes of various compositions, and they infected many listeners with their enthusiasm.

Patrick Peachman 

Patrick Peachman is a keyboard player, arranger and programmer from Germany. He creates piano arrangements for popular contemporary soundtracks, combining real-time piano playing with the visualization of musical material using his own software.

Henri PFR 

Henri PFR, 24, is the new Belgian electronic music star. His unique and innovative approach to melody creation has earned him numerous Gold and Platinum awards, seven times the D6bels Music Award and, as a result, the most award-winning artist of any artist at the Belgian Music Awards. In 2019, Henri PFR entered the Top 100 Best DJs according to DJ Mag # 97 and became a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. Also this summer he will perform for the 4t

STEP ONTO THE STAGE WITH SIGMA'S MAESTRO CHALLENGE!

 It's time to go on stage! Become the first violin in the Sigma Symphony Orchestra and earn event-only rewards, one of which is Sigma's Legendary Maestro Skin .

Until July 27th, players will be able to earn a Badge , Legendary Emote , six unique sprays, and the Legendary Maestro Sigma Skin for a total of nine new rewards.

MAESTRO: Find out how to unlock new rewards for Sigma.

VIEWING REWARDS: Earn special music-themed cosmetics by watching Twitch streams.

FULL VOLUME: Find out more about the new Overwatch compilation Cities & Countries.

MAESTRO

Play a major role in Sigma's Symphony and receive special concert-themed cosmetics! For a limited time, victories in Quick Play, Competitive Play, and Arcade will earn you a Badge, Legendary Emote, and a new Legendary Maestro Skin for Sigma!

As you play Arcade Mode, you will receive Maestro Challenge rewards from Sigma in addition to the regular bonuses.

VIEWING AWARDS

Earn extra rewards for watching Twitch streams before, after, and during matches. Until July 27th, log into the promoters' channels as they play Overwatch to receive six Maestro Challenges from Sigma!

ATTENTION:

To receive Twitch Drops, you must first connect your Blizzard and Twitch accounts. Go to the Twitch connections page to log in and link your account.

Sigma's Maestro Challenge rewards will be available from July 14-27 for watching live streams on any Twitch channel in the Overwatch category .

Learn more about Twitch Drops in our video!

During Sigma's Maestro Challenge, we'll be inviting you to a different Overwatch content creator every day! Drop by your favorites during the event for even more music-themed items.

VOLUME AT FULL!

Hear this music? ? This is a new collection of Overwatch music called Cities & Countries, featuring music from Overwatch missions and battlegrounds around the world. Follow the links and start listening on your favorite platform!

THE OPEN GAME WAS RELEASED

With the start of Season 23, Overwatch players have the opportunity to play Competitively in a new way in Open Play. The Open Play mode will appear in the Competitive Play menu, where players will be able to use a team composition different from the 2 Tank / 2 Soldier / 2 Healer squad from the Role Play mode. In addition, separate ratings will be used for the two modes.

Overwatch Chief Designer Michael Heiberg said the decision to add Open Play to competitive mode was based on the popularity of this mode in Arcade, where players can fight in daily changing custom game modes.

It all started with a simple experiment.

“We appreciated the popularity of the Classic Quick Play mode,” says Heiberg, “and wondered how much players would enjoy a similar mode for competitive play.”

This year, the Overwatch development team's main goals are to quickly tweak the balance, do lots of experimentation and tweaks, and so we decided to add Open Competitive Play to Arcade to see how exciting it is for players.

This mode not only gained immense popularity, but its addition had an unexpected effect on the "Competitive game". As it turned out, the presence of two modes of competitive play led to a decrease in the length of the queues in both modes.

“Open Play attracts more players as Fighter Heroes than tank buffs or Support Heroes, resulting in fewer fighters in the Role Play queues, which evens out the balance of roles in this mode,” explained Heiberg.

The coexistence of the two modes helps reduce queuing times - but more importantly, it helps players with different interests choose the mode they like best.

“Personally, I prefer to play a balanced team with separate ratings for different roles, without worrying about whether I need to change roles,” said Heiberg.

"But sometimes I want to play in a more free format, try some unusual strategy."

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The Open Game is now out - choose the Competitive Game mode that suits you today!

FOUR YEARS TOGETHER: A DEVELOPER'S MEMORIES

 You've prided yourself on incredible best moments, delivered load after load, threw enemies out of the battlefield, and enchanted your teammates with your dancing - what has not been in Overwatch in these amazing four years! The development team also put a lot of energy and emotion into our common dream of a bright future in which everyone can be heroes: soldiers, adventurers, scientists and just cranks. Years of work spent on development, design and programming have brought together millions of players from all over the world and created a community united by many close ties and fond memories.

In honor of the fourth anniversary of the game, members of the development team shared vivid memories and fun moments that have accumulated during the creation and existence of Overwatch.

Dylan Jones, Lead Technical Character Artist:

Long ago, while trying to figure out how Brigitte's flail should function, a colleague and I held a brainstorming session. We already had an animation concept, but it didn't quite match the flail mechanics we used in our internal testing. The designer liked the way the flail moves on the server, and now we needed to finalize the animation. Eventually, I grabbed the wired Xbox controller and swung it around, using my other hand to tug on the wire so I could catch it again. In the end, we realized that Brigitte's flail should move more like a ball on a string than like a real flail, and this helped to deal with the animation.

I'll tell you another story: One day we got an email from someone who didn't quite understand what character designers were doing and thought that the concepts for all the characters were drawn by Jeff Goodman, our lead character designer. Goodman was amused, and in response, he drew Tracer in the style of "stick-stick-cucumber" for fun. I developed this idea and made a look based on the incomparable Goodman concept:

Timothy Ford, junior technical director:

Before Hanzo, there were no heroes in the game who could climb walls. This video shows you what the new mechanic looks like before we fine-tune the animation and motion dynamics and add visual and audio effects. It is very important to make the game mechanics work and attractive enough before bringing in our talented artists to give it a finished look. This is Hanzo at an early stage of development: I remember we used the animation of the Reaper's body, and there was only one pose for all the first-person animations.

In this video, Lead Hero Designer Jeff Goodman and I run through an early version of The Temple of Anubis. Simulating wall-running in realistic rooms where all the walls are straight is much easier than on the Overwatch battlegrounds, where there are almost no walls at right angles to the floor and ceiling. It looks great, but working on the mechanics of moving along the walls was not easy. The opportunity to evaluate the work of the algorithms on a more or less typical battlefield in terms of geometry was very valuable to me. Here you can see the wall running in the prototype stage; since then it has been significantly improved. In the end, we divided the movement on the walls into two types: vertical (like the Shimada brothers) and horizontal (like Lucio). The gameplay engineers, which I myself belong to, are responsible for developing the mechanics that our many heroes bring to the game. As we explain to those unfamiliar with our work, "game engineers are the ones who make Mario jump." We can say that Overwatch is thirty-two games in one at once, because with each hero we solved completely new tasks. For gameplay engineers, Overwatch is a godsend.

Kat Lee, Testing Analyst :

I remember the first day at my new workplace with particular warmth. I was happy to be hired, but I was nervous before meeting colleagues. So, the first question that Jeff Kaplan asked me was about my cat. It was then that I immediately realized that it would be great! I also love to remember how in 2019, before the winter holidays, the entire Overwatch team gathered in a restaurant. The DJ had a great karaoke. I will never forget how we all sang the theme from Pokémon together.

Jeff Kaplan, Game Director:

The idea for the new game came from the fourth team (which the community knows as the Overwatch team) in the summer of 2013. There was a lot of uncertainty around, but we decided we wanted to create a new Blizzard universe. We were attracted by the image of a bright, optimistic world of the future, full of unforgettable and terribly likeable characters that we would like to be like ourselves. From the beginning, we planned to bring the new game to BlizzCon in 2014. We were able to complete all the tasks on time and, moreover, by some miracle, we did not leak information: no one suspected that a new game was being developed at Blizzard. It seems that our company has never been able to keep a secret so reliably. I remember standing backstage with Chris Metzen and waiting for our turn to step onto the main stage and ta

DOUBLE XP OVERWATCH - JUNE 5-9

 The amplification works! Well, into battle!

This year has been amazing and we are very grateful to you for being a part of it. In celebration of the fourth anniversary of Overwatch, we want to celebrate the community that made this success possible (that's you!): Anyone who logs into the game this weekend on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, or Nintendo Switch will receive twice the experience. usually.

This bonus will affect almost every aspect of the game for which you can gain experience, including:

time spent in the match;

the end of the match;

completing several matches in a row;

winning the match;

filling in the team in the current match;

receiving medals.

This bonus will also add up to the existing party bonus and the game room bonus. The only event for which you will receive the usual amount of experience will be the first victory of the day.

The Expanded Experience Period will begin in all regions and on all platforms on June 5 at 10:00 am ET and end on June 10 at 09:59 am ET. The exact start time is shown in the reference table below. You can convert time from one time zone to another at thetimezoneconverter.com .