Overwatch — the game formerly known as Overwatch 2 — is enjoying something of a revival right now, hitting its highest concurrent peak on Steam since its 2022 launch.
While the game has yet to enter its “new, story-driven era” with a year-long narrative, 10 new heroes, and a major overhaul — all that goes live starting from tomorrow, February 10, although we did get to meet Anran over the weekend — the promise of new content has fans jumping back into the game after Overwatch 2 ditched the 2 last week, leaving us with the name Overwatch. Again.
SteamCharts suggests the game averaged a concurrent peak of around 40,000 since November, albeit with a 50K peak in December. In the last 30 days, however, this has shot up to 69,135 players, making February 2026 the busiest month for Overwatch since its launch, which saw a peak of 75,361 people. That’s an almost 11% increase and we’re not even halfway through the month yet.
Announced last week at the Overwatch Spotlight, Blizzard revealed its first year-long storyline, The Reign of Talon, which will focus on the antagonistic faction Talon as it takes over around the world, while Overwatch continues to fight back. In-game events, hero trailers, animated comics, short stories, and map updates will tell a story across six seasons rolled out throughout the entire year, beginning with the launch of five new heroes on February 10 as the new season begins.
On the Talon side, new heroes will include Domina (tank), Emre (damage), and Mizuki (support), and on Overwatch we’ll get Anran (damage) — who some of us met over the weekend — and Jetpack Cat (support). More heroes will join in the future, with a new hero added in each of Season 2-6 to come. A new story arc is planned to begin with another Season 1 in 2027.
We’re also getting a Hello Kitty-themed in-game event from February 10-23, a new Meta Event called Conquest, where players choose to align with either Overwatch or Talon over five weeks to compete for rewards including lootboxes, skins, and titles. There’s also a major UI and UX overhaul with a new hero lobby and a promise of faster navigation on the way.
As we summarized last week, it’s no surprise Blizzard is looking for a fresh start for its beleaguered hero shooter. The sequel stumbled out of the gate, and while it saw a massive surge of players at the start, those numbers dropped in the following year. As time went on, user reviews complained about a number of issues such as monetization and controversies around the cancellation of the game’s long-awaited PvE Hero mode. In fact, this isn’t even the first major overhaul Blizzard has announced.
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world’s biggest gaming sites and publications. She’s also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
