Overwatch director teases nerfs, competitive play changes to come

Two of Overwatch's more popular characters are changing soon, director Jeff Kaplan told Eurogamer. In an interview, he outlined what the team is planning for McCree and D.Va, along with the game's returning competitive mode and other features.

McCree is well known for his meme-generating ultimate attack and all-around skill, but Blizzard Entertainment thinks the character might be too powerful. Another designer took to Battle.net at the end of May to address concerns that McCree is overpowered, suggesting that a nerf was in the works.

Kaplan corroborated this post. "We want McCree to be a counter to people like Tracer, Genji and Reaper," he said. "What we're not crazy about, right now, is the way in which McCree can absolutely shred tanks." The plan is to lower the damage on McCree's fan the hammer attack, making him less effective against tank characters.

"McCree is causing a lot of concern in the community"

D.Va, on the other hand, has faced the opposite complaint: that she's not strong enough. Kaplan said that the character suffers from both low damage and survival, but Blizzard doesn't plan to upgrade both. Instead, he explained that buffs will come to one of the two attributes, but the team hasn't yet decided which one.

D.Va's changes are expected to come later than McCree's, which Kaplan cited as a far higher priority.

"I think the D.Va buffs will take a little bit longer for us to get to, but the McCree balance changes should come sooner," he explained. "D.Va's not in a horrible place, we just feel like she could be in a slightly better place, whereas McCree is causing a lot of concern in the community and we want to make sure they know we're responsive."

It's unclear when these characters will see their respective gameplay alterations, but Kaplan did confirm that a bigger change is still on its way for later this month. Overwatch's Competitive Play mode will return by the end of June, he said, and with it comes a longer season, a more skill-based system without a safety net and a dynamic queue for matchmaking.

Overwatch currently boasts more than seven million players, according to Blizzard — although thousands of those have been permanently banned, thanks to their cheating efforts. Watch below for our thoughts on the game in its current state.