The second beta of Overwatch 2 starts today, June 28. To encourage you to engage with the shooter actively on Twitch, Blizzard wants to reward your streaming consumption with an exclusive skin. The catch: You need to gift the most well-known streamers €15.
In the first beta, Blizzard’s shooter had a huge but very short-lived success on Twitch. For the second beta, which starts today at 8 PM, Blizzard wants to entice you to Overwatch 2 streams in other ways.
If you gift 3 subscriptions on Twitch in total, you will receive an exclusive skin for Brigitte. However, fans are upset about the selection of streamers.
You will only receive the skin if you throw your ‘Gifted Subs’ at big streamers like xQc, Asmongold, or DisguisedToast. The community believes that this gives even more money to the wealthiest influencers while leaving the smaller ones behind.
In this trailer, you can see what Overwatch 2 has to offer when it launches in Free2Play on October 4:
“Support a Streamer”: For €15 on Twitch, receive a Brigitte skin
Which skin are we talking about? Under the “Support a Streamer” initiative, you’ll receive the legendary skin “Medic Brigitte” for one of the strongest support heroes in the game.
To claim this, you must gift a total of 3 Twitch subs in the chats of a select list of streamers between June 29 and July 19. You’ll pay €5 per ‘Gifted Sub’, meaning the total cost for this skin is €15.
Which streamers do you need to support? This list of streamers you should gift your subs to is a kind of “who’s who” on Twitch. Not only are prominent Overwatch streamers included, but also other big names who have little to do with Blizzard’s team shooter.
Here’s a small selection:
- Asmongold
- xQc
- DisguisedToast
- Crayator
- JackFrags
- Fextralife
- A_Seagull
- ml7
- Emongg
- Noko
- LuLuLovely
Thus, MMO giants like Asmongold and streamers from other shooters such as Apex Legends or Battlefield are listed, as well as the controversial RPG Wiki Fextralife. You can find the full list of streamers on the website of Blizzard.
“Let’s support streamers who really need it”
This is what Overwatch fans say: In the Overwatch community, fans are very disappointed with this initiative.
On reddit, people say things like “Better not, Blizzard” and list a series of reasons:
Normally, I’m quick to spend money on a new skin. But this is just a big no for me.
– Smaller streamers who could benefit from this cannot receive it
– Amazon/Twitch takes 50% of these expenditures anyway
– About €15 is more than you would pay for Overwatch League skins (which are worth €10)
– The skin is not of the quality one would expect from a Legendary skin
u/EArkham on reddit
Another reddit user even says that the selected streamers are a bad influence:
The list of streamers leaves a really bitter aftertaste. Let’s at least support the creators who truly need it instead of the big streamers, many of whom are not even part of our community or have a negative influence.
u/Hey-Ying on reddit
Fans are therefore not pleased with the idea of giving even more money to the already largest and richest streamers on Twitch just to receive a skin in return. They hope Blizzard includes more smaller streamers who would deserve support from the community.
Blizzard responds to the criticism
What does Blizzard say about the criticism? AndyB, the community manager of Blizzard, has responded to angry fans in the official forum. He replies to a user:
You are greatly overestimating what everyone except the most successful streamers actually earns.
If they do not wish to donate to one of the big names, we have many smaller, long-standing Overwatch streamers listed who would appreciate your support.
AndyB in the Blizzard Forum
Furthermore, this is just the “first event” of this kind, for which Blizzard “intentionally selected only a limited number of participants”. The purpose is to: “Collect data and learn”. Thus, Blizzard wants to build on this model and “most likely expand the availability” if it is successful. (via Blizzard Forum)
What do you think of this initiative? Do you find it good or completely off? What’s your opinion on Blizzard’s response? Let us know in the comments.
Apart from generating a lot of traffic on Twitch, Blizzard also wants to monetize Overwatch 2 in different ways when it launches as a Free2Play shooter on October 4. You can learn more about their plans here:
