Overwatch 2 recently rolled out a price raise on Overwatch League Tokens for players on console, following a fan pointing out a discrepancy between PC and console prices. Blizzard made waves when the developer announced the Overwatch sequel would be moving to a free-to-play model on launch, shedding its predecessor's loot box-based model. However, the second entry in the hero shooter has seen significant criticism from fans for its pricing model, with simple highlight intros priced at $7. Now, a recent change sees Blizzard hiking the price for Overwatch League Tokens for console players.
A recent interaction between an Overwatch 2 player and Blizzard may have resulted in a price raise on Overwatch League Tokens, with Twitter user Raidermile reporting their experience with Blizzard's customer service. The user pointed out a discrepancy between the price of Overwatch League Tokens on console and PC, with the 400 pack costing $19.99 on consoles and $23.99 on PC. Blizzard reportedly "passed the comment along for review" before the user would later discover the console price for the 400 Overwatch League Token pack had been raised to match its PC counterpart.
Overwatch 2's pricing controversy would not be the first time the freshly released sequel's shop has been the subject of criticism from fans. Overwatch 2 players have been quick to notice several issues within the game's shop, including exorbitant and sometimes inconsistent pricing with Overwatch 2's skins and bundles. New characters like Junker Queen and Kiriko have also seen backlash from fans of the game for their legendary skins, with many feeling the skins don't change enough to warrant the higher price tag.
Blizzard has become familiar with pricing controversies in its games with other major entries like Hearthstone and World of Warcraft Classic seeing similar controversies. Fans of the Blizzard card game outside the US saw inconsistent pricing with Hearthstone's new premium currency, Runestones, with some packages equating to inherently greater value than others. The World of Warcraft developer has been frequently criticized in the past by fans for "greedy" practices with pricing models across its various franchises.
The shop has been far from the only issue with Overwatch 2's launch as the game has been plagued by problems with both Heroes and its servers. Blizzard recently removed both Torbjorn and Bastion from Competitive Play due to major bugs, with Bastion completely disabled and Torbjorn still available in unranked matches. The days after the game's launch also saw numerous server issues with some players unable to log in to the game or being disconnected, and Overwatch 2's servers even being hit by a DDoS attack. The launch of Overwatch 2 has been a rocky one for the long-awaited sequel and Blizzard.
Overwatch 2 is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.