The latest Overwatch 2 dev blog discusses the possible return of 6v6 battles, and whether or not this return would be the right move to make.
To determine whether or not 6v6 is worth bringing back, the developers needed to give a bit of backstory and context as to why it was removed in the first place. The original 6v6 battles allowed for either two very powerful tank synergies or a barrage of DPS ultimate abilities more prevalent, causing the mental stability of some players to rapidly decline. Basically, having to break through massive amounts of CC and tankyness wasn’t fun, and neither was getting hacked while being hit by a tire and tactically shot down by Soldier all at once.
According to the devs, the change was not only much needed but highly requested at the time, and many players felt as though the matches became too long and drawn out. Queue times were also a major factor in this decision, and rightfully so according to the chart that shows the massive decrease in queue times once the 5v5 format was implemented. After going through all of the data and reasoning for the changes in the first place, Blizzard finally covered what their next move would be. They state,
“With that said, we're looking at running a series of events to try out different core team composition formats in Overwatch 2. The community has, juuuust once or twice, suggested a test. Why not put various forms of 6v6 in the game in order to gauge the results? We agree, and based on your feedback, we’re exploring how we can test different forms of 6v6 in the game to gauge the results.”
At this point, it seems there will be testing to see whether we live in a 6v6 world, a 5v5 world or maybe even one where both are readily available in Overwatch 2. For now, it seems the decision is to do a massive amount of testing to find the right path to take.
