Overwatch has been around for over five years now, with Blizzard having made numerous changes to the game's roster since launch. Besides adding new heroes to Overwatch, Blizzard has also tweaked the game's launch characters, buffing and nerfing them in an attempt to balance the game. While changes have been made to every Overwatch character in some capacity, a fan recently realized that one of the Overwatch heroes has never received any kind of nerf.
Overwatch Tank hero Winston has never received a nerf in any of the updates that have been released for him since the game launched in 2016. On the contrary, Blizzard has only ever really buffed Winston or made neutral changes to the character. This makes sense as Winston is generally considered to be one of the weaker and more difficult characters to play as in the hero-shooter, so it really comes as no surprise that he's never received any nerfs.
While Winston has never been nerfed in Overwatch, there could be a major rework in store for him in the near future. With Overwatch 2, Blizzard is changing the flow of the game dramatically by reducing team sizes from six players to just five, with only one Tank hero allowed per team. This change necessitates that Blizzard change up the currently-available Overwatch Tank heroes, and Winston will certainly be getting some changes.
A complete overview of Winston's changes in Overwatch 2 isn't available just yet, but Blizzard has confirmed one new ability that he will have when the sequel launches. In Overwatch 2, Winston will have access to a new charged shot attack that will give him significantly more range than he does in the current iteration of the game. This will allow Winston to snipe enemies from afar, and give him much more versatility than he has right now.
And since Overwatch 2 shares PvP with Overwatch 1, the changes coming to Winston will impact him across both games. It will be interesting to see if this Overwatch 2 Winston rework will wind up making him too powerful and necessitate a nerf of some kind, or if the character will be able to continue avoiding nerfs.
Fans will have a much better idea of how these Winston changes impact the game when Overwatch 2 launches. Unfortunately, an Overwatch 2 release date still has yet to be announced, though reputable leakers seem to believe that the game will launch by next summer.
Overwatch is out now for PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.
