- Image of Reaper Mythic Skin courtesy of Blizzard

Overwatch 2 Can’t Thrive Without Lore Shorts

Originally posted on Total Apex Gaming | By Mollie Dominy | Last updated Jul 12, 2025 9:59 AM ET

We all remember when Overwatch had those really cool animated shorts, right? The ones that actually gave a deeper look into the story of Overwatch, rather than just being a typical first-person shooter with more action and less plot?

Well, game director at Blizzard Entertainment, Aaron Keller, believes they need to make a comeback—if the studio wants to live up to the claim of “firing on all cylinders.”

Remember the Pixar-Style Origins?

In case you don’t remember, Overwatch used to drop really cool Pixar-style short films to introduce new characters and flesh out the world itself. (Personal favorite was the introduction of Mei—the feels were triggered, and much money was spent trying to find the right blind bag with her in it!)

Sadly, Overwatch 2 hasn’t been… as faithful to that practice as you’d think it would be over the last several years.

Aaron Keller Agrees: Story Took a Hit

Image of Aatlis Map courtesy of Blizzard

There is some good news, though—this might be changing. Aaron Keller spoke to streamer Jay3 and reportedly said:

“One of the things we hear players talk about a lot online is, it kind of feels like Overwatch has dropped the ball when it comes to story and lore.” He even acknowledged: “We used to put a few more of the big animated shorts out than we do nowadays.”

Keller also admitted that the shorts didn’t just disappear out of the blue. And if you guessed that a canceled PvE campaign was the culprit—congrats, you nailed it. He explained:

“We did have a big plan to go after story in the game. That was the PvE with a campaign…That didn’t work out.”

A Soft Reset for Blizzard’s Narrative

Overwatch 2 was sold as a promise of an expansive co-op campaign that would move the story forward. But the game grew to a point where the team couldn’t bring it all together—and it unfortunately led to the cancellation of that campaign.“So there was a kind of reset moment for us when that happened,” Keller said. He continued with: “We would like to get back to it. One of the best parts of Overwatch is the universe and the characters.” (Facts and truth.)

And one final statement from Keller:

“For me, personally—for us to say that Overwatch 2 is firing on all cylinders, we need to have some of those [shorts] come back.”

All-in-all, if Blizzard wants Overwatch 2 to hit that sweet spot with every fan, then they’ll need to ramp up on the story and background lore that should’ve accompanied the game in the first place. Action and cool graphics are all well and good, but without some emotional draw that can keep the players hooked for years, the game is just a flat game with no depth outside of being a decent FPS game.

This article first appeared on Total Apex Gaming and was syndicated with permission.

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