Blizzard really wanted people to watch its games but has failed to appropriately compensate.
Overwatch League’s 2022 season wrapped up at the beginning of November, with the playoffs becoming the second most-watched event of its history according to Esports Charts, only outmatched by the League’s inaugural season in 2018.
Two major factors played into that: the release of Overwatch 2—which makes this the first OWL to take place in the sequel—and the fact that Blizzard really wanted you to watch it. The developer was offering bundles of OWL tokens and skins for those who tuned in. Or at least, it was supposed to. Despite viewers watching over 30 hours of games in October and November, some have received nothing while others have only been given partial rewards, and there seems to be no solid solution in sight.
Overwatch League acknowledged the problem back in mid-November, saying that it was working to push out rewards to those who’d tuned in and hadn’t received the eligible rewards. But a Reddit thread posted yesterday by u/Hohoho-you that has over 4,400 upvotes seems to suggest that anyone who hasn’t received the rewards by now won’t be getting them. The post contains a screenshot from Blizzard support, who told u/Hohoho-you “If you still haven’t got the cosmetics it means that you were not eligible. Customer Support is not able to verify eligibility for OWL drops and cannot assist with this issue.” The poster claims he watched over 35 hours of Overwatch League games and waited two weeks for a response from Blizzard support.
ok_well_i_guess_if_you_havent_gotten_your_owl from r/Overwatch
The comments on the Reddit post are filled with people stuck in a similar situation. Some have received zero rewards at all, while others have only received a handful of the early rewards despite watching tens of hours of eligible games. While some comments said they had received similar responses from support, one comment claimed that they were told that Blizzard was currently aware and working on a solution.
There’s a good chance that this whole thing may be a frustrating case of miscommunication between Blizzard customer support and the Overwatch 2 team itself. I’ve contacted Blizzard to see what the situation is and I’ll update if I get a response. Regardless, it’s understandable players are frustrated that, almost a month after the season, rewards still haven’t been processed correctly.
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