Blizzard is letting us play through Overwatch history with the next seasonal event.
Last year, Overwatch Uprising treated us to a unique PvE event where players teamed up in groups of four to fight off hordes of omnics. It told the story of Tracer’s first mission as a member of the Overwatch, giving fans a glimpse into the game’s behind-the-scenes lore.
To build upon that, Jeff Kaplan announced the next iteration of the Uprising event during a break between Wednesday night’s Overwatch League matches.
Called Overwatch Archive: Retribution, the new event features what looks to be a more dynamic PvE mode, this time with a story that revolves around the Overwatch organization’s covert branch of operations: the Blackwatch.
Play as Reaper, McCree, Genji or Moira as you fight against a whole mess of Talon soldiers. As shown in the video, Blackwatch skins for each of these four characters will once again be available during the event, in addition to other new cosmetic items. Kaplan did promise during his announcement that Reaper in particular would be getting a new skin that shows the hero as he was during the super soldier experiment, when Reaper went by the name of Soldier 24.
Both Retribution and the old Uprising mode will be available to play when the event goes live. Both missions are part of an overarching series Blizzard is calling the Overwatch Archives. During the announcement, Kaplan explained that the Archives was Blizzard’s way to encapsulate these playable glimpses into Overwatch‘s past into one cohesive unit.
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Kaplan also explained that the particular Blackwatch mission seen in Retribution is an important moment in Overwatch‘s history. Whatever it is that happens during the mission starts to change Gabriel Reyes from regular Overwatch operative to the dark edgelord Reaper that we all know him as.
Overwatch Archive: Retribution launches on April 10.