One fan of Overwatch 2 has done the math and worked out the massive amount of cash required to purchase every legacy cosmetic item available in Overwatch 2. While the first game operated with a loot box system, its successor has brought along with it a new shop section, allowing players to pick and choose the cosmetics they'd like to own instead of leaving it to chance.
Alongside the shop, Overwatch 2 introduced a battle pass mechanic not unlike those commonly seen in other live service games, as well as the new Overwatch Coin currency which allows players to purchase cosmetic bundles, skins, battle passes, and more. Although Overwatch Coins can be earned in small amounts via the completion of weekly gameplay challenges, the primary method of acquiring them is through microtransactions. Needless to say, a large portion of the community hasn't responded well to the prices of the new shop's offers.
This led Reddit user loliscoolyay4me to do the work themselves by creating a spreadsheet and listing every cosmetic item ported from Overwatch along with their associated prices in the shop. After adding up the numbers, the total price of every legacy cosmetic available in Overwatch 2 amounts to a jaw-dropping $12,080.69. The community even went on to discover that purchasing this list of items without spending a dollar of real money would require saving up Overwatch Coins by completing every weekly challenge for approximately 450 years.
Fortunately, many veteran players won't be needing to sell their car in order to complete their collection. As long as a Battle.net account is merged, players are able to keep any and all items acquired from the original Overwatch. While the loot boxes from the first game provided randomized drops, they were obtainable for free by leveling up, allowing a slow but consistent method of grabbing cosmetics in the game.
Many in the community claim that this new system is particularly unfair for newer players, as they can no longer claim these items for free due to the Overwatch 1 servers being shut down. Although the new battle pass allows players to access a range of cosmetic items at a relatively low cost, the prices seen so far in the shop have been met with great disappointment from fans.
Even though the shop prices aren't a far cry from those seen in other free-to-play titles at the moment, it means that players bent on collecting each skin that the game has to offer will no longer be able to do so without spending a huge amount of money. Despite the outrage, many players see the new shop system as a fair tradeoff if it means making Overwatch 2 a free-to-play game. This change in business model has attracted a wealth of new players over the past week, and has brought the game back up to a player count it hasn't seen in years.
Overwatch 2 is available now on PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S.