Overwatch's lackluster 10th anniversary event will have its rewards improved next week, with more free stuff planned for later this year

Overwatch players expected a lot more for its 10th anniversary in-game event. For many, grinding for loot boxes that contain old skins with new colorways and some sprays didn't feel worthy of such a significant milestone, not to mention the huge amount of games you have to play to earn them in the first place.

In a game with a massive catalog of cosmetics—many of which were only available for a limited time—players had hoped there would be a way to earn them through the anniversary event. It was a reasonable expectation to have considering Overwatch 1 used to offer anniversary loot boxes that contained almost everything that has ever existed in the game. And it didn't help that the Chinese version of the event seems to shower players with rewards, some of which aren't even available for everyone else, like skins from old seasonal battle passes.

The disappointment players expressed on social media was strong enough to prompt a response from game director Aaron Keller on X. In it, he called the reactions "fair" and announced some improvements to the rewards coming next week.

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Instead of needing to grind out almost 100 matches to earn the anniversary loot boxes, you'll only need to complete 60, with wins counting as two. In addition to that, the loot boxes rewarded to everyone for filling up a meter based on players collectively completing challenges will be doubled next week and tripled the week after. And in the final week, everyone who logs in will get a special anniversary loot box that has four Legendary skins.

Keller also announced that the next season will have a new event with "even more rewards" and that the team is working on ways to offer more free cosmetics "later in the year." In other words, the 10th anniversary celebration will continue for the next few seasons in some shape or form.

"I understand that future rewards don't make this specific event bigger, but I hope it gives some context for how we're thinking about this year as a whole," Keller wrote.

Early reactions to the news are mostly positive, although some players still think the recolored anniversary skins aren't good enough. I've seen people argue that Blizzard should be handing out some of the most expensive skins in the game for free and others say that they're surprised they got anything for free.

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Personally, the flood of pricey shop cosmetics over the last few years has kept my expectations low when it comes to events like these, but I still think Blizzard could've done something more exciting for the 10th anniversary. The "classic" mode that attempts to emulate the original game as it was when it launched is a neat addition, and it would've been cool to see a bunch of cosmetics that actually tie into the game's history. It's Overwatch after all, an FPS that basically created an entire sub-genre. Not a lot of games do that and also manage to stick around for a decade. A set of slightly renewed skins and some sprays that recreate memes doesn't really match the gravity of such an achievement.