Overwatch's Big Season 1 Event is Copying the Homework of a…

The Overwatch Season 1 relaunch is giving fans numerous reasons to be excited. Desperate for a new hero to learn? You’re all set, as 1 Tank, 2 Supports, and 2 Damage characters are all dropping on February 10. Looking for cool new cosmetics to grind for? There’s a battle pass full of lore-heavy costumes, a Mercy mythic to chase, and a Hello Kitty collab to spend some hard-earned money on. Seeking a shake-up of the core mechanics? Then the new hero sub-roles are for you, with each bringing a fresh passive ability to the characters within them. Add on a UI revamp, the return of post-match hero cards in Season 2, and a greater focus on story than ever before, and it really feels like Overwatch has never been better. And yet, I’m most excited about a feature that has flown under the radar: Conquest.

Described as a five-week meta event, Conquest kicks off with gamers choosing to align themselves with the heroic Overwatch or villainous Talon. Once they’ve decided, they’ll need to complete lore-focused challenges involving existing characters, with each completed challenge (mitigated damage, winning games, etc.) Granting them points for their faction. These points will contribute to the faction meter, which players can watch increase and decrease in real time as Overwatch fans around the world contribute. Each week, a winning team will be declared, with exclusive rewards granted to the victorious faction. These rewards include:

75 Base Lootboxes
12 Epic Lootboxes
7 Legendary Lootboxes
9 new Voice Lines
31 2D Cosmetics
2 Weapon Charms
1 of 2 faction-themed Legendary Echo skins
Exclusive new Rare, Epic and Legendary titles (and a secret hidden one)

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With the Echo skin likely only being given to the side that proves to be the winner of the entire five-week competition, this event has some proper stakes, and it sounds like a fun bit of motivation to play as often as possible. While the five additional heroes will likely get a lot of players in the door, this event showering them in rewards (if they choose the correct side) could be what keeps them invested. And for me, it’s more than just an awesome new approach to Overwatch events, as it's a concept that calls back to a niche PS3 game I adored: MAG.

Blizzard confirmed that players can be double agents and switch sides whenever they complete the current week’s faction pass. However, this means they will have already helped the team they’re leaving, ensuring players should think carefully about when to swap sides.

Conquest Has Me Nostalgic For MAG, a Game That Came Far Before Its Time

For those unfamiliar with MAG (short for Massive Action Game, a fitting label), it was an online-only PlayStation 3 exclusive that went offline for good back in 2014. But despite not having played it for over a decade, it’s a game that is forever stuck in my mind as one of the coolest multiplayer experiences I’ve ever had. The premise of the game was simple enough: choose one of three private militaries and fight for them in a persistent “Shadow War” where the story constantly evolved based on which faction was finding the most success. All three factions were distinct; there was Raven (my team of choice), which relied on precision and high-tech gear, SVER, a group of rebels that embraced guerrilla tactics, and Valor, which had a modern military vibe.

The faction-choosing for Overwatch’s new event feels just like the clan concept from MAG, and it reminded me of how much I loved that game. It’s sadly been forgotten over the years, but it can’t be understated how unique it was. Not only were players choosing and fighting for three factions with distinct visual styles, weapons, and personalities, but they were doing so on unbelievably big battlefields. MAG’s big selling point wasn’t the faction-choosing, it was the fact that matches of Domination featured 256 players in a single match. This not only set a record when the game debuted, but it’s something that even modern large-scale FPS games don’t accomplish. Battlefield 2042, for instance, only featured 128 players, yet its maps were considered massive by many. In MAG's Domination, there were 128 players on each team.

MAG introduced a 3v3 game mode via DLC called Escalation, which saw all three factions doing battle in a 96-player match. Other game modes supported 64 players and 128 players, ensuring a healthy variety of competitive multiplayer matches.

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It can’t be stressed enough how epic MAG was at the time, as it’s incredible that 256-player matches were even possible on the PlayStation 3. I won’t pretend that MAG was perfect; its gunplay was merely decent, as the shooting mechanics were a far cry from the smoothness of a game like Call of Duty. And while cool in theory, the Shadow War didn’t progress clearly enough in-game, with players needing to search up faction videos and recaps online to keep up to date on the story. Unbalanced lobbies meant match quality was hit-or-miss, but the ones that did hit were unlike anything else in gaming. I genuinely think that if MAG launched in 2026, with all the live-service bells and whistles like seasonal story updates, battle passes, and a free-to-play format, it would be the next best thing. Sadly, the Zipper Interactive-developed title feels destined to fade further into obscurity with every passing year despite its conceptual brilliance.

MAG May Be Dead, But Overwatch’s Conquest is a Fun Spiritual Successor

overwatch reign of talon season 1 clash removed why

Given how different MAG was from a hero shooter, and how old the game is, I’m well aware that any similarities between its Shadow War and the Overwatch Season 1 event are almost certainly accidental. However, that doesn’t make the event any less exciting to me. It’s a concept I’ve always dreamed of in live-service games, and looking back at MAG, I know why now. Every time I’ve hoped for Fortnite to do a Marvel vs. DC or PlayStation vs. Xbox event using all its collaboration characters, I’ve basically been hoping for a game to do something like MAG did without realizing it. So, while Overwatch may not have 256-player matches, it is checking off the player-influenced faction vs. Faction events I’ve been eager to see in another shooter. To me, it’s the most exciting part of a content-packed Season 1 relaunch, beating out Overwatch dropping the 2 from its name and all the new heroes. And who knows? If this event proves to be a massive hit, perhaps a developer will be inspired to create a game fully built on faction warfare that more closely resembles the forgotten PS3 gem I spent dozens of hours playing.