Overwatch 2 is pretty new, and there are plenty of things to get excited about. So why did they take what’s so special to me: my ability to dance the load?
Dancing is a fun and silly way to engage your teammates and foes alike in Overwatch 2. It can also keep you entertained when you’re left to board the cargo and push the cart to the target while your team goes out to fight your opponents on the other side of the map. Since the payload wouldn’t move without someone nearby, a team member would often fall behind to do God’s work.
And what better way to get rid of this sacred act than to dance over the bomb?
It turns out that while some characters retain the ability to thwart some serious moves, others suddenly seem too shy to take center stage in the payload. Take the cyborg ninja genji and the fat ninja Hanzo. While Hanzo can pull the “hunter’s dance” on the cargo, Genji is left slipping and sliding off the wagon each time.
slip and slide
It looks as though parts of the payload’s geometry are handled the same way that skins are used in Overwatch 2. By this I mean that any surface that Blizzard says isn’t ‘flat’ or shouldn’t be reached causes your character to slide right off. This mechanism is a good way to restrict access for curious players who want to explore the restricted corners of each map.
This means that Genji can stand on the load and sit on the load, but as soon as he starts dancing and his foot taps on one of the bent parts of the load, he freezes and slides, like a plank.
Genji’s passive ability, Wall Climb, allows for any flat surface to be scaled, as long as it isn’t marked as inaccessible, but Blizzard seems to have been quite liberal with surface markings to keep ninjas grounded.
A good example of this is the path under the railroad towards the first point in the downtown map, which was newly added to Overwatch 2. From the image below, you can see two red lines running parallel to the train. If Genji tries to climb this flat surface, he will freeze instead and fall to the ground.
To make matters worse, this bridge is the choke point, an area that takes the attacking squads to a natural congestion point. This allows the defending team to determine where the attackers are coming from and shoot focused fire to kill anything that dares to walk through. In other words, it’s the worst place on the map to fall awkwardly in the middle of a match.
A Genji player caught in this trap will receive immediate punishment for attempting to rush over the train and ignoring the choke point laws, and death will likely come quickly.
Dance on the edge
Genji’s main lines don’t seem to be taking a break at the moment. He first fell into choke points and now does not dance to the load while his estranged brother, Hanzo, is living the time of his life. That doesn’t seem fair. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Genji is alone in clinging to her ass at the moment.
So far, vigilant players are aware of the many heroes who can or cannot dance to the payload in the Paradiso, Circuit Royale and Hollywood maps.
Hanzo, Zenata, and Winston can, while Genji, Rinehart, and Anna can’t.
The latter, in particular, sounds like a personal mockery of Blizzard, since Anna is my main hero. I can’t tell you how many times the payload has been left on my own while my team pushes to the other side of the map. I stand there, doing my best to go as far as the load allows me so I can peek into the corners and try to cure my dying team.
It can be very frustrating, and now I’m learning that I can’t even lighten the mood with a fun dance. What did I mean to do now? Sit there watching my team get important health scores away from me and the payload? Awesome, looks fun.
I may not be the only one who has to get used to a life without dancing. When the load moves, it seems that any expression that is not fixed on the ground will immediately slide. So beware, if your main Overwatch 2 is an eccentric dancer, they will unfortunately have to put their moves off the payload.