The LinkedIn profile of a former Overwatch marketing head is making waves as it reveals new info about Overwatch 2 active users data.
One of the problems with BattleNet--one of many, really--is a lack of data. The Activision-sequestered platform is an island unto itself, providing no information to the outside world. This means that, outside of quarterly investor reports, we've not had any true info about the state of Overwatch 2 active users, number of players, who is playing when, and so on.
This was rectified somewhat when Overwatch 2 came to Steam last July. However, this only paints a portion of the picture. And if we're being honest, so much of the ire and backlash to Overwatch comes from a contingent of fans that swear up and down the game is dying and chasing away fans. Of course, this isn't remotely true.
We do now have some insight into the game's success, thanks in part to the LinkedIn profile of a former major player in the world of Overwatch. How is the game doing, who is this person, and what does it mean? Here's the answers.
Overwatch 2 active users: 50 million since launch
The LinkedIn profile of former Vice President and Head of Global Marketing for Overwatch Sam Saliba provides us some insight into how the game's done since launch. At last we heard in a press release from Blizzard in November 2022, the game saw a total of 35 million active players in its first month.
According to Sam's profile entry for his time with Overwatch, the game "drove over 50 million active users and $225 million in revenue."
He goes on to list other achievements during his time with the company, including:
- Exceeded forecast and KPIs by 130% by leading integrated launch of Overwatch 2 game, which resulted in #1 trending on Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, Twitch, and Google Search, and drove over 50 million active users and $225 million in revenue. Presented launch plans to 17,000 employees.
- Grew marketing agency partnerships by 250%, onboarded and partnered with 5 agencies to bring creative vision to life, resulting in a Silver Clio award.
- Accelerated social and digital marketing growth, including launching a new TikTok channel that generated 13.6 billion impressions and increased positive sentiment, followers, and revenue.
- Increased unaided brand awareness from 0.1-12 percent among target audience of Gen Z.
- Built and grew the team by 750 percent, helping to restructure and improve efficiency and alignment.
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What does 'active users' mean?
The term 'active users' is a bit of a loaded gun. Great for the marketing gurus of the world because of how nebulous the phrase appears. That can mean a lot of things. Is an active user someone who plays daily? Monthly? Is it a player who logged in once? Perhaps someone who spent money?
We don't know.
The hardest data we have to back anything up comes to us from the tracking at Steam Charts. However, this only provides a small look at the data. For one, Steam Charts has only tracked info since July 2023. More to the point, Steam is clearly not the favorite platform of the game's base and most likely only accounts for a small section of its active users.
Not that we'll ever know, as currently Blizzard doesn't release that data. Unless they can use it to make investors happy, that is.
In that sense, 50 million active users is hard to describe as meaningful. If the first month of a game that released in 2022 saw 35 million players then what does it mean that, in a little over a year since that time, they've only saw 15 million more Overwatch 2 active users?
The numbers are a Rorschach Test: You're going to see what you want to see. That said, it does appear the game isn't losing numbers and holds a steady active base, which will most likely grow at the start of a new season.
I know the Overwatch haters of the world (hello, Reddit) will hate to hear that, but it appears to be the truth at this time.
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