Overwatch 2’s discounts accused of being ‘illegal’

According to the ACCC, the current sales in Overwatch 2 are allegedly illegal, as a Reddit thread has pointed out.

According to the ACCC’s rules on advertising, Overwatch 2’s current “sale” of Halloween skins are allegedly illegal, with many players pointing to their website as proof.

For context, Overwatch 2 has a sale currently going on right now for a new Halloween skin for Kiriko, the new support hero in the game.

The skin is currently priced at $26 USD, but is already discounted at 29% off. As Redditor Nirxx points out, this type of pricing is actually illegal in a few countries, including Australia.

According to the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC), this automatic sale of the skin can be misleading or deceptive, since the skin has never been sold at the higher, non-discounted price.

Since the skin automatically sold at a “discounted” price, it never had the opportunity to be bought at the regular price.

Overwatch 2 also simply allows you to buy items from the store with real money, but some items are sold in a bundle only, instead of being available individually. Picture: Blizzard

In addition, Kiriko’s Halloween skin is only sold in a bundle and cannot be purchased separately, and this is considered anti-consumer in many countries.

Both of these methods are often used in live-service games to manipulate players into buying the item in question before the sale runs out, or to spend money on a bundle when you only need a single item from it.

Other users in the thread pointed out that the practices are also allegedly illegal in Brazil, the UK, and Canada, with many posting a call to arms to report Blizzard in the hopes of getting the bundles repriced or removed.

This follows a general outrage over the decision to remove loot boxes in favour of a battle pass system, which forces players to dedicate significant time to the game in order to get certain items, instead of having a chance to unlock it via loot boxes.

We have reached out to both the ACCC and Blizzard for a response.

Activision Blizzard has had a rough month in general, as its request for dismissal was denied yet again, this time by the appeals court, and another sexual harassment lawsuit has been filed against the company, with further allegations of negligence on the company’s part.

Written by Junior Miyai on behalf of GLHF.