Blizzard Explains Cancellation Behind Overwatch Graphic Novel

With Overwatch being pretty much multiplayer-only, this meant that as far as storytelling is concerned, there are only so many ways Blizzard can approach it. We’ve seen them launch comics and shorts, and at point in time there was even plans for a graphic novel which unfortunately was cancelled last November.

For those wondering about the reason behind the cancellation, it seems that Blizzard felt that putting out a graphic novel would limit the universe of the game. This was revealed during an interview with Polygon where the game’s director Jeff Kaplan expanded on the reasons why Overwatch’s graphic novel was cancelled.

According to Kaplan, “The art was beautiful and the writing was excellent and it was a really hard decision for us. The reason had less to do with the specific content in that novel and more to do with the way that it would have limited us,” he told us. “It was a very specific, contained story.”

He adds, “We sort of saw Overwatch really open up to the world, and listening to players and the stories they were telling and what they imagined the Omnic crisis to be really made us second guess what we were doing in First Strike, We thought, ‘Hey, if we go down this path, it really closes all these doors.’”

We’re not sure if there are plans to revisit the idea of an Overwatch graphic novel, but until then we guess fans will just have to wait.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Gaming
Tags: Blizzard, Overwatch