Overwatch 2’s new hero makes history as Venture drills in with unique debut

Overwatch 2 Season 10 is bringing a plethora of changes, including one regarding how you can play Venture, as the new hero makes history by debuting in Competitive right away.

In Overwatch 2’s Season 10 patch notes, Blizzard unveiled that Venture, the game’s latest hero, will be joining Competitive as soon as the new update drops. This marks the first time in Overwatch history that a brand-new hero will be instantly available in ranked matches.

With previous heroes in the game, players would need to wait around two weeks to play them in ranked matches as they’d initially roll out just in casual play. They would also need to unlock them from the Battle Pass first, at least ever since the swap to Overwatch 2.

However, as mentioned in a developer update this season, that will no longer be the case in Season 10 onward, given that new heroes, including Venture, will be unlocked for everyone. 

Devs are aware that immediately adding Venture in Competitive is a “pretty major change” compared to previous heroes, but they mentioned they’ve “always wanted to allow new heroes into Competitive” at the start of a new season in Overwatch 2.

They explained that in the past, they wanted to “make sure new heroes were free of any bugs or outstanding balance issues” and give players enough time to unlock them from a Battle Pass.

However, seeing that Venture already made an early and limited-time debut in Season 9, devs are “confident” that Venture will be “ready to jump into the action right away.”

While we had the chance to try the DPS hero out for a while, some players are understandably worried about them being instantly available in ranked.

The elephant in the room? Players picking Venture in Competitive without knowing how to use their abilities, not to mention any potential bugs. For the first issue here, looking up a guide to play Venture to get a feel of how their kit can be used to pick off enemies can help. For the latter, only time will tell, though it’s certainly not unusual for new heroes to come with their fair share of issues out of the gate.

That said, it’d be interesting to see how things play out when Overwatch 2 Season 10 drops on April 16 at around 2 PM ET.