It’s finally December, which means Overwatch’s annual Christmas event dubbed Winter Wonderland is just around the corner. Here is everything we know about the upcoming event, when it comes out and what to expect.
Like most Overwatch events, there are a couple of things to know about Winter Wonderland: it will bring new skins and a limited-time game mode.
What special game modes will the event include?
In the case of Winter Wonderland, there are two: Mei’s Snowball Challenge and Yeti Hunter.
Just as with Summer Games and Halloween Terror 2020, don’t expect to see either mode revamped too heavily. Instead, what Blizzard has been doing is added some slight tweaks to the classics.
With Mei’s Snowball Offensive, every player has to play as Mei with her primary fire shooting a snowball. If you hit an opponent, they’re eliminated and the team with no players remaining loses the round.
Meanwhile, Yeti Hunt has Mei players tasked with freezing a “Yeti” in the form of Winston on Nepal Village. It will be interesting to see how or if Blizzard decides to modify the modes like they’ve done in the past.
New Winter Wonderland skins
Winter Wonderland also introduces new skins themed around Christmas or just snow-themed attire including winter sports. Some of the popular skins from years past include Santa Torbjorn, Ugly Sweater 76, Nutcracker Zenyatta and Beachrat. This year, it seems like Mei will definitely be getting a new skin.
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Freeze!Overwatch Winter Wonderland is coming December 15! pic.twitter.com/BAeH16PfFp
— Overwatch (@OverwatchEU) December 12, 2020
In a tweet shared by the European Overwatch account, the event’s start and end time are revealed to be December 15 alongside what appears to be a penguin version of Mei’s Snowball companion. That could very well mean that Mei will also be getting a penguin revamp for the highly anticipated seasonal event.
Notably, D.Va, Baptiste, Brigitte, Genji and Echo don’t have any Winter Wonderland skins yet, so there is a chance they get some this time around.
When will the event start?
Like we mentioned, Winter Wonderland 2020 will begin on December 15 and end on January 5!
In the past, Winter Wonderland has begun on December, 13, 12, 11 and 10 with each day falling on a Tuesday. This year, the event is mixing it up by landing on a Wednesday. But it’s possible that it’s just a time-zone difference and that it will be arriving on a Tuesday in North America.
This leaves just about ten days between the event starting and Christmas, so Blizzard may be going all-in on the festive cheer this time around. In any case, the event should be a fun one, especially as Overwatch 2 looms with BlizzCon on the horizon come February. Will this be the final Christmas event in the regular Overwatch game? We’ll have to wait and see.