Overwatch Has Bad News for Fans of the Clash Game Mode

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Starting with the new season, Reign of Talon, the Clash game mode will no longer be available in regular Overwatch matches. Players will still be able to enjoy Clash through custom games. This change takes effect February 10th, following the recent relaunch of Overwatch.

At the recent Overwatch Spotlight event, Blizzard surprised fans with big plans for the game in 2026. Now known again as just Overwatch, players can look forward to 10 new characters throughout the year – five will be available right away in the first season. The game will also feature a redesigned user interface, new abilities based on specific roles within a team, and ongoing stories that unfold over the entire year. The first of these storylines, ‘Reign of Talon,’ will center around Vendetta’s takeover.

Clash Leaving Quick Play in Overwatch Reign of Talon Season 1

To add new content to the game, Blizzard is removing one existing mode. Overwatch creator Aspen asked Blizzard’s Alec Dawson at a recent event about plans for new game modes. Dawson confirmed that the team is focusing on improving what’s already in the game rather than adding anything new, and announced that the Clash mode will be removed from Quick Play starting February 10th. After that date, Clash will only be available in custom games.

Image via Blizzard

Clash is a game mode that launched with Season 12 of Overwatch 2. Teams compete to capture five control points, pushing further into the opponent’s side of the map. The first team to capture all five points wins. However, matches often end quickly and feel unbalanced, despite efforts by the developers to fix this. Because of this, Clash was removed from ranked competitive play in Season 15, but continued to be available in casual, unranked matches. It was later added to the competitive and quick-play versions of Stadium modes in Seasons 16 and 18, respectively.

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According to Dawson, Clash will no longer be available in Quick Play with the release of Reign of Talon. His statement that it will only be playable in Custom Games suggests that the shorter version of Clash currently in the Arcade (Stadium) will also be removed. We’ll know for sure when the update launches on February 10th.

Before now, the only other game mode completely moved to Custom Games was Assault, also called 2CP, when Overwatch 2 launched in 2022. Interestingly, the two Clash maps in Overwatch 2 – Hanaoka and Throne of Anubis – were updated versions of the Hanamura and Temple of Anubis Assault maps. This means these maps have now been removed from standard Overwatch gameplay for the second time, with no current plans to bring them back.

Overwatch Is Not Giving Stadium Much Love This Year Either

Although the Stadium game mode remains popular in Overwatch, it’s receiving significantly less development attention this year compared to its launch in 2025. When Stadium first came out, it was updated frequently with two to four new heroes each season, alongside new maps, features, and even a new game type called Payload Race. However, the current development roadmap for Overwatch in 2026 only includes the Vendetta Hero Builder and UI improvements in Season 1, and the addition of Ramattra in Season 2.

The main version of Overwatch is receiving a lot of updates, like the Conquest event in Season 1 and the Japan Night map in Season 3. With so many new heroes added in Overwatch Reign of Talon Season 1 – and more planned for each season – the hero roster in the Flashpoint mode is actually starting to fall behind for the first time. It’s clear that the developers are currently focusing more on the main game, likely because it has more players. However, Flashpoint hasn’t been abandoned completely, and hopefully, it will continue to receive support in the future.

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2026-02-06 02:08