When Jeff Kaplan, the director of the Overwatch development team, announced that a new map, Oasis, was in development and that it would be launched early in 2017, he wasn’t kidding.
“Researchers and academics from around the region came together to found a city dedicated to scientific progress without restraints — a monument to human ingenuity and invention. The city and its inhabitants are governed by the Ministries, a collection of brilliant minds who possess many secrets that have attracted the interest of powerful organizations from around the world.”
Oasis is also the first map to be placed in the Middle East, specifically in Iraq, the only other map that’s close being Anubis which is in Egypt. Oasis, much like Nepal, Lijiang and Ilios, is a Control map, Blizzard’s name for King of the Hill.
Two teams will start at opposing ends of the map and make their way to the middle to battle and contest the point. Capturing the point and holding it earns your team a win, resulting in the map resetting to a different instance and area of Oasis. The first team to win two of the three rounds wins the game, whilst competitive players will need to win a best of five. The three different objective areas in Oasis are called University, Gardens & City Centre.
Oasis also introduces a new game mechanic Blizzard has been testing out for a while now: jump pads. Jump pads were first seen in Lucio Ball, during the Overwatch Summer Games. Oasis was first introduced to the game in the PTR (Public Test Realm) on November 29th.
Oasis is not the only thing in the works over at Blizzard’s HQ. Jeff Kaplan recently confirmed that a new hero was already far along the design process and would be seen in the game soon.
