How Overwatch Decides Play of the Game

Whether you win or lose a game of Overwatch, there is something that can make all of that time worthwhile- the Play of the Game. By showcasing your epic play that you made at some point throughout the match to the rest of the players in the game, you feel as if your desperate attempt at saving the game for your team was not in vein.

However, what has remained a mystery since the game released is exactly how Overwatch decides who gets the Play of the Game moment for each match. That is until a recent interview with Software Engineer, Rowan Hamilton, revealed exactly how it works.

In the interview conducted by Gamespot, Hamilton states that the way Overwatch’s Play of the Game is determined is not just on the amount of kills a player gets. “Yeah. There’s a lot of different variables. I’m not intimately familiar with the system so I can’t speak to all of them, but there’s obvious stuff like damage and kills.” He said. “… a lot of support actions do come into it, we’ve added some stuff recently, such as determining how hard a shot was to hit based on how fast the target was moving, how far away the target was moving. So a snipe of someone half a screen away who was just chilling out and waiting to be headshot won’t be weighted as heavily as a Tracer zipping across, barely in sight that you manage to pick off.

For those of you curious why your killing spree in five seconds didn’t get the Play of the Game, but those two sweet sniper kills did well now you know the answer. It’s not a simple mechanic of just working out the most damage dealt within a set period of time, but a more complex system that determines the most impressive moment of a match.

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