'Overwatch' news: Patch 2.17 arrives with bug fixes, Deathmatch game modes update

A screenshot of Torbjorn in the announcement video of a patch update for "Overwatch." Facebook/OverwatchSEA

Blizzard Entertainment has released patch 2.17 for the shooter game "Overwatch." The update aims to fix bugs and improve the overall gameplay. However, it does not include Deathmatch modes, as much as players have been clamoring for one.

The patch will modify the interface, allowing players to be constantly aware of their ping and round trip time as well as their interpolation delay with the "Show Network Stats" option that can be accessed in the menu. Even though this is a slight tweak in the overall scheme of the game, being aware of one's own ping is especially essential and can make the difference between life or death in a match.

Reinhardt's bug which allowed players to push characters through walls has now been resolved, as well as the bug that permitted Sombra to get to odd locations on the Anubis map. Doomfist's Meteor Strike has also been resolved, wherein the area-of-effect circle wasn't visible to other players.

Even though that the recent patch wasn't what fans were hoping for, the patch will prove to be useful for the upcoming Overwatch World Cup that is set to occur on Nov. 3, after Blizzard draws the World Cup on Aug. 28.

But of course, fans are still waiting for the Deathmatch modes to be released.

Fortunately, Blizzard announced that they have already sent two modes to Public Test Realm (PTR) and these two are Team Deathmatch and Free-for-all. These game modes are basically killing spree matches that players can have with their friends or random strangers online.

At this point, it is quite difficult to predict how well these tests would do given that there are a good number of characters on the "Overwatch" roster — with each of them having different capabilities and specialties. Some specialize in defense, while others specialize in stealth, among other things. Blizzard might have to deal with a lot of rebalancing issues prior to releasing full versions of these modes.

"Overwatch" is available for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Microsoft Windows PC.

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