Overwatch Lunar New Year 2019 Event Announced

Popular hero shooter Overwatch will have its Lunar New Year Event 2019 this month. The Overwatch Lunar New Year Event 2019 start date is January 24 and the end date is February 18 to celebrate the Year of the Pig. Expect new Overwatch skins, cosmetics, and other unlockables at a discount price. There's no telling what Blizzard might add new to during its Year of the Dog event. Winter Wonderland saw modes like Mei's Yeti Hunt while its Summer Games brought Lucioball back with some tweaks. Safe to say we'll probably see new skins and sprays at the very least.

Expect Blizzard to reveal what the Overwatch Lunar New Year 2019 has to offer on Twitter in the run up to the event. We could see a new skin for Roadhog what with it being the Year of the Pig and Ashe may get her first new legendary skin since her launch in November. We won't be surprised to see Capture the Flag mode get some modifications too.

Previously, Blizzard revealed that it has five to six Overwatch heroes in development at any given time. The Overwatch team has a variety of potential heroes to choose from to announce and add to the game. Though the thought process behind them isn't the same.

"There are five or six different hero prototypes being worked on at any given time," Overwatch Production Director Chacko Sonny said. "Some are driven by ideas like 'this would be a great addition to this class' and other times its driven by a cool sketch that we want to turn into [a hero]. I don't want to present a picture that they're all derived in the same way. The inspiration comes from many different places and there's a lot discussion at the time, figuring out what the next hero is and what's the right thing for the game at that point in time."

On that note, we asked if there was a definite hero count in mind for Overwatch. The game launched with 21 heroes and has added eight more since Sonny claims that the studio is driven by what heroes add to the gameplay rather than the sheer number of them at a player's disposal.

"They've all introduced something new and changed the way people play the game," he said. "There have been some cases where we tweak some things post-release, but we think there's some fertile ground to introduce some new hero designs. I know certainly with some of the prototypes that I've been playing recently, I'm super excited for what's coming up."

If you're a fan of video games, check out Transition, Gadgets 360's gaming podcast. You can listen to it via Apple Podcasts or RSS, or just listen to this week's episode by hitting the play button below.