Most Broken Video Game Characters: Brigitte
The Search for the Most Broken Video Game Character
Once upon a time, Overwatch was balanced. But like all hero-based, class-based, specialty-based, etc. type games, some characters were just more popular than others. With this, the healer role was undoubtedly the least popular, thus Blizzard created Moira. While technically a Support character, she blurred the line between healer and damage-dealer and started Blizzard down the path of developing new heroes, not for the sake of diversity, but with the explicit goal of changing how the game was played. Over the next year, the "Dive" meta arguably became the most prevalent in the game. Dive was an aggressive, high-speed, coordinated attack on enemy healers. A strategy so effective it led many people to complain that Overwatch had become unbalanced, causing players to start leaving the game.
Enter, Brigitte.
Brigitte was a hero tailor-made to counter the Dive meta, but in the months following her March 2018 release many pro players complained that she was too powerful. On top of her healing abilities and her nigh-unbreakable shield, her crowd-control abilities were way to effective, being able to hit multiple targets with her main attack and being able to stun enemies with her shield bash through barriers.
GOATS
GOATS: An aggressive, short-range, triple-tank/triple-healer composition. Named after the North American Open Division team that popularized it, GOATS.
The 3 Tanks form the beefy frontline, using shields and large health bars to advance forward. The 3 Supports, as their title suggests, back up and support the Tanks to keep them alive.
As the popularity of the GOATS meta spread across all levels of Overwatch, gone were the flashy, high skill plays that casual players and viewers love from Damage heroes. With games filled with high HP, constant healing, and low damage output, it led to drawn-out attrition-heavy matches that were incredibly boring to watch. As viewership fell off a cliff and player complaints piled up, developer Blizzard was under pressure to rebalance the game into the viewer-friendly spectacle it once was. After months of trying to nerf Brigitte and tweak other heroes in an attempt to diversify the game, GOATS still remained the go-to meta. Eventually, Blizzard decided to think bigger: if changing the characters didn't work, then they would change the game.
2-2-2
2-2-2 Roll Lock was a new character select system introduced in July 2019 that required teams to be comprised of 2 Tanks, 2 Supports, and 2 Damage-Dealers at all times, putting a decisive end to the GOATS 3-3 comp. Ever since launch, the ideology of a 2-2-2 composition was always present, seen as the most balanced and "ideal" team set-up. But an ideology it remained, players still had free reign to assemble their team using any combination of the game’s diverse cast, with the only rule being the "one-hero limit". Until 2-2-2 would turn an unwritten rule into an unbreakable law.
Very few characters in the history of gaming have ever had as big an impact on their respective games as Brigitte did on Overwatch. She destroyed one meta, created her own, then changed the fundamental architecture of the game forever.
