Anniversary

Overwatch Seasonal Events

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A group photo shot of all 24 heroes of the first year

Anniversary is a seasonal event celebrating of the release of Overwatch. The event offers players a limited series of items, which can be earned through special Loot Boxes, and unlocked through Hero Gallery. Once the event ends, all event-exclusive content becomes unobtainable until the next year's anniversary event.

History

• The inaugural event ran from May 23 to June 12, 2017. While the event did not have a seasonal brawl or map, it introduced Lockout Elimination and Limited Duel for the Arcade, along with 3 new arena maps: Necropolis, Castillo, and Black Forest, all of which remained after the event ended.

• The event returned on May 22, 2018, running through to June 11, 2018. The event came with new arena map Petra, a Competitive variant of deathmatch, and new loot box drop system: 2018 anniversary boxes are also guaranteed to drop one item from another seasonal event, and legendary anniversary boxes will always drop at least one legendary item; the latter can only be obtained by logging in during the event or bulk purchasing 50 crates.

• The event returned in 2019, ran between May 22 and June 11 and offered unique Sprays, portraits and Skins as rewards for winning a certain number of matches each week.

• The event returned in 2020, ran between May 19 and June 9 and offered unique sprays, portraits and skins as rewards for winning a certain number of matches each week.

Anniversary items

• All items
• 2019 items
• 2018 items
• 2017 items

Media

Thank You Overwatch Anniversary 2018

Thank You Overwatch Anniversary (2018)

Trivia

• This is the only event to not introduce any event-exclusive Victory Poses or Highlight Intros.
• A later section of the Anniversary event main menu theme uses the same music present in the first part of the Uprising Origin Story Video.
• Due to 24 heroes being released at the time of this event, and Junkrat and Roadhog being given Joker cards, the 9 of Hearts and 9 of Clubs were not given to a hero in the form of a spray.
• If Junkrat and Roadhog's dance emotes are positioned and timed correctly, they will high-five each other during their dances and an audio cue will be heard when they do.

Reference

• Ana's dance emote is an Egyptian Saidi Dance.
• Ana's "Follow me" voice line is reference to a recurring line in the Terminator franchise.
• Bastion's dance emote is The Train Dance.
• Brigitte’s dance emote is a reference to a viral video of the Swedish Women’s handball team performing a Zumba dance.
• D.Va's dance emote is a reference to the Voltron's dance from Robot Chicken.
• Doomfist's emote is a reference to Baby Groot's dance from the opening of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
• Genji's dance emote is a reference to Kinjaz. It contains a few moves from two of their preformances.
• Genji's skin, like the name implies, is based on Super Sentai and Kamen Rider series.
• Hanzo's dance emote is a traditional Japanese dance called "Nanchu Soran Bushi" or "The Fisherman's Dance".
• Junkrat's dance emote is a dance Will Smith did on The Fresh Prince of Bel Air .
• Lúcio's dance emote is a Rollerblade Dance.
• McCree's dance emote is The Electric Slide Line Dance.
• Mei's dance emote is the choreography that goes with the Hare Hare Yukai dance from the 2006 anime The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya.
• Mercy's dance emote is The Hustle.
• Moira’s dance emote is an Industrial dance
• Moira’s "Good news, everyone" voice line is a reference to a catchphrase of Professor Farnsworth in Futurama.
• Orisa's dance is partly based on Equine dancing.
• Orisa's "Satisfied with protection" voice line is likely a reference to Big Hero 6.
• Reinhardt's dance is a reference to Gene Kelly's "Let Me Call You Sweetheart"
• Reinhardt's "Honor! Justice! Reinhardt!" voice line is a reference to the exact same quote said by his voice actor at BlizzCon 2016.
• Roadhog's dance emote is The Cabbage Patch.
• Soldier: 76's dance emote is most likely a reference to Nuts!.
• Sombra's dance emote is Shuffle Dance
• Tracer's dance emote is The Charleston.
• Widowmaker's dance emote is Ballet.
• Winston's dance emote is a reference to The Twist from Pulp Fiction.
• Zarya's dance emote is a reference to the 1988 Crystal Light National Aerobic Championship.

External Links

• Overwatch: Anniversary

Patch Changes

May 23, 2017 Patch: Anniversary seasonal event added