While I knew Overwatch would be big, it being a Blizzard game after all, I'll be the first one to admit that I didn't expect it to catch on this rapidly.

But catch on it did, and throughout its excruciatingly 'short' run-time Overwatch had managed to snag 9.7 million players, and secure an impressive 81 million hours of playtime from them, which comes up to 8 hours per person! To put things into perspective, Star Wars: Battlefront had 9.5 million players, The Division a respectable 6.4 million, Destiny a slightly lower 4.6 million, and finally, Battleborn had 2 million players during its Open Beta.

Here's what Blizzard's CEO, co-founder, and main Orc-person Mike Morhaime had to say about the team's massive achievement:

“We're thrilled that such an incredible number of players from around the globe got a chance to check out Overwatch during the Open Beta. Our mission was to make sure as many console and PC gamers as possible could experience the full game ahead of its launch—the response was overwhelming, and we hope that everyone had a blast.”

As someone who has apparently played enough to cower three people in terms of time I have to say that Overwatch did not disappoint. It promised a stylish, polished, and most importantly, fun team-based shooter and that's exactly what Blizzard delivered upon. However, while I do think Overwatch is excellent even in its current state, there are some issues and map-design problems that will need to be sorted out as soon as possible if Overwatch is to become a mainstay game for the general public, and not just the hardcore fans.

If you're interested in my take on the issues Overwatch is currently dealing with, and how I feel they could be solved, I welcome you to check out my critique.

Overwatch will be releasing for all platforms on May 24th at a $40/€40 price tag for the PC, while the consoles will be 'forced' to buy the Origins Edition at $60/€60.