After causing a stir with some small patches late last year and earlier in 2024, Blizzard‘s MOBA Heroes of the Storm is back again with its biggest patch yet since entering maintenance mode in 2022.
Currently in testing on the PTR, the update is still a relatively small patch by the standards of most games, but it’s noteworthy for including substantive balance changes to around half a dozen heroes, including survivability buffs for Arthas and nerfs to Hogger, Rehgar, and Junkrat. This is in addition to the laundry list of bug fixes and tweaks seen in other recent patches.
Alongside these patches, the official website for Heroes of the Storm has also see a round of tweaks. This may simply be about reducing the site’s database footprint, but the more optimistic tinfoil aficionados out there may read something into the fact that Alexstrasza’s entry in the site is now using her Dragonflight art, which was made after Heroes entered maintenance mode.
What, if anything, this means for the future of Heroes of the Storm is still anyone’s guess. A full return to active development still seems unlikely, but speculation continues around the possibility of a launch on Steam or Xbox Game Pass. The recent string of patches have been come about 2-3 months apart, so it’s possible the plan is to push out bug fix and balance patches on a roughly quarterly basis going forward.
If nothing else, we’re getting some good memes out of it.
