Blizzard has been doing online multiplayer gaming for a very long time. I think the first game I ever played online was actually the original Rainbow Six (good times on the heat servers). But shortly thereafter I got really into Starcraft and Diablo II , and Battle.net was like a magical portal to a different dimension. Blizzard has always accounted for cheaters, and usually humors them by creating separate, open servers in which they can hack and play with no consequences (effectively removing them from regular, closed server multiplayer). In a delicately balanced and competitive game like Overwatch , though, there’s no room for those kinds of shenanigans, and Blizzard won’t be tolerating cheaters.
On the official Overwatch forums community manager Lylirra let potential hackers know exactly what they were up against. “If a player is found to be cheating – or using hacks, bots, or third-party software that provides any sort of unfair advantage – that player will be permanently banned from the game. Full stop.” No warning, no 3-day ban; instant permaban. Blizzard also wants everyone to know that kill-cams aren’t perfect. Sometimes after you die things might look a little off in the kill-cam but that doesn’t always mean that your opponent was cheating. Blizzard would also like you to remember that sometimes your enemy is just better than you are, and a skilled FPS veteran finding your head faster than you can find the trigger doesn’t always mean “omg hax.”