Overwatch 2’s mythic skin prices revealed to be (unsurprisingly) very expensive

Overwatch 2 season 10 is now live, with a few important changes to how Blizzard is monetizing the game. Most notably, the hero shooter’s new hero Venture is free for all players, and no longer locked behind the battle pass. Overwatch 2’s battle pass now also pays out multiple kinds of currency, including the premium paid currency known as Overwatch Coins and a new type of currency called Mythic Prisms, which players can spend on mythic-tier skins.

Mythic Prisms are spent in a new section of the Overwatch 2 shop. Players can spend the new currency on this season’s new mythic skin — Vengeance Mercy — or mythic skins from previous seasons. Complicating the matter a bit is that the two most recently released mythic skins (for Moira and Orisa) won’t be available in the shop until future seasons.

In addition to offering Mythic Prisms as part of the premium battle pass, Blizzard is also selling that new currency, letting Overwatch 2 players catch up on mythic skins they may have missed from past seasons’ battle passes. The price of Mythic Prisms may be eye-watering for players who are looking to directly purchase mythic skins, but likely won’t be a surprise for longtime Overwatch fans who have been conditioned to expect to pay $20 or more for a single skin.

Mythic Prisms are now being sold through Overwatch 2’s in-game store in three bundles:

• 10 Mythic Prisms – $9.99
• 50 Mythic Prisms – $39.99
• 100 Mythic Prisms – $79.99

A base-level mythic skin, without additional customization options, costs 50 Mythic Prisms, or $39.99. A fully-upgraded mythic skin costs 80 Mythic Prisms. That makes the total starting cost of a complete Mythic skin around $70, depending on which bundle players purchase.

Image: Blizzard Entertainment

That sticker shock will likely lead to a lot of grumbling about the cost of mythic skins, since that’s equivalent to the costs of many AAA console and PC games. But for players who purchase the premium battle pass (which costs $9.99), they’ll get enough Mythic Prisms each season to purchase a fully upgraded mythic skin if they invest the time to complete the pass up to level 78 (out of 80 tiers). Alternatively, players could spend only 50 of their 80 Mythic Prisms earned through the battle pass to unlock the base skin, saving the remainder for other skins or mythic skin upgrades.

Here’s how Blizzard explains how players earn Mythic Prisms over the course of completing the premium battle pass:

Starting on Tier 8, you’ll collect 8 Mythic Prisms every 10 tiers until Tier 78.

At Tier 48, you’ll be able to unlock the base level of Mythic hero skin that you want to collect.

Once you complete Tier 78 of your Premium Battle Pass, you’ll earn enough Mythic Prisms to unlock the remaining customization levels for your Mythic hero skin.

Mythic Prisms can only be earned by progressing through the premium battle pass or through directly purchasing Prisms, Blizzard explained in an FAQ about Overwatch 2’s new Mythic shop. Other currencies, such as Overwatch Credits and Coins, can’t be used to purchase mythics, just Mythic Prisms.

Image: Blizzard Entertainment

Blizzard has said that its new approach to unlocking mythic skins is designed to give players more choice. Players who never touch Mercy may not see much value in paying for the battle pass to unlock her mythic skin, and can now spend those newly earnable Mythic Prisms on cosmetics for their favorite characters. But the new Mythic shop will undoubtedly inspire more negativity toward Blizzard’s heavily monetized free-to-play shooter; after all, Blizzard just added a bunch of older skins that a new player could spend upward of $500 on, if they went all in on Mythic Prisms.

That may be the price to pay (or not) for a reversal of one of Blizzard’s most controversial decisions around Overwatch 2: putting heroes behind a paywall. Now that that’s been undone, it appears that Overwatch whales will be the ones footing the cost.