Overwatch Winter Wonderland 2021 kicks off with new skins and 3 weeks of challenges

Overwatch Winter Wonderland is back for 2021, ringing in another year of festivities full of seasonal game modes and skins to collect.

The latest iteration of the holiday event is now live, and it's set to run through January 6, 2022. Weekly challenges will reward players for winning nine games of any type, with Epic skins as their ultimate reward: Wooltide Tracer, Mistletoe Symmetra, and Peppermint Bark Brigitte will be yours to unlock (in that order) by finishing your challenges for each week.

You could just stick with quick play and competitive if you want, but you'll also have the opportunity to play every previous Winter Wonderland brawl event. Head into Overwatch Arcade and queue up in the Winter Brawls playlist to relive the festive joy of 4v4 Freezethaw Elimination, Mei's Snowball Offensive, Yeti Hunt, and Snowball Deathmatch. Yeti Hunt is especially cool because it turns Overwatch into an asymmetrical horror multiplayer game of four Meis versus a single powered-up Winston.

Meanwhile, the in-game store and loot box pool has been updated with five new legendary skins: Reindeer Orisa, Sleighing D.Va, Snowman Wrecking Ball, Ice Wraith Genji, and Snowboarder Baptiste.

While it previously looked like this may be the last holiday season with the original Overwatch at the forefront, Blizzard revealed back in November that it had pushed both Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4 out of its 2022 release schedule to make sure they could reach their "full potential." In other words, the original Overwatch has at least one more big holiday shindig left in it before the sequel replaces it in the spotlight - keep that in mind while you're out hunting for skins.

Bastion won't be able to turn into a tank in Overwatch 2 and we're still not sure how to feel about it.