Bring back the pre-match waiting area

[durask]

I feel like an important community aspect was lost in this update. Now it's just like any other clinical matchmaking system where you have no interaction with your team or the enemy before the game begins.

It's not like it was replaced by anything of value either since it's just the character portrait from the select screen and some text. Plus with the new map visuals, why not let people take in the hard work of the artists? Like the new boxes room at mid or the subway platform to the side of midboss, even just the characters looking around is more interesting to see than the current screen.

Speaking of, you can't see what characters people are playing until you're on the zipline, so you have less time to lane switch or formulate a plan with your team.

Not sure if this was done to mask character pop-in when people joined, or to avoid an awkward transition into the camera fly-over at the start, either of those reasons aren't a worthy trade-off in my opinion.

This feels like what they did with Halo when they removed the pre and post game lobbies, which took out a fun social aspect from the game.

 

[winnix830]

I also loved the pre-match hangout with everyone! It was so fun to chat and fake punch each other.

Related, the delay in ability to access shop is also a loss.

 

[KahiLuaKolu]

I loved the face off and i really hope it comes back

 

[Poundcake]

Big +1. Felt like it brought a lot of personality to the game, provided a bit of fun banter during short downtime, and allowed people to get their bearings before the match started. Now it feels like every other game gets paused on the initial zipline rollout while one or both teams get their lanes settled.

You really don't appreciate little things like this until they get removed. Just put us in an actual building lobby with some muzak playing until the ritual starts.