One of the hottest tickets in gaming right now is an invite into the closed beta of Blizzard’s new first-person shooter, Overwatch. One of the quiet sub-plots is speculation over what the business model will be. With early comparisons of Overwatch being to Valve’s free-to-play Team Fortress 2, it was expected that Overwatch would also be free-to-play.

However, a Game Informer report suggests that Overwatch won’t be free-to-play. At least, not at launch. Sources tell them to expect it to be a $60 full price release.

Game Informer says that a source at a GameStop store informed them of a corporate email about Overwatch. According to that email, Blizzard’s next offering will be available on PS4 and Xbox One as well as PC where it is currently in closed beta.

The big news from that email is that Overwatch will be priced at $60. The early speculation and analysis was that Overwatch would have to launch as a free-to-play game in order to compete with the likes of Team Fortress 2 while using microtransactions of some sort to support the game, likely in the form of skins or emotes rather than characters.

However, an IGN report said that the current Overwatch offering that GameStop is selling is called “Overwatch: Origins Edition.” Speculation has now turned to the belief that the “Origins Edition” of Overwatch could be a paid starter pack for the game. Heroes of the Storm, Blizzard’s MOBA, had a similar starter pack available at retail stores.

For their part, Blizzard told both publications that interested parties should keep their eyes on this weekend’s BlizzCon as the publisher would be making an announcement about Overwatch during the convention’s opening ceremony. So it looks like we’ll have something more to report come Monday.

Source: Game Informer, IGN