Activision Blizzard will potentially lose their partnership with the Lego Group as the toy production company recently announced their decision to pause the Overwatch 2 themed set that was planned to release next month due to Activision Blizzard’s recent sexual harassment situation and lawsuits. According to Brick Fanatics, the Lego and Overwatch 2 Titan (76980) collaboration was first revealed by a French retailer last December. The box art featured the Omnic Titan and included game characters Mei and Tracer as minifigures to mimic Overwatch 2‘s cinematic trailer that was shown during Blizzcon 2019. The Overwatch 2 themed set also appeared alongside a Lego Ninjago-themed set in Lego’s official 2022 Italian catalog, which would have been available to purchase next month. However, the collaboration will no longer happen as the Lego Group is reconsidering their partnership with Activision Blizzard.
Today, the Lego Group publicly shared a statement to announce the indefinite delay of their anticipated Overwatch 2 themed set, which was set to release on February 1, 2022. In the statement reported by Brick Fanatics, the Lego Group revealed that they would need to review their current partnership with Activision Blizzard and decided to pause the release of the Overwatch 2 product until further notice. The company’s decision comes after expressing concern regarding Activision Blizzard’s current sexual harassment situation and lawsuit:
“We are currently reviewing our partnership with Activision Blizzard, given concerns about the progress being made to address continuing allegations regarding workplace culture, especially the treatment of female colleagues and creating a diverse and inclusive environment. While we complete the review, we will pause the release of a LEGO Overwatch 2 product which was due to go on sale on February 1, 2022.”
The Lego Group now joins the long list of companies who have publicly released statements or spoken out against Activision Blizzard, where Treyarch, Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo, and the ESA have previously released statements voicing their criticism towards the company and its CEO Bobby Kotick.
The Titan (76980) would have been Lego’s first Overwatch 2 themed set and its most recent Overwatch collaboration since the company worked with Activision Blizzard back in 2019. Overwatch 2 is also coincidentally experiencing a similar delay in development, where Activision Blizzard announced the game’s delay back in November of last year.