Blizzard says Battle.net isn't chasing Steam or Epic — it's a curated shelf, not a warehouse

Blizzard has no interest in going toe-to-toe with Steam or the Epic Games Store. That's the word from senior vice president Andrew Guerrero, who spoke to Polygon at this year's BlizzCon — the same event where Blizzard announced that Cyberpunk 2077 will be joining The Witcher 3's upcoming Songs of the Past remaster on Battle.net.

Guerrero was direct about the platform's philosophy: "We're obviously not out there trying to do the Steam or Epic Game Store thing. We really look at ourselves as — we have our audience. We have a passionate core of people that play Blizzard games and games similar to Blizzard, and if something makes sense for them, we'll get after it. It's a much more focused approach." The pitch, in plain terms, is curation over volume — Battle.net asks what its players would "absolutely love" and chases top-tier experiences that fit that mold, rather than signing everything that moves.

That positioning makes sense for Battle.net's place in the market. PC storefronts that aren't Steam tend to carve out a niche rather than compete head-on: GOG leans into DRM-free retro titles, Epic throws exclusivity money around, and Battle.net has always been the home base for Blizzard's own games — World of Warcraft, Diablo, Overwatch, Hearthstone. Adding CD Projekt Red's RPGs is a natural extension of that identity; CDPR's audience overlaps heavily with Blizzard's, and The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077 are exactly the kind of prestige titles Guerrero is describing. Guerrero also noted that Blizzard has made its publishing pipeline "much more straightforward" to accommodate select third-party releases without turning the storefront into an open marketplace.

There is one eyebrow-raising footnote to all the "we just want what's best for players" talk: a Geralt crossover skin for Diablo 4 barbarians is locked behind a pre-order of The Witcher 3 Songs of the Past DLC on Battle.net specifically. It's a small but pointed incentive to bring players onto the platform — which is fine, but sits a little awkwardly next to the curated-and-caring messaging.