Knowing how to get stars in Overwatch is vital for those who want to unlock event skins, particularly in the ongoing Archives 2021 event. Weekly Challenges now require stars to get the skin of the week, but since this is different, some might not immediately know what to do. Here’s how players can earn stars in Overwatch.
How to earn Overwatch stars
To earn stars in Overwatch, players have to play specific Arcade missions during the event. Stars are doled out for these missions and the difficult regulates how many stars players get. Normal has a limit of three stars and Hard has a limit four while Expert and Legendary both can yield five stars maximum (Challenge Missions also have a five-star limit).
Players do not need to complete missions to earn stars nor does completing a mission automatically yield the maximum amount of stars.
Failing a mission still lets players keep as many stars as they had when they died. Other Arcade modes, Quick Play, and Competitive don’t count either.
This will likely apply to future events as well, but let’s use the Archives event as an example. Go to the Arcade section and there will be two tabs on the right: Mission Archives and Challenge Missions. Pick either of those.
Mission Archives will open up the story missions from past years. This includes Uprising, Retribution, and Storm Rising and their All Heroes variants. Any of those six let players earn stars.
Challenge Missions take place on those same three maps, but have certain modifiers. Some have enemies drop lava after death while others only take damage when players are nearby. These missions are very difficult and are only advised for those who have a good co-op team going. Players also can’t choose the difficulty for these missions.
This specific challenge also nets double stars for players that choose the Storm Rising missions. That info is right beneath the banner showing players how many stars they have so it’s worth looking at to see what challenges have special bonuses attached the them.
