Battle.net has been expanding beyond Blizzard’s own games, but the company says it has no plans to turn the platform into a direct competitor to Steam or the Epic Games Store, despite rumors of plans for a much bigger platform. Instead of filling the storefront with thousands of releases, Blizzard wants to remain selective about which third-party games it brings over.

The topic has become more relevant following the announcement that Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Remastered are coming to Battle.net before the end of the year. Their arrival represents another major expansion for a platform that was once almost entirely focused on Blizzard and Activision games.

Battle.net is expanding, but it doesn’t need to compete with Steam or Epic

Battle.net has already changed significantly over the years. After launching in 1997, it eventually became Blizzard’s main PC platform, hosting games such as World of Warcraft, Diablo, and Overwatch. Activision titles later joined the service, while Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard has brought Xbox and Bethesda games such as Avowed, Sea of Thieves, The Outer Worlds 2, and Doom: The Dark Ages to the platform as well.

With CD Projekt Red now joining the list, it would be easy to assume that Blizzard is preparing to open Battle.net to significantly more third-party publishers. However, that doesn’t appear to be the plan.

Speaking to Polygon during BlizzCon 2026, Blizzard senior vice president Andrew Guerrero explained that the company is “not out there trying to do the Steam or Epic Games Store thing.”

“We’re obviously not out there trying to do the Steam or Epic Game Store thing. We really look at ourselves as, you know, 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, I’d say, of ‘What do we think our players would absolutely love? What are the top-tier quality experiences out there that we might be able to get some more exposure to, and does it make sense?'”

Andrew Guerrero, Blizzard SVP, via Polygon

Instead, Blizzard is focusing on its existing audience and looking for games that it believes those players would genuinely be interested in. This means third-party releases will be selected individually rather than Battle.net becoming an open marketplace for practically any developer.

Guerrero also explained that Battle.net wasn’t originally designed as a general-purpose publishing platform like Steam. Blizzard has made changes that make adding external games easier, meaning every new release no longer requires a completely custom process. Still, the company doesn’t intend to introduce a system where developers can simply submit and publish their games themselves.

A major reason behind this approach is discoverability. Opening the doors to a huge number of releases would also create the challenge of sorting through them and deciding what should be shown to users. Blizzard would rather keep the selection smaller and focus on games it believes fit its audience.

So, while Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Remastered may signal that more third-party games are coming to Battle.net, don’t expect the platform to suddenly become another massive PC storefront. Blizzard appears interested in expanding it, but only with carefully selected releases.

About the Author

Abdul Haddi

Abdul is a tech writer and Editor for PC Guide, specializing in all things tech, gaming, and hardware.