Blizzad reveals new characters for Overwatch

[kris40k]

What the hell is going on in this thread?

There's an awful lot of random hyperbole and accusations of xenophobia going on here for a post about a space cowboy and a woman with biceps.

I dunno, but apparently Tracer is Satan, now.

Do...do we have to hate Tracer?

 

[theNater]

I'm just trying to gauge where we are intending to go with this long term.

I can't speak for anybody else, but I'm hoping it takes us to a place where things go a little something like this:

People who see something they don't want in a game, or don't see something they do want, complain loudly about it in game-discussion parts of the internet. Then developers analyze those complaints, and decide how they wish to react, based on whatever criteria they think is important. Then, the developers clearly and publicly identify the complaints, and explain or demonstrate their reaction and the reasons behind it. Through this process, games get designed, which some people buy and play.

That's exactly what has happened here, which is why it drives me batty that some people are pointing to this event as if it were a harbinger of doom. Blizzard is happy, the people who were complaining about body type diversity are happy, and everybody knows that complaints get heard(encouraging future complaining). If at some future point a developer changes a game in a way you don't like in response to other people's complaints, complain about the new state of the game at that time. Your complaint will be heard, and if the developer agrees with your conclusions, they'll change it back.

I dunno, but apparently Tracer is Satan, now.

I missed that one. When did this happen?

 

[inmunitas]

I'm just trying to gauge where we are intending to go with this long term.

I can't speak for anybody else, but I'm hoping it takes us to a place where things go a little something like this:

People who see something they don't want in a game, or don't see something they do want, complain loudly about it in game-discussion parts of the internet. Then developers analyze those complaints, and decide how they wish to react, based on whatever criteria they think is important. Then, the developers clearly and publicly identify the complaints, and explain or demonstrate their reaction and the reasons behind it. Through this process, games get designed, which some people buy and play.

That's exactly what has happened here, which is why it drives me batty that some people are pointing to this event as if it were a harbinger of doom. Blizzard is happy, the people who were complaining about body type diversity are happy, and everybody knows that complaints get heard(encouraging future complaining). If at some future point a developer changes a game in a way you don't like in response to other people's complaints, complain about the new state of the game at that time. Your complaint will be heard, and if the developer agrees with your conclusions, they'll change it back.

Is that... like... how it's always been done though? Only real difference this time is that you have the incompetent morons siding with those who want the change, instead of slandering them for being "self-entitled hyper-consumers".

 

[inmunitas]

Is that... like... how it's always been done though? Only real difference this time is that you have the incompetent morons siding with those who want the change, instead of slandering them for being "self-entitled hyper-consumers".

No. How it's always been done is that specific audiences have been completely ignored because they aren't the "core" audience. A pervasive attitude that the opinion of the majority audience is the only one that matters. Enforced by a misrepresentation of the majority audience only being a specific kind of person (Male, 20-30), to which nearly all marketing and design is directed to.

And your slippery slope fears are ridiculous. How would it in any way cause you harm that people "force" inclusion of fictional characters representing their culture, sexuality or body type? By your own admission that stuff doesn't matter.

So what are you so afraid of happening, exactly? That other people get what they want and that it's something you don't care about personally?

Oh the horror!

As for your claim that anyone that supports this is an incompetent moron. Well... You're the only one resorting to insults in lieu of actual arguments. That I believe is something to consider in determining who really is the moron in a debate.

Spoiler

It's the one that uses insults in lieu of arguments.

That's just a strawman argument and none of it is what I've said or even implied.

 

[Mutant1988]

Is that... like... how it's always been done though? Only real difference this time is that you have the incompetent morons siding with those who want the change, instead of slandering them for being "self-entitled hyper-consumers".

No. How it's always been done is that specific audiences have been completely ignored because they aren't the "core" audience. A pervasive attitude that the opinion of the majority audience is the only one that matters. Enforced by a misrepresentation of the majority audience only being a specific kind of person (Male, 20-30), to which nearly all marketing and design is directed to.

And your slippery slope fears are ridiculous. How would it in any way cause you harm that people "force" inclusion of fictional characters representing their culture, sexuality or body type? By your own admission that stuff doesn't matter.

So what are you so afraid of happening, exactly? That other people get what they want and that it's something you don't care about personally?

Oh the horror!

As for your claim that anyone that supports this is an incompetent moron. Well... You're the only one resorting to insults in lieu of actual arguments. That I believe is something to consider in determining who really is the moron in a debate.

Spoiler

It's the one that uses insults in lieu of arguments.

That's just a strawman argument and none of it is what I've said or even implied.

Is it a strawman argument that you call anyone supportive of this an "incompetent moron"? Or is it just that cabal of ultrafeminists I've been hearing about that are incompetent morons? It's hard to tell which imaginary foe you're fighting if you aren't specific.

Didn't you get moderated as well, for dismissing absolutely everything I said as bullshit? Tsk tsk. And then there's asking me to take a personality test instead of disproving my arguments. . That's sure some good rhetorical skills you got there buddy.

Do tell me your true feelings then, if I misinterpret everything you say. I'd chalk misinterpretation up to how poorly you communicate though.

Also, for the record:

You're putting in a Southerner and claiming they represent all of Britain, that is discrimination.

Except not. You added the "Represent all" bit to that yourself. No one else claimed it represented "ALL" of Britain. Only that it represented Britain in any capacity whatsoever.

Which it does.

 

[inmunitas]

Is that... like... how it's always been done though? Only real difference this time is that you have the incompetent morons siding with those who want the change, instead of slandering them for being "self-entitled hyper-consumers".

No. How it's always been done is that specific audiences have been completely ignored because they aren't the "core" audience. A pervasive attitude that the opinion of the majority audience is the only one that matters. Enforced by a misrepresentation of the majority audience only being a specific kind of person (Male, 20-30), to which nearly all marketing and design is directed to.

And your slippery slope fears are ridiculous. How would it in any way cause you harm that people "force" inclusion of fictional characters representing their culture, sexuality or body type? By your own admission that stuff doesn't matter.

So what are you so afraid of happening, exactly? That other people get what they want and that it's something you don't care about personally?

Oh the horror!

As for your claim that anyone that supports this is an incompetent moron. Well... You're the only one resorting to insults in lieu of actual arguments. That I believe is something to consider in determining who really is the moron in a debate.

Spoiler

It's the one that uses insults in lieu of arguments.

That's just a strawman argument and none of it is what I've said or even implied.

Is it a strawman argument that you call anyone supportive of this an "incompetent moron"? Or is it just that cabal of ultrafeminists I've been hearing about that are incompetent morons? It's hard to tell which imaginary foe you're fighting if you aren't specific.

Didn't you get moderated as well? Tsk tsk. And then there's asking me to take a personality test instead of disproving my arguments.

Do tell me your true feelings then, if I misinterpret everything you say. I'd chalk that up to how poorly you communicate though.

That's still a strawman, you're making assertions I've not made. Who do you think usually slanders gamers for demanding higher standards from developers? The gaming press of course.

edit:
Also, if had bothered to look at that test, it's a way of allowing me to gauge how you think, as I don't understand your reasoning.

 

[Gengisgame]

That's still a strawman, you're making assertions I've not made. Who do you think usually slanders gamers for demanding higher standards from developers? The gaming press of course.

edit:
Also, if had bothered to look at that test, it's a way of allowing me to gauge how you think, as I don't understand your reasoning.

I just starting ignoring mutant, not only did he put words in my mouth with every reply, he did so with statements in my comments that contradicted what he said, continued to do so even after I pointed that out.

 

[Mutant1988]

Is that... like... how it's always been done though? Only real difference this time is that you have the incompetent morons siding with those who want the change, instead of slandering them for being "self-entitled hyper-consumers".

No. How it's always been done is that specific audiences have been completely ignored because they aren't the "core" audience. A pervasive attitude that the opinion of the majority audience is the only one that matters. Enforced by a misrepresentation of the majority audience only being a specific kind of person (Male, 20-30), to which nearly all marketing and design is directed to.

And your slippery slope fears are ridiculous. How would it in any way cause you harm that people "force" inclusion of fictional characters representing their culture, sexuality or body type? By your own admission that stuff doesn't matter.

So what are you so afraid of happening, exactly? That other people get what they want and that it's something you don't care about personally?

Oh the horror!

As for your claim that anyone that supports this is an incompetent moron. Well... You're the only one resorting to insults in lieu of actual arguments. That I believe is something to consider in determining who really is the moron in a debate.

Spoiler

It's the one that uses insults in lieu of arguments.

That's just a strawman argument and none of it is what I've said or even implied.

Is it a strawman argument that you call anyone supportive of this an "incompetent moron"? Or is it just that cabal of ultrafeminists I've been hearing about that are incompetent morons? It's hard to tell which imaginary foe you're fighting if you aren't specific.

Didn't you get moderated as well? Tsk tsk. And then there's asking me to take a personality test instead of disproving my arguments.

Do tell me your true feelings then, if I misinterpret everything you say. I'd chalk that up to how poorly you communicate though.

That's still a strawman, you're making assertions I've not made. Who do you think usually slanders gamers for demanding higher standards from developers? The gaming press of course.

edit:
Also, if had bothered to look at that test, it's a way of allowing me to gauge how you think, as I don't understand your reasoning.

Slanders gamers for demanding higher standards how? If anything, the gaming press has criticized the vocal critics of progressive changes and minority groups interests (Or hell, women, which is anything but a minority) being catered to as being wholly non-constructive and insanely hostile.

And no, I'm not making assertion of things you've not "made". You said that the incompetent morons side with the critics this time. Who is the incompetent morons, why are they incompetent and how are you any better when you don't describe WHAT they do wrong?

And again, what in the current development is so bad. And how is this design bad when it's unnecessary by your own admission. Why then does it matter either which way?

As for the idea that people don't relate to design or video game characters, that's just wrong. People do relate to design, to character, to narrative. Not just any one thing, to all of it.

As for my personality, that's none of your fucking business. Meet my arguments instead of trying to derail the discussion to center around my (Many) personal faults.

Feel free to tell me which parts were bullshit. I'm still curious about that.

 

[Mutant1988]

I just starting ignoring mutant, not only did he put words in my mouth with every reply, he did so with statements in my comments that contradicted what he said, continued to do so even after I pointed that out.

Except not. You said that the character was added to be ugly. You asserted that the character only existed to be ugly. You claimed that people would actually want other things than "ugly".

You're dismissive and insulting. It doesn't matter if you didn't mean to be, because you still were.

Feel free to take the quotes I posted and tell me what part I'm misinterpreting. I even underlined the important bits for your convenience.

Lol it would be a pile of BS to think otherwise, all this is not over some character people really, really like

I do respect people who like the character for the design, they are just few and far between because people do not get this many people don't get this worked up over a character design, there are actual articles about how this is good, what others like is bad.

Because it had nothing to with muscles it just shows what it was really about, it was making an unattractive female as some sort of protest, I gave examples of things people may actually want (robots, monster girls, elementals) you have made my point for me, this was simply about making it not be attractive

As you point you just wanted unattractive females despite there being plenty of diversity within that area, not interesting just unattractive. You can have unattractive if that's what you want but that should be personnel taste, not some statement against what others like.

Also respect. Except not, because you claim "they" only wanted her to be ugly, to protest, etc.

 

[Silvanus]

It's bloody lamentable that this is controversial.

The new characters look fine, and there's no reasonable reason to think they're there as a result of bullying or anything other than regular criticism.

The fact that people are kicking up a stink about this illustrates for me why people are getting the impression the audience is hostile to diversity. Really face-palm-worthy stuff.

 

[theNater]

Is that... like... how it's always been done though?

It's really not. A lot of companies are stuck in the old "focus group" model, where they pick a handful of people they think are likely to play their game, and ask those people a lot of questions. A few are in the even worse model of "targeted design", where they pick a demographic group and then only do what they think will appeal to that group, without even asking(material for children is especially prone to this). And then there's some who never talk about the complaints, because they don't want to appear to be "caving" to the people complaining.

It's important to remember that the internet is a new thing. As little as ten years ago, somewhere in the neighborhood of half of the people in our countries didn't have it. Lots of people are still learning what it can do. This means two things: First, that a lot of companies are still figuring out how to deal with internet complaints, and second that if you see a complaint you haven't seen before, it's likely that complaint is actually held by people who didn't know how or where to express it. Not through being inherently stupid, merely for not having had the proper resources.

 

[inmunitas]

Slanders gamers for demanding higher standards how? If anything, the gaming press has criticized the vocal critics of progressive changes and minority groups interests (Or hell, women, which is anything but a minority) being catered to as being wholly non-constructive and insanely hostile.

False, no progressive changes are being made, they're all too short sighted and temporary. Gaming press sites, as in Polygon, Kotaku etc. are using "clickbait" headlines/articles in an effort garner more traffic as they increasingly become less relevant.

And no, I'm not making assertion of things you've not "made". You said that the incompetent morons side with the critics this time. Who is the incompetent morons, why are they incompetent and how are you any better when you don't describe WHAT they do wrong?

Incompetent, adjective, not having or showing the necessary skills to do something successfully. They wouldn't be loosing relevance if they had adapted to change, and wouldn't have to resort to "clickbait" to maintain traffic.

And again, what in the current development is so bad. And how is this design bad when it's unnecessary by your own admission. Why then does it matter either which way?

It's unnecessary as it doesn't change the audience. Console market is stagnant, latest consoles lack innovation and the hardware was obsolete on release. Follow Valve, Intel and their tech partners and groups if you really want lasting progressive changes.

 

[The Goat Tsar]

I wanted to talk about McCree but I've clearly come to wrong place.

 

[EternallyBored]

I wanted to talk about McCree but I've clearly come to wrong place.

Interestingly enough, he was featured rather prominently in the original group shots in the reveal trailer, like front and center, when other characters in the initial reveal weren't in the same trailer, the other characters in the trailer and early art actually give an interesting look at potential future characters, including a sort of feminine looking robot, and a big fat road warrior looking guy with a gas mask and tire armor.

McCree himself honestly looks like he is pretty straightforward at this point, his ultimate could very well end up being OP as hell depending on how it's implemented, and the flashbangs are an odd choice considering his cowboy theme, but the main thing I see with him is that he seems a lot less mobile than other characters like Widowmaker, Reaper, and Pharah. He seems like he has a very limited movement range at the moment, and I foresee him getting some overhauls throughout the beta.

 

[The Goat Tsar]

I wanted to talk about McCree but I've clearly come to wrong place.

Interestingly enough, he was featured rather prominently in the original group shots in the reveal trailer, like front and center, when other characters in the initial reveal weren't in the same trailer, the other characters in the trailer and early art actually give an interesting look at potential future characters, including a sort of feminine looking robot, and a big fat road warrior looking guy with a gas mask and tire armor.

McCree himself honestly looks like he is pretty straightforward at this point, his ultimate could very well end up being OP as hell depending on how it's implemented, and the flashbangs are an odd choice considering his cowboy theme, but the main thing I see with him is that he seems a lot less mobile than other characters like Widowmaker, Reaper, and Pharah. He seems like he has a very limited movement range at the moment, and I foresee him getting some overhauls throughout the beta.

From what has been described to me, he moves very slowly and I like those kind of characters because positioning becomes important. When new players used his ultimate, apparently they ended up dying charging up the headshots rather than killing three people like in the trailers. I agree the flashbangs are weird for his character but I think that's just there to give him some compensation for moving slowly and not being a tank. I won't be surprised if Blizzard swaps the flashbangs for a more cowboy-themed crowd control ability. His abilities are relatively simple but his low mobility and difficult to use ultimate makes him look easy to learn, hard to master.

 

[EternallyBored]

I wanted to talk about McCree but I've clearly come to wrong place.

Interestingly enough, he was featured rather prominently in the original group shots in the reveal trailer, like front and center, when other characters in the initial reveal weren't in the same trailer, the other characters in the trailer and early art actually give an interesting look at potential future characters, including a sort of feminine looking robot, and a big fat road warrior looking guy with a gas mask and tire armor.

McCree himself honestly looks like he is pretty straightforward at this point, his ultimate could very well end up being OP as hell depending on how it's implemented, and the flashbangs are an odd choice considering his cowboy theme, but the main thing I see with him is that he seems a lot less mobile than other characters like Widowmaker, Reaper, and Pharah. He seems like he has a very limited movement range at the moment, and I foresee him getting some overhauls throughout the beta.

From what has been described to me, he moves very slowly and I like those kind of characters because positioning becomes important. When new players used his ultimate, apparently they ended up dying charging up the headshots rather than killing three people like in the trailers. I agree the flashbangs are weird for his character but I think that's just there to give him some compensation for moving slowly and not being a tank. I won't be surprised if Blizzard swaps the flashbangs for a more cowboy-themed crowd control ability. His abilities are relatively simple but his low mobility and difficult to use ultimate makes him look easy to learn, hard to master.

He comes off as a very burst damage character from what I've seen. The revolver looks like it does some hefty damage, and fanning the hammer seems to give him the ability to basically tear people apart at close range. The dodge roll mechanic is interesting, and something I think Blizzard will tweak if he ends up needing more mobility, the fact that he can empty his gun, dodge roll to reload, and then empty it again seems to make him look like a slower more offensive version of Tracer.

No idea what to make of the flashbang, it just seems like an odd ability, they might tweak it or change it entirely, but the concept as it is right now seems to be to give him a way to pin faster characters down for a second so he can fan the hammer and unload his entire cylinder into them.

Overall, a very straightforward character with abilities that largely center around getting to use using his hand cannon to down enemies and using dodge roll and flashbang to chain close range kills, he will probably work best in very close range.

 

[Zhukov]

McCree himself honestly looks like he is pretty straightforward at this point, his ultimate could very well end up being OP as hell depending on how it's implemented...

I've seen it used in gameplay footage. If anything, it's underpowered.

He moves slowly while charging it and there are both audio and visual cues visible to enemies when it's activated.

It's basically a 'Please Shoot Me' button. Or, more accurately, "Please Shoot Me While I'm Relatively Immobile While Also Making Myself an Obvious Threat and Therefore Priority Target".

It could work wonder if combined with one of the shielding abilities (the gorrilla's shield, the monk's heal, maybe the paladin guy's shield if you can shoot through that), but without that degree of cooperation it's going to get the user killed more than anything else.

 

[ninja51]

They should have made his belt say DVNO. They're the seriously badass four capital letters... I mean if you're "really" set on four capital letters to remind someone how "cool" you are.

 

[inmunitas]

-Snip-

Hey could you answer my questions? You seem to have missed it so just giving you another notification here.

Here's the posts to save you the time of going back and requoting it:

You're putting in a Southerner and claiming they represent all of Britain, that is discrimination.

Could you point me to where I claimed that?

And then could you explain how it's discrimination rather than just saying it is?

Your failure to recognise the United Kingdom as just that, a union of kingdoms, cockney is just England (and south England at that) what about the other countries? We see it all the time in the media.

#1: "Oh I've visited to the UK"
#2: "Oh I? Whereabouts did you go?"
#1: "London"

At least Valve did Scotland in TF2, makes a change.