Overwatch new heroes: Ana Amari revealed, Blizzard's hints point towards Sombra, Athena and Liao next
Update 12 Jul, 2016: Ana Amari, Pharah's mother, has arrived. Scroll down for her trailer, and who might be coming next to Blizzard's shooter.
Overwatch was never going to stay the way it is now for long. 21 - now 22 - heroes won’t keep everyone occupied, and Blizzard have always been upfront that it would grow - and for free too. With Overwatch’s lore told the way it is, through vague hints and out-of-game stories, teases come easy and often from the big blue. Be it a dossier buried in some notes on a map, a name slipped into a blog post or a long-known character finally being added as playable, there are always hints as to who’s next - and we’ve gathered them all here.
For what’s already available, have a check of the best Overwatch characters.
First, a note on release timing. Blizzard have said that characters will be released one at a time, despite having done so in a batch of three during beta with D.Va, Genji and Mei. This began with Ana Amari and looks to continue. It’s an odd choice, as adding three characters at once stops every team having 4-6 of the same hero on launch day, though game director Jeff Kaplan points out that this allows them to target balancing more effectively.
Now, onto the new Overwatch heroes. Remember that some of this is guesswork, rumour-milling and hint-mongering at the best of times, so not all of these will resolve into new heroes, if at all - where things are unlikely, we’ll let you know.
Overwatch Ana Amari Trailer
A video has been released that shows Overwatch's first new hero and Pharah's mother, Ana Amari, laying the smackdown on all your favourite heroes from a distance. She can even hold her own against the vocal cue "it's high noon". Check out our post revealing Ana Amari, or see her trailer here:
Overwatch New Hero Release Schedule
During the International Comic Con on July 21, Blizzard developers James Waugh (director of story & creative development), Michael Chu (senior designer, Overwatch), and Arnold Tsang (assistant art director, Overwatch) are presenting a behind-the-scenes look at the creative process of developing the art, design, and story for Overwatch's newest hero. That's Ana Amari. Beyond that, we may see something else new at Gamescom, and Blizzard will certainly have news by the time we get to Blizzcon.
Sombra - Unknown
The codename "Sombra" has popped up with increasing regularity as the game progressed through beta and towards release. A newspaper article that reads “Quien es Sombra?” - ‘who is Shadow’ in Spanish - is found on Dorado. Pictures of her were found scattered on that map and others, though were easily confused with ones of a hooded, cybernetic-looking figure that turned out to be Ana Amari in her Shrike outfit.
Also on Dorado, there's a terminal that reads "Protocolo Sombra" - Protocol Shadow. On this map she's even mentioned in one of Reaper’s voice lines, who says “Where is Sombra when you need her?”, suggesting she’s a part of villain organisation Talon. In our interview with Michael Chu, we covered both the game’s current lack of bad guys and Sombra herself, though he didn’t have anything to reveal on that front. Eurogamer got similar from Jeff Kaplan.
In Ana Amari's reveal trailer, some mysterious numbers are visible for a single frame. Translated, they produce an equally odd message in Spanish, saying that "she who has the information, has the power." This is likely referencing Sombra, based just on the language if not the tone.
As for her origin story, there were two major theories, and this is where it gets complicated. At first many thought she was Ana Amari, until that became obviously untrue when Pharah's mother was revealed.
However, there was no definitive link between Sombra and Ana Amari. In fact, two heroes were being teased, rather than one. In fact, the clearest picture we have of Sombra, from the newspaper, doesn't look anything like the pictures we've seen of Amari, or her sniper rifle.
The theory now goes that Sombra is one of two characters from the Hero cinematic Blizzard released slightly before launch. Either the unseen mother of the teenage girl Soldier: 76 saves, or the girl herself. This is based on how Hero didn't push the story forward or introduce new elements as its partners did, and thus must have had some hidden meaning. It also changes the context of Reaper's line from one asking for support to one mocking Soldier: 76 - who must be present for him to say it - as to where his 'Shadow' is.
Like most theories, it also has its holes. It doesn't explain the Sombra Protocol message, or some of her other, odder appearences. She is likely to be our next hero though.
Athena - Support AI
Athena isn’t actually a new character, she’s been in the game since the very first days of the beta. Taking the same role as the Administrator in Team Fortress 2, Athena is Overwatch’s announcer - letting you know when you’re about to get into battle, win, lose or kill entire teams.
In the lore she’s the AI that helps to run Overwatch as an organisation, assisting specifically Winston in the creation of his scientific marvels and in restarting Overwatch in the Recall cinematic. She almost gets hacked by Reaper, but manages to reboot before he can finish.
The reason people believe she’ll become a character is twofold. First, already being a massive part of the game’s backstory and fitting into a support role. She’d be a very natural addition to the cast and one that people want - effort and passion Blizzard won’t want to waste.
The second reason comes down to more concrete evidence. A monitor is present on the Watchpoint: Gibraltar map that previously displayed a message to Winston, but was later changed to be her logo, seen above. The idea is that she has now moved out of the mainframe and into a real body.
It’s also been theorised that the various full cast shots released for the game over the years, before the first roster of 21 heroes was locked in, already showed her off. A cyclops omnic was in one shot, in the foreground just enough that it would suggest Blizzard were confident they would make it in. It also featured a very similar logo on its forehead to the Athena one seen in-game.
We asked Blizzard directly about Athena during an interview, but they had nothing to say about where she was going - yet, anyway.
Liao And Another - Unknown, one possibly a tank
The most recently hinted at hero and the one with the least amount of info out there, Liao was a founding member of Overwatch along with Soldier: 76, Ana Amari and Reaper, among others. We have nothing but a name, sourced from an in-universe post about the organisation itself, and nothing beyond that is even hinted at. In Ana's lore trailer, we did see this image of the full old Overwatch crew:
It's possible that Liao could be either of the unrecognised characters on the outer edges. Based on the Asian-sounding name, I'd go for the fella myself, leaving the armoured woman as another new character. Given she looks like a complete and total badass, I'd bet on her being the tank, something hinted at by the numbers of each class in-game, plus some comments from Blizzard. Assuming Athena, or someone like her, ends up in the additional support role that's also needed, that leaves a tank to even things up.
To loop it all back around, it's also possible that the unrecognised woman is Sombra, considering her placement in the same trailer as the hexadecimal hints plus Soldier: 76 and Reaper's knowledge of her. An ouroboros of hints, here, to be untangled as the year goes on.
That’s everyone Blizzard seem to have under the hood for now - more details on them, as well as the squads of heroes coming afterwards, in the near future.
DOOM. FIST.
I WAS ABOUT TO SAY THE SAME
PLZ BLIZZARD
The Dorado map is Mexico.
taking a close look at the scope in the blueprint, it does seem to have sharp corners on it's lower half of the front face you look into. Has potential to be the same scope as the one being worked on at the desk (comparison image: http://puu.sh/pSzTp/b4caa94a10.jpg )
I think Liao is most likely the guy on the left of Ana's old photo(last image of the post). It seems like they are in an order, with all of the original members on the left side(plus Pharah) with "newer" members on the right, such as McCree and Mercy. Also, he's appeared 3 times in the overwatch cinematic shorts. Once in the big group image, again in the flashing characters on Winston's "Recall" short, and a third time in Ana's flashbacks.