So, When Does Drusera Show Up?

In addition to the announcement that Her Universe will be designing clothing for Overwatch in additionto WoW, Blizz introduced another Overwatch character, Ashe.

The animated short, Reunion, I found fascinating because while there's a lot of Blizz in the short, there's also quite a bit of Wildstar. I was not expecting to get that Wildstar vibe as much as I did, but the short was a Western / SF mashup, so maybe that's it.

Regardless, here's the short:

A Thursday Quickie

I was going to write something else, but I came across this Team Fortress 2 vs. Overwatch video posted by The Winglet: 

Well done!

In Other News...

...I'm likely the last person in the gamer universe to notice the cleverly-integrated-into-the-comic reveal that the face of Overwatch, Tracer, is gay.*

From Blizzard. And Polygon.

Here's the Polygon post on the subject.

I personally think it's a great idea, not strictly from a representation PoV, but also from a story angle. Having perused the comic itself, it just simply fits with the story. And Tracer herself, really. Not so much as a surprise (in my mind) as a feeling that everything clicks.

Which is as it should be.





*Or at the very least, bi.

Oh look, another seasonal event!

I'm having flashbacks.

I just saw the YouTube clip for Overwatch's Winter Wonderland event, and I felt pulled in a couple of different directions.

It was a fun little clip, down to the Widowmaker part, but it felt like a mashup of Wildstar and WoW, wrapped up in a little bow provided by Blizzard.

The WoW part, not a surprise. After all, it is a fellow property of Blizzard's. But Wildstar? Well, it was just cartoonish and goofy enough to fit in the Wildstar universe, even though it's a completely different game. And Wildstar, like WoW, doesn't take itself entirely seriously. Finally, while Wildstar's graphics are rougher and far more Western influenced than Overwatch's, it does have a similar feel to the color and art design.

Or perhaps it's just me, having imbibed a bit tonight.

No Graphic Novel for You

The new graphics card is functional, and I'm going to have a post on that shortly. However, I wanted to pass along this little tidbit to Overwatch fans. Apparently the graphic novel set in the Overwatch universe has been scrapped.

From kotaku.com.au. For some reason I couldn't find this article
on the main kotaku.com site. Go figure. And no, I don't know who
this is; it's just the main pic on the article, and the "mobile exoskeleton"
armor looks suspiciously like a Star Trek Next Gen suit
in terms of its... swimsuit look.

This is actually quite an interesting development for Blizzard, as they've been moving heavily into other tie-in sources for a long time now. I'm sure that Blizz hasn't given up on creating a graphic novel for Overwatch, so we'll see how things work out.

Did Somebody Call for a Hammer?

In case you lived under a rock the past week --or didn't know anything about Activision Blizzard-- you'd know that Overwatch was released into the wild.

And now they've begun throwing the ban hammer around.

According to The Daily Dot, Blizzard has banned roughly 1500 accounts out of China as part of their attempt to stay ahead in the cheating arms race.

While others are applauding the swift action to keep people from cheating on the game, I'm skeptical whether they can keep up the pace with cheaters without devoting a lot of resources to constantly monitoring the situation.

Judging by my experiences with a certain MMO from Blizzard, I'm not exactly sure that they'll be able to keep up over the long haul. I'm sure I'm not the only one, but I'd frequently report toons with racist/sexist names or people who behaved badly in the game. But as time went on, I began to realize that the reporting did little good: when a person with a overtly racist toon name is L76 and playing in a battleground, that means that either nobody reported them or that the admins didn't bother dealing with the issue. And with people who leveled in the days before the instant L90 (or whatever it is now), they couldn't avoid people even if they tried.* And for that person to be playing in BGs....

I am glad that Blizz is starting off strong, but they now have to commit to follow through for the long run. And judging by at least one of their other properties, I'm not so sure that commitment will be there.






*And if anyone knows about that, it's me. I'd play at odd hours, serverwise, and even if you leveled simply by node farming or killing monsters out in the field you will still run into other people from time to time.

No, this isn't Frampton Comes Alive

Blizzard released another short film for Overwatch, and this one hits you right in the feels.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

And before anyone asks, no, I can't play shooters. But I wish this was a third person angle game.

I Guess Blizzard Wasn't Channeling Sir Mix-a-lot After All

Today's graphical correction has been brought to you by Overwatch.

Seems that Tracer, the Brit with the cockney accent who can teleport around the battlefield, has a very, um, un-Tracerlike victory pose:

From The Mary Sue.

Maybe Tracer would pose like that --in private-- but this pretty much goes against everything we have, both in-game and out-of-game, about Tracer so far.

Some fans voiced their concerns about Tracer's pose, and the Blizzard devs agreed and removed the pose from the game.

Amazingly enough, the commentary has remained (relatively) civil on the Blizzard Beta sites, although I can imagine that it won't last.


EtA: Well, that escalated quickly.

Sigh...

I was watching this trailer again the other day, and I kept thinking that this would be an awesome game to play. But why did it have to be a First Person Shooter? As much as I try, I can only play an FPS game for about five minutes before the headaches start.

We'll call it Overwa-- What do you mean that's taken?

Apparently Blizz might have to change the name of Overwatch to something else.

Innovis Labs submitted a US Patent and Trademark request for the name Overwatch 2 months prior to Blizzard submitting the same request, and you can probably guess the rest.

Here's a short blurb from The Escapist on this little mixup.