Because his parodies of Overwatch are so popular, a video troll was able to visit Blizzard and meet the developer he has mocked.
Anyone who regularly visits the public forums of Overwatch or the associated subreddit has surely heard of a certain YouTuber: Dinoflask. The community owes him some great memes, such as “Wrestle with Jeff, prepare for death”. The reason for this is his parody videos, in which everything revolves around the Overwatch head Jeff Kaplan.
Jeff Kaplan regularly publishes so-called “Developer Updates,” in which he talks about current topics of Overwatch and explains what the team is currently working on or what the developers are looking forward to.
Dinoflask takes these videos and re-edits them, making it seem as if Jeff Kaplan is saying new things. Instead of being a friendly, caring developer who listens to the community’s concerns, he turns into a self-satisfied cynic who revels in the tears of the players.
All changes to the game under “Dinoflask-Kaplan” are only made so that players are frustrated and want to alleviate their frustration by purchasing loot boxes. Sometimes it even goes below the belt, but humor is always the focus.
Kaplan thinks the videos are great and even said that he “can say in Dinoflask’s videos what he wouldn’t dare otherwise” – of course not entirely serious.
Dinoflask received a special honor. When Kaplan celebrated his 15th anniversary at Blizzard earlier this year, Dinoflask was invited. At a developers’ meeting, one of his videos was presented before he had to face the developers himself. “That was pretty embarrassing,” he confessed in an interview with Kotaku.
40,000 Words, Neatly Listed
Dinoflask started analyzing early to work as efficiently as possible while creating his scripts.
He has a document in which he has listed the nearly 40,000 words that Kaplan has spoken in all videos. Each word is linked to the corresponding passage in the videos, allowing Dinoflask to piece everything together quickly. However, it still often takes a whole week – or a weekend when he dedicates himself to nothing else – to finish a small clip of 3-5 minutes.
Especially funny: Because Dinoflask still needed a sound file of Kaplan where he clearly said “Torbjörn,” Kaplan did exactly that and simply added the word “Torbjörn” to a regular “Developer Update” video.
What do you think of Dinoflask’s videos? Is this exactly your sense of humor and fits perfectly with the Overwatch community? Or is it all just too silly?
