The Game Director reveals some secrets of Overwatch’s offensive heroes. Genji used to have Stealth and McCree comes from Half-Life.
During the development of Overwatch, there were many anecdotes and discarded concepts that never made it into the final game. Game Director Jeff Kaplan revealed 7 secrets about the various offensive heroes of the game in an interview with colleagues from IGN.
Genji and Hanzo were originally planned as a single character (who looked like Genji). He had both a bow and his shurikens and the katana. Additionally, he had an ability that allowed him to turn invisible to ambush his enemies. That was simply too much for one character and felt terrible as a whole – which is why they split him up.
McCree is heavily inspired by Half-Life 1 and 2. There was also a revolver there, and the developers loved the feel of the weapon so much that they wanted a character in Overwatch who uses this gun. Even the animations look similar!
Pharah started her development as “Rocket Dude” and, after deciding to make her a woman, she became “Rocket Queen.” Internally, the developers still call her that and then start singing the song by the band “Guns ‘N’ Roses.”
By the way: In one of the early concept drawings, Pharah is still seen in yellow armor with a red helmet – so that will not be a future character either.
The concept of Reaper originates from the canceled game “Titan.” At that time, he had different abilities and could – like Sombra today – see enemies through walls when they had low health points. You should always feel that Reaper is coming for you when your health points are low.
Soldier: 76 is a character almost entirely conceived by Chris Metzen. He was originally a comic hero but fit “like a glove” for the role they were looking for. So Chris Metzen simply handed over the character to Overwatch. The comic, by the way, is from the 90s – so it has been around for a while.
The development of Sombra took particularly long. Her cloaking was initially a passive ability that became active as soon as Sombra left combat. The developers experimented for a long time until they figured out the right timing – ultimately, it was almost spontaneous, which they then discarded.
Also, Tracer originated as a basic concept from Titan. There was supposed to be a class called “Jumper” that could teleport up to 30 meters on the battlefield. “That’s totally overpowered and doesn’t fit in any game!” said the other developers – today she works very well in Overwatch.
Jeff Kaplan has already revealed more secrets in these posts:
