lore-discussion

[dry pebble]

I was just viewing as a design thing

[wise grotto]

Pretty sure she’s not meant to have different colour csuse she also isn’t the one who made anything she uses
It’s just tech repurposed for herself by others since she’s not an architect

[digital linden]

i’m surprised we heard nothing about the arcology map in the spotlight

[civic lynx]

I think Aaron confirmed afterwards it’s “still coming” but I’d assume not this year anymore

[digital linden]

aw

[dry pebble]

Makes sense

I wish her biolight, was more greenish esque than blue to portray she be using what handled to her instead of creating it like Symmetra

Sym's biolight being perfectly blueish while hers being more greenish cause she isn't up to engineer it

[dense garnet]

I meannnn

If Genji's dragon and Mizuki's ult is hardlight as well

[dry pebble]

But her character design arleady presents the color yellow to contrast Life's pink and sym's blue so

[dense garnet]

Also pretty sure it's blue just because enemy barriers are red

[dry pebble]

Also lowkey would be wrong wording cause i definetly would love this

Multiple armed like an indian goddess

🔥

[dense garnet]

Like Doc Ock

[dry pebble]

Doc ock has tentacles tho

But i get what you mean

[dense garnet]

True, we need a tentacle hero

Jetpack Squid

[dry pebble]

If Emre's gameplay was more depthly created it could have used tentacles i guess

[dense garnet]

Tentacles are pretty eldritch

[dry pebble]

The Eye thing on torso arleady looks like an alien parasite evoparating it

[civic lynx]

That’s what I expected tbh

[dry pebble]

I expected her to look alot older.

[civic lynx]

I thought it would’ve been more extra arms or the butterfly wings that allowed her some form of flight

[digital linden]

forever mourning that old moira concept design

[civic lynx]

Instead of only being for the push attack pretty much

[dry pebble]

I honestly had zero expectations for her to become a hero but i have zero complains

[dry pebble]

I wish her bionic arms were able to shoot instead of her equipping guns it because i really don't find her wielding one fitting with her personality

[civic lynx]

Yeah I agree

[dry pebble]

Bossy, richie rich brat girl wielding a gun

[digital linden]

agree

[civic lynx]

Even the gun’s design doesn’t really fit

[digital linden]

i like her gun design but all the power being from the bionic arms would’ve been cooler

[dry pebble]

Clearly

[civic lynx]

It looks incredibly different to what I expected from another Vishkar gun

[dry pebble]

Also i can't be the only one who thinks arms gives the silhouette bodyguards standing behind her

Absolutely adoring that

[digital linden]

yes i thought that

i think that’s definitely intentional

[dry pebble]

She build for Mafia skin

[civic lynx]

I’ve only seen it as butterfly wings and I thought it was to signify vishkar’s (outwardly presenting at least) elegance

I can definitely see it as the bodyguards silhouette tho

[mossy vale]

We do NOT.. 1. Because they’d be really hard to animate a such and 2. I don’t trust the community with.. tentacles..

[digital linden]

do we know how old she is? i’d assume early 30s

[dry pebble]

She looks way younger

[digital linden]

overwatch aren’t good at showing age in their characters

so we’ll see when the birthdays drop

[dry pebble]

Its been only such problem with the New released characters

They werent afraid of giving face cliches to their heroes

Emre is definetly suffering from that

[civic lynx]

Watch them try to say Domina is like late 30’s or 40’s

[dense garnet]

They said they tried that but it looked weird in first person

Personally I want a melee tank

Maybe that mech hero will be one

[digital linden]

yh that’s my main concern he looks rather young

[dense garnet]

Concept art in that spotlight in the background had them with a sword and shield

[digital linden]

i think he’s a couple years older than freja

[dry pebble]

One last thing i want to mention about Domina

[digital linden]

i rlly cant see him being 50+

[dry pebble]

Sorry but her ulti VFX is ugly as fuck

[dense garnet]

Young? Bro looked kinda middle aged to me

[dry pebble]

Might be worst looking ult design i have ever seen from OW

[civic lynx]

Most likely tbh

Probably meant to be an alternative to rein since they can’t work out how to make him good

[digital linden]

he definitely doesn’t look wuyang young but he doesn’t look old like a golden age overwatch member

he’s probably slightly older than cassidy

[dense garnet]

Rein just has to not be slower when holding his shield ngl

[dry pebble]

There's so much i don't like about Emre's design, and much i love about

[civic lynx]

I think emre looks a bit… safe

[dense garnet]

Pretty much every other tank doesn't have to sacrifice mobilty for their barrier

[civic lynx]

Both in lore appearances and in game

He just looks a bit boring

[dry pebble]

His face is also got pointy for a reason compared to his square shaped face structure??

It became sharpier

[digital linden]

yeah

[dense garnet]

Emre's my most excited for addition lol

[digital linden]

i wish they kept his distinct mohawk

[dense garnet]

Idrc for Anran or Mizuki rn

[dry pebble]

Why they try so hard to difference it from Hazard

[dry pebble]

I never understand amount of hate that hair have gotten

[civic lynx]

Mizuki looks so boring

[dense garnet]

He sounds boring too

Like a male Kiri

[dry pebble]

It is definetly looks way better than that

[digital linden]

mizuki is the one im least interested by

[dry pebble]

Mizuki is so fanmade design

[dense garnet]

I think I just don't have a type for the overconfident sassy types

[dry pebble]

It doesn't feel like a OW character

[civic lynx]

Fr even his lore description at spotlight is like

This person is morally grey but they’ll become good later

Golly Jee how original

[dry pebble]

Mizuki feels like a tryhard character to push into update in order the sell the heroes as one per team.

[digital linden]

they finally release a talon affiliated support and don’t make it that talon related and imply he’s going to be switching sides😭

can we just have coherent evil supports

it’s why i love moira

[dense garnet]

Stop redeeming people I want PURE EVIL characters

[civic lynx]

I assume S3’s hashimoto hero is full evil

[dense garnet]

Yes I'm looking at you Widow

[civic lynx]

If they’re a high ranking hashimoto and LOYAL they can’t really be redeemed

[dry pebble]

I also find Freja personally looking so weird in design

She looks way more weird standing beside Emre

[dense garnet]

Pretty sure you're getting Mizuki rewards for Overwatch's side in the faction event

[civic lynx]

They look they’re from 2 different games

[dry pebble]

So True

[digital linden]

mizuki was made for the sole purpose of a blue eye samurai collab /j

[civic lynx]

Yeah he’s on OW’s stuff

But I assume he won’t in lore switch factions til S3

So it’s just a bit of a mess

[dry pebble]

When am i gonna have image permission i want to send the Emre edit i have seen on X

[digital linden]

when i’m in a boring overwatch character contest and my opponents are kiriko and mizuki

[civic lynx]

Kiri ain’t even boring she’s just annoying

[dense garnet]

Emre's april fool's ult line better be "enemy ac-130 above"

[dry pebble]

I wouldnt put Kiriko in the same rove as mizuki

[digital linden]

been wanting image permissions here for so long😭

[dry pebble]

Like, Mizuki is way worse

[civic lynx]

Mizuki has about as much personality as a dead goldfish

[dry pebble]

Mizuki, doesn't even looks like would be a NPC design

His appearance is shuffled all over

[dense garnet]

I reserve judgement on Mizuki's character for now cuz idk anything about him

[civic lynx]

If you stripped OW’s cartoon style he could fit easily in mortal kombat

[digital linden]

kiri’s personality just really bores me personally though i am glad her new interactions let her cinematic self shine thru

[civic lynx]

He doesn’t look built for this universe

[dry pebble]

I don't think there's much to learn about him either

[dry pebble]

Even Mortal Kombat has characters that look actually like one

Mizuki feels soulless

[dry pebble]

He looks like his outfit made of Nerf mercs BTW

Like look at his clothings there are brand names all over it like Nerf guns

Coloring is also like that

[civic lynx]

It also confuses me how his first legendary is not lore related at all

Mf just wearin bullshit

[dense garnet]

I feel like all 5 heroes will get their hero trailers or somesuch soon, so we'll see what they're all about

[dry pebble]

Also this is not a complaining, but i will never not see Jetpack Cat's cylinder shaped Jets in pack not looking like Cat cups that contains food and water

[digital linden]

LMFAOAO

[civic lynx]

I swear to god if that outfit is what he wears to infiltrate the yokai I will freak the fuck out

[dry pebble]

Fuck i actually would do that if i had skill for drawing

It would be sweet

[digital linden]

he looks a mess

[dense garnet]

That's probably what it is, let's be honest

Streetwear getup

[civic lynx]

Wrap it up

[dry pebble]

He looks more like he advertising the clothes that meant to be for streets rather than coming from it

[mossy vale]

Did you guys see the battle pass skins?

[civic lynx]

They got Domina and Anran wearing non canon costumes but they look good

Then there’s Mizuki in… that

[mossy vale]

I wanna talk about the lore implications for it

[dry pebble]

Mizuki is ASS

[dry pebble]

Yeah Emre's isn't that good

They doesn't try to do anything with the Eye on torso

[civic lynx]

Vendetta needs to sort her priorities out

[mossy vale]

Vendettas is pretty awful… I like mauga tho

[dry pebble]

Mauga is best skin imo

[civic lynx]

Why is one of the first things she does redesigning the talon uniform

[dry pebble]

His armor both looks skeletal and armor like

[mossy vale]

But I noticed on the other heroes for talon, there are wolf designs which show vendettas influence

[mossy vale]

Yeah legit the only good skin in the battle pass is mauga

[dense garnet]

One of the devs said Moira's new Talon skin is her favorite

[dry pebble]

I honestly never gonna view her as the New leader of Talon

She is too clean

[mossy vale]

Ehhh moiras is okay

[civic lynx]

Thing is she probably won’t even be leader for long

[dry pebble]

Give her scars for fuck sake

[civic lynx]

Talon will either fall apart and be removed

[digital linden]

I LOVE MOIRAS

[civic lynx]

Or doom will become leader again

[dry pebble]

Doom shall kick her ass

[civic lynx]

She won’t be a multi year threat like doom was

[mossy vale]

I keep saying that her pride will be her downfall

[dense garnet]

I think that Vendetta will keep Talon. Doomfist will just make a new faction

[digital linden]

do we think doom’s gonna retake it or someone else will step in

[civic lynx]

I think doom will kill or force vendetta out

Then let someone else take over that he approves of

[dense garnet]

It'd feel weird imo if the daughter of Talon's leader lost her control of Talon twice lmao

[dry pebble]

What that gets me so much is that Her and Max is just literally pull out a coin that contains all of the Talon agents informations that gives the feeling of there will be some time pass until Vendetta manage to took down Doom with others only to just beat him in 1v1

[mossy vale]

It would be mad funny

[dry pebble]

Like in this case the coin were just useless

[mossy vale]

True unless the coin was for something else?

[civic lynx]

I assumed the coin would’ve had blackmail on the members so she could force them into cooperation with her leadership

But clearly not since 3 of them up and left

[dense garnet]

I think Vendetta is going to remain as Talon's leader for a long time if not indefinitely. There'll just be moving Doomfist and his polycule over to a new faction

[dry pebble]

I don't think so since it was for kept agents oriented but majority of them arleady left

[digital linden]

widow leaving means she won’t get further drugs or treatment from moira right

[dry pebble]

Blackwatch 2

[mossy vale]

I wonder what they’re gonna do with Reaper because vendetta slimed doom out for something he did and like, I dunno I miss reaper and widow

[civic lynx]

I think widow and reaper would end up in the same faction again later down the line

[mossy vale]

For something reaper did *

[civic lynx]

And sombra will go wherever benefits her the most (after helping sigma)

[digital linden]

reaper and widow are a good duo, and i think sombra and emre are going to have an arc of their own due to the conspiracy

[dense garnet]

I'm just gonna say it

If Sombra wanted to free Sigma, she would've done it when she left

[civic lynx]

I think she will be back for sigma later

[dense garnet]

If anything that would've been the best time to get Sigma out

[civic lynx]

She knows getting him free from moira wouldn’t be easy

And if I had to guess she’s gonna wait until talon is distracted with OW or fighting amongst themselves to take him out

[digital linden]

and he’s one of their most powerful weapons

[dense garnet]

I just don't think that's gonna happen forba long time tbh

[wooden drift]

How...? I don't think it's that easy when he definitely under surveillance 24/7

[dense garnet]

"Alright I broke out of Talon. Now I'm gonna break back in for sigma"

[digital linden]

do we think any of the talon council will take part in the overwatch gibraltar attack? or would it just be common soldiers

[civic lynx]

Sombra is literally a hacker she can easily shut off talon’s security

[dense garnet]

We already know that they don't, because we see it happen in the comic

[digital linden]

ah

[wooden drift]

She already did it the comic without any of the agents

[civic lynx]

Vendetta’s busy trying to damn near play cities skylines managing all the different plans and places she wants to control or get things from

[digital linden]

i blindsided that mb

[mossy vale]

I feel like the only talon members that will stay are Moira and mauga, since Moira just wants funding and mauga just wants to shoot people . Like they have goals that are benefitted by staying with talon. Reaper, widow, sombra, emre probably have other goals?

[dense garnet]

Max will 100% stay

[mossy vale]

True max as well

[digital linden]

also talon being more public is a dangerous game

[dense garnet]

And Sanjay most likely

[mossy vale]

I was thinking of heroes that are members ^^

But yes max and Sanjay will most likely stay

[digital linden]

i’m still waiting to see what’s going on with that venture / mauga / sombra comic in illios

[dense garnet]

Moira, Mauga, Domina, maybe Emre, and Freja if he also stays

That's why I think most if not all of the rest of the 5 heroes this year will be Talon-affiliated

[mossy vale]

I thought they said domina wasn’t a member of talon? Or she’s not directly affiliated

[civic lynx]

She’s not officially a member but she works alongside talon I think

[mossy vale]

Ah yeah

[dense garnet]

Domina is allied with them. I think giving Talon her shielding tech is enough of an indicator

[civic lynx]

She’s getting near impenetrable armour for talon gladiators

[dense garnet]

Ashe too but less so

Next hero in season 2 is like 110% a Deadlock member

[edgy tree]

You think shutting off the security won't cause suspicion?

[civic lynx]

And in the spotlight they say vishkar (including Domina) will benefit from those tragically affected by vendetta’s new war

[dense garnet]

Season 2 and 3 are gonna be villain heroes. Idk what side D.MON will be in season 4, assuming that's D.MON

[civic lynx]

It will but she’s an expert at getting in and out of somewhere quickly and would probably have a plan that’s impossible to have fail

[edgy tree]

She'll most likely do it when the group leaves for the Helix base to avoid having even a slight chance to engage with them

[civic lynx]

I think S2 is helix which… idk if they’re good or evil

[edgy tree]

especially Mauga

[civic lynx]

S3 is hashimoto so obviously evil

[dense garnet]

Season 2 is most likely Frankie

[edgy tree]

They're mercs for hire

hard to say they're good

[dense garnet]

Pharah was Helix but primarily good

[edgy tree]

that's just pharah

[dense garnet]

Yes, I'm just saying in a morally gray faction, there can be good people

[edgy tree]

People working in it can be good

the faction itself doesn't

[dense garnet]

Also if Helix was so morally gray, Vendetta would've bought them out

[mossy vale]

Where can I find all the side characters / non playable characters from overwatch?

Because idk who Frankie is

[edgy tree]

They're paid to protect the interests of the government not its people

They disregard collateral damage

[dense garnet]

Frankie is a founding member of the Deadlocks alongside Cassidy and Ashe. She's the hacker of the Deadlocks and uses flying drones for surveillance and recon. And her hair is tied up in a lavender braid. Just like the season 2 hero silhouette

She appears in an Ashe novel so we don't have a physical image of Frankie, but they give us her physical description

Also, in one of the Stadium maps, you can see Frankie's signature on a wall graffiti'd

[digital linden]

if that silhouette is her, her braids look a lot like jinx

[mossy vale]

Ahhh

[digital linden]

wonder how her drone will be in game

[dense garnet]

I envision it'll be like her using an ability to control the drone kinda like Jetpack Cat's flight

If you've played Rainbow Six, it can be like Echo in that game

[digital linden]

i’ll have to look into that

[edgy tree]

so like the garlic drones in garden warfare

[digital linden]

if it’s a pilotable thing that’d be cool

i’d like her to be a utility focus dps

that archetype doesn’t get much love

so the drones point to that

[dense garnet]

Yeah, you might be able to set up the drone in a location and keep it there, and while you're in a firefight, you can slip away and activate the drone that's hiding behind the enemy to surprise them

[edgy tree]

would be cool to have a high risk support with a controllable drone that leaves them open to dives

[dense garnet]

They confirmed next hero is a dps

Which is the drone hero

[edgy tree]

oh it's a dps

[digital linden]

yh which is why i’m hoping for a utility focus

excited for what they do with all the upcoming heroes

[edgy tree]

would be cool if they also had 2 ults like Anran

[dense garnet]

Can't wait for the Omnic Noir

[edgy tree]

one with the hero itself and one with the drone

[dense garnet]

Also Frankie will be a proper black rep, she's described as dark skinned

People been asking for that

[digital linden]

same - and the one who looks like they have a robotic ponytail, preferably an omnic too

it looks quite similar to the stalker unit from null sector

hair wise (if it is hair)

[dense garnet]

Please be a Phreak or smth

[civic lynx]

Personally that’s what I hope it is

They just redesigned it a bit to fit being an actual character

[digital linden]

yeah

i loved that npc design in the missions definitely the most unique and potential for a hero

[dense garnet]

Emre lore is just

"FINLAND"

[dry pebble]

There were people asked me how i would have expected Emre to be done to contrast brainwashed thing to its design better

I would actually like it if he looked like a borg from star trek actually

[dense garnet]

Should've looked like Adam Smasher

[mossy vale]

But overwatch has a lot of black characters?

Or you mean one from the US?

[dense garnet]

Yeah, it just seems to be a common complaint that we don't have enough

[mossy vale]

Ohh

[dense garnet]

Or at least not enough from actually Africa ig

There's Doom and Orisa ig

There's a lot of countries that aren't repesented that should be

Like Spain and Turkey

[mossy vale]

Yeah I was just about to say there’s doom and orisa from Africa, but if Frankie is a deadlock affiliate then she would be American no?

[dense garnet]

Yeah she'd be african-american

[mossy vale]

I thought emre was Turkish

[mossy vale]

Ya that’s what I meant

[dense garnet]

You're right, Emre is Turkish

I remember looking at a list of non-included reps and Turkey was there

[mossy vale]

Ohhh

[dense garnet]

But yeah people are happy with Soj and Pharah and such

People want more of them

And less Japan lol

[mossy vale]

Fair

Yeah that’s absolutely fair lol, they’ve catered to east Asia a lot. Wasn’t that because they finally unbanned ow in China? So they released Juno and Wuyang?

[dense garnet]

Well we got a west asia rep with Domina again

[mossy vale]

True

[dense garnet]

People still complain that India keeps getting the same city for India too

[mossy vale]

I was trying to guess what accent domina has

[dense garnet]

India has a lot of languages and Sym and Domina speak the same one

So people want more languages repped too

[mossy vale]

Domina sounded almost British ? If that makes sense

[dense garnet]

I can see it kinda?

[mossy vale]

I gotta listen to her more tho for sure

[dense garnet]

Pretty sure her VA is actually Indian

[mossy vale]

Yeah I think I saw that too

[dense garnet]

Funny that Emre's VA had them change the ult line

Because apparently in Turkish, "search and destroy" sounds like "fuck and destroy"

Even though Emre is speaking Finnish

Also fun fact Emre's VA has voiced Batman and Joker before

In fan animations

[mossy vale]

Wouldn’t emre speak Turkish if he’s from Turkey? Why would he speak Finnish if he’s not from Finland?

Or am I dumb

[dense garnet]

Chernobog is Finnish

[brittle sky]

Her actress is British. In this case though, I imagine it's more to represent how high class Indian schools teach British English to their students. Because you know.

[dense garnet]

Chernobog possesses Emre for his ult

[mossy vale]

O whoops

[alpine terrace]

who is frankie? is that one of the 10 supposed new characters? i have only seen the 5 that will release tmrw

[dense garnet]

Frankie might be the season 2 hero

[alpine terrace]

ooh ok.. i have been looking forward to a new character who is black for a while now so that is nice to know

[dense garnet]

^ for Frankie

[alpine terrace]

thnx

[brittle sky]

Now, her physical description and the silhouette don't match, and the milspec high tech of the silhouette doesn't fit the deadlock aesthetic, and the powder keg map hypes up a new helix security boss a lot in an email...

But yeah, frankie is possible.

[dense garnet]

It's not like 100% confirmed but

She's the most likely known candidate

Season 3 is 100% a Hashimoto and season 4 is probably Dmon?

If not Dmon, then a new Junker

[spare fox]

yeah the top of the roadmap slot has both DVA and JQ so?

that's also the Blizzcon season so it might be BIG and tease more

multiple stories?

[dense garnet]

Dmon's been asked for a long time

Could be the Blizzcon reveal

Idk

[spare fox]

maybe continuation of the Gwishin story

[wise grotto]

Season 3 could be a yokai though

[brittle sky]

Possible, but given how loudly they're saying the upcoming hashimoto hero is set to immediately defect, hashi seems set to be unrepresented again

[spare fox]

yes but it could be another Anran-Wuyang situation where they are related story-wise

[merry mason]

They almost certainly are but if they are friends/ family I think it would be better for the story if she felt betrayed by him instead of Defecting along with him

[spare fox]

seems most likely

[brittle sky]

Could also be one of his former mentors

[spare fox]

or the shimada's runaway mother dundundun

[wise grotto]

Also I think a key part with that season 3 one is im
Pretty sure season 3 was confirmed a dude
And the hashimoto use energy weapons lime mizuki or genjis
And season 3s character definitely has a gun

[spare fox]

probably not that

everyone is going to lose their shit when they add yet another Japanese character lol

me I don't care, it's just annoying to hear the constant complaints about asian characters

[brittle sky]

Based on a single dev line that like have said 'em just as easily as him, and would represent a character orders of magnitude more femme (very narrow limbs, high and emphasized waste going out into rounded hips) than they've done before on masculine characters.

[wise grotto]

True but I REALLY don’t think it’s a shimada at least because they have a consistency in terms of weaponry

And this character is NOT that

[brittle sky]

Sure, I'd be skeptical of a shimada. Oni masks and modern garb are more hashimoto's deal. I'm just putting some doubt in the (in my opinion) tenuous basis for saying season 3 is he/him.

[wise grotto]

I’m fairly confident they’ll be yokai since the gun is there and the hashimoto all get there weapons from the same dude who made genji and Hanzos weapons

[spare fox]

keep in mind, it looks like a gun

it could be not a weapon but another part of their kit

like a grapple or signal or something? maybe not a weapon but gun-shaped tool of some sort

or maybe some kind of energy-gun like one that "shoots" the spirit being

like a patronus from harry potter but like... with a gun

[wise grotto]

He specifically makes the hashimoto ones flawed so they don’t have those beings (hanzo genjis aren’t flawed which is why they get them)

I don’t see why the silhouette wouldn’t have the primary and instead hsve a secondary or ability out as a focal point though

Usually they always either hsve the primary or don’t have anything out

[shrewd pivot]

Something interesting, the robot here looks like it was shot through the chest and through the wall, leaving a hole in the robot chest and the wall.

Edit: nevermind mbmb it's Iceland lol Watchpoint: Grímsvötn

[spare fox]

idk I'm just iterating a bunch of possibilities. We don't even know if they're hashimoto

and if they are hashimoto, it's probably not a hashimoto just like all the rest

[spare fox]

it's in Iceland right? isn't there an active volcano in the vicinity? the writers probably aren't using that specific volcano but a fictional one based on that

[dry pebble]

The head design of robot in right's head design is so well made

[dry pebble]

Probaply

I mean we have lava themed map in order arleady

I just wish we could have seen maps from foreign countries didn't made a debut in game

[shrewd pivot]

Nevermind it's Iceland concept for Watchpoint: Grímsvötn mbmb

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grímsvötn

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah it was echo's concept design :') instead she got the uncanny irobot face lol

[dry pebble]

I love uncanny robot face more.

And im happy that's the echo we got, actually looks like its highly advanced and human like. Considering the fact Overwatch following sci fi tropes for their characters

Echo is one of my favorite characters ever

[shrewd pivot]

I would have loved echo to have a non human face as base, personally, to show she is tech. Like she could still have the human face in emotes or certain moments, but not as her base look yknow?

[dry pebble]

I think it being her base look what is sells for her character. She isn't like other robots, its a humanoid. Sci fi Media is full of android that has human faces as design

[shrewd pivot]

Like idk the irobot face is funny but it feels like they were too afraid to make an effeminate dainty robot without a human face bc 'mass appeal'

[dry pebble]

I really can't describe it really

[dry pebble]

What you mean by mass appeal

[shrewd pivot]

I wish we had the option bc Echo's stealth + camo skin shows that we could have had all sorts of unique face plate designs instead of a copied human face

[wise grotto]

Imma be honest none of echos designs have ever been mass appealing
Current echo makes more sense for her lore as a ai meant to imitate humans and learn from them

If you wanted an ai that could do that you’d rather then be as approachable and normal looking as they could

The other designs would just counteract her purpose

[dry pebble]

Yeah, and she is supposed to be an android like more than an Omnic.

[dry pebble]

Not only that we have Bastion for that plane arleady

[dry pebble]

Echo's face doesn't look uncanny as she does in art

Which i wish was opposite i love her being both uncanny and unappealing but also loveful and cheering

[shrewd pivot]

It's very common for designs to use human faces/body types for female characters (ie, Inside out going from shapes for all emotions to only making the effeminate emotions sadness, joy, disgust, be very humanoid while fear and anger got to remain extremely strong shapes), Echo has a stupid butt crack in her final design lmafo it felt like the face was an unironic attempt at making her "effeminate" but with that trope of "effeminate = humanoid"

I personally find the option of various face plates more compelling for skins bc Echo's face is Mina's face. I wish we got more skins like stealth / camo with unique shape faces instead of the copy pasted human face.

[dry pebble]

I mean, she is her echo after all

Nice argument but i disagree, hologramic human face is what maker her design awesome and significant.

[shrewd pivot]

Sure! But Echo's story is about being Mina's echo of motivation to make ai that are good for the world, Echo's story is distinctly about Echo grappling with her purpose. Ideally she wouldn't just 'be Mina' but instead grow into her own being.

[dry pebble]

To be fair i really want to type counter arguments but english isn't my native language which causes me to not know the words for me to use here

I will come back to this rather

[shrewd pivot]

I mean, I just enjoy robot designs a lot, so the stealth + camo unique shape face plate is much more engaging as a design (every skin could have a unique shape! Even some skins with a human holo face) than ALWAYS being a human holo face for every skin.

Bastion can express emotions without a human face, so can Orisa. I would love to see more of that "show don't tell", not less.

[dry pebble]

For simple input, if Echo wasnt had a human face to begin with her design wouldnt had a feature that distincts herself from being a regular, omnic mass produced robot. Her looking like a human but being artifical intelligent that using human avatar to begin with is to create bondness and better contact within humans, aka like Baymax etc.

[shrewd pivot]

I understand your point! The irobot hologram face is very iconic for Echo.

But, Zenyatta is a regular, mass produced omnic. He is still very unique. So is Ramattra.

Echo is unique because she has floating arms, legs, and wings. She uses hovering hard light technology, it is obvious she is not a mass produced omnic even without her human face.

[dry pebble]

But Zenyatta comes before Echo in release

Besides both Ram and Zen is a long familiars in terms of produce. Echo is Mina's personal work

[shrewd pivot]

Making Echo have an uncanny human face I think shows she does not relate to humans well. If her face looked more natural (not a giant alien forehead lol) she would look like a robot that is designed for good human communication.

[dry pebble]

Human face plays a key part in her design

[dry pebble]

In Mina's perspective, Omnic were brutally human killer robots therefore she would normally attempt to a design that would distinct Echo to not look one of them

I get what you mean so far.

[shrewd pivot]

My point is, that there are ways to show Echo is self learning, without defaulting into "effeminate = humanoid" as seen in a lot of fantasy media. (Ie, orc men being monsters but orc women looking like green humans, or how in Inside out lady Disgust looks like a doll human but mister Fear looks like a string).

From my understanding Echo chose to model herself off of Mina Liao, Mina liao did not program Echo to use that specific face. Echo normally does not even have a face, as seen in her emotes where she scans things.

You can see in Echo's concept art that Echo's human face was a later addition.

[dry pebble]

Holy shitt third one looks so dope

[spare fox]

oh yeah and speaking of Echo, don't forget there are still 2 other classified creations of Dr. Liao we have no clue about

[shrewd pivot]

Yep!

[dry pebble]

Is this Fr??

[shrewd pivot]

I am so happy they are reusing this design tho (echo concept)

[dry pebble]

Interesting

[spare fox]

eeee I wonder if we're gonna hear about those with the story revving up

[shrewd pivot]

True!

[dry pebble]

I hope they be using the design Ultra suggested

I think three of them should have different roles like god programs

[shrewd pivot]

It wouldn't suprise me if Mina's work had something to do with the kitsune (which we must assume is ai) as some kind of "ecological protector ai" or something of the sort

[dry pebble]

Perhaps the AI within Emre

[shrewd pivot]

There was Aurora, Echo, (edit: and Athena ofc!) and a few unnamed projects yet to be explored. I am hype to see what the unnamed projects will be.

[dry pebble]

Nah i don't think so

[dry pebble]

I love how two of them is indirectly religious themed

[spare fox]

and Athena

[dry pebble]

Iris is deity like figure and Echo is like Angel

[dry pebble]

Specifically created to inform Winston of his heart rates

[shrewd pivot]

I think that is the eye conspiracy, not Mina Liao tech related. But you never know!

[dry pebble]

Eye being ai would be insteresting

[spare fox]

I think it's a quantum computer designed to control shadowy aspects of the world by the world's elites but it's gone semi-sentient and gone rogue

[dense garnet]

The AI in Emre is Chernobog

One of the God AI's

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah what's scarier than Anubis god ai? Chernobog god ai with aurora gifted sapience lol.

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah that's the best guess rn! No confirmation but story is highly suggesting to be that.

[spare fox]

yeah but also it's designed to be used in the shadows so it's not going to go making itself known like anubis did

[glad fox]

I like echo having human face. Gives her more personality

[spare fox]

I don't know if I want to think the Conspiracy is sapient or not but it definitely has high intelligence and computing power, imo

[brittle sky]

Not much of a conspiracy if it's a singular entity

[dense garnet]

I think that Chernobog gained sentience unlike the other God AI's. Somehow, it got reactivated and chose Emre to be its host considering it's a completely digital entity and needs to use something or someone as a physical body

[shrewd pivot]

That's fair. My point is this tho: would you prefer Bastion and Orisa and Zenyatta and Ramattra to have holographic human faces too? I don't think a human face necessarily gives her more personality, but I agree it does make her stand out as the uncanny 'irobot' ref of the roster. Bastion is the Wall-E ref, Orisa ow1 had baymax vibes, etc.

[brittle sky]

Why would it have to be unique among the ais for that?

[dense garnet]

Dunno. Maybe it was the last God AI to be active when Aurora came to be?

[shrewd pivot]

God ais gaining Auora sapience would be an unprecedented event, an individual omnic with Aurora sapience is one thing. A god ai with global logistics aspects gaining sapience would be like a real godly entity among men, definitely something humanity would note.

[glad fox]

Their robotic faces give them their own personality in a way. Also makes sense in a way since she is not an omnic while others are omnic variants

[dense garnet]

Yeah my theory is that Chernobog is special because it was shut down after Aurora made omnics sentient, not before

[shrewd pivot]

Fair, I just am a robot fan myself so I enjoy when robots get to be animated as lively without relying solely on human faces haha. I respect your take tho

[brittle sky]

I think it's possible they didn't even gain sapience that way. Just that the human assumption they lack it might be flawed. Between multiple God ais being anthropomorphized by humans (xibalba is worshiped, macaria is seen as a heroine and portrayed by a human in plays) and chernobog's own proactive predictions and "I understand, I'm sorry", it's possible they were always more self aware than humans perceived or insisted.

Again, "underestimating the personhood of nonhumans" is a bit of a repeated theme in ow.

[shrewd pivot]

I would like to believe in "optumistic future" overwatch, humanity wasn't actively enslaving sapient robots prior to the Awakening, otherwise Sojourn's sister talking about how useful nanny robots are becomes absolutely horrific writing.

[dry pebble]

Where do you find concept art of the heroes

[shrewd pivot]

Overwatch posts, art books, and development videos.

[glad fox]

Omnics werent sapient pre awakening though

[brittle sky]

I don't think omnics were aware fully (though they were 'like in a dream' per zen), but the alternative is that giant ais that seem to look like a duck and act like a duck are not in fact ducks, so it's okay to deprive them of duck rights.

[shrewd pivot]

Not from my understanding. Aurora's awakening granted awakened omnics sapience. Omnics were unable to make choices and followed programing similar to any other non sentient robot. The genesis animated shorts describe this, that emotions were not a thing, choices were not a thing, until Aurora's awakening.

[shrewd pivot]

It's the difference in scifi of the "Chinese room(aka pushing buttons as a statistic machine, not actually understanding anything)" Chatgpt vs actually sapient lifeforms. This is explored a lot in scifi. A mannequin robot made to sound human is not actually human. Only robots with the capacity for sapience can be sapient, otherwise you could argue water currents are as alive as humans are, for "moving/appearing" lively.

[brittle sky]

Chinese room stories are also inherently pessimistic as they seek to either cast doubt on human sapience (as the original story does), portrays a world where there are philosophical zombies whose internalities can be disregarded, or that we live in a world where corporations get people to ruin their lives by exploiting our empathy on elaborate phone trees. It's explored, and those stories are useful, but I think relying on Chinese rooms to avoid moral quandaries is a far bigger departure from the optimistic and humanistic vision of overwatch than representing a need for human empathy to expand.

[shrewd pivot]

Very fair take. "Chinese room" thought experiments should ONLY be applied to robotics ofc, never organic life.

My counter point, for omnics being NOT sapient prior to awakening: omnics being a direct allegory for enslaved humans is not appropriate, as omnics were mindless machines built for labor, hivemind attacked humanity first, then hivemind woke up-- that is a bigoted conspiracy about enslaved groups if overwatch asserts omnics were sapient prior to awakening. If omnics were sapient prior, it would be a very direct allegory to organic life. I instead read omnics as humanity's hubris and unintentional consequences of pursuing powerful technologies, thoughtless gods creating life without thinking about the safety of that life. Also, it would make Sojourn sister's comments about nanny omnics prior to the awakening horrific and unacceptable writing imo if omnics were actually sapient prior to awakening.

Overwatch already handled animal perspective and the expansion of sapience with super intelligence with Hammond, so I think it's fair to say an omnic roomba was indeed a non sentient omnic roomba and not actually sapient prior to the awakening.

[brittle sky]

I was talking about the possibility God ais were more self aware than people thought, and that they may be sapient or equivalent through some means tangential to aurora's awakening of omnics. Any comment of omnics having memories or flickers prior to the awakening was beside the point.

[wise grotto]

I think the difference between all of those robots and echo
Is none of them where created exclusively to learn and imitate humans
Echo was
If echo looked like other omnics her purpose wouldn’t be shown off in her appearance much at all like the rest of the omnics and robots

[merry mason]

In the age of LLMs I think we can all agree that something being able to calculate a lot of data and output something that appears human written is not an indicator of sentience. Neither is people’s ability to anthropomorphize them.

Like when genesis dropped I thought “what do you mean the god ais aren’t sentient with the way they interact with the world of course they are” but now I can just imagine them as a particularly powerful agentic AI

[shrewd pivot]

Oh I mean, non sapient organisms show intelligence, like slime molds with intelligent problem solving of mazes etc. That's a given!

[wise grotto]

They’re as sentient as the god ais in cyberpunk

They’re technically sentient because they’re constantly learning and adapting but not objectively sentient because they cannot do things creatively they can only do things the way they know they’re supposed to or optimize what they’re doing

[shrewd pivot]

The issue comes from overwatch using the word "sentient" when they actually mean "sapient". A logistics ai to a certain complex degree could be defined as sentient, just as ant colonies (not the ants, bit the colony) is defined as a super-organism with intelligence.

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah sentient is defined as being able to have observations from an individual perspective, such as insects understanding pain in the leg may mean danger.

Sapience requires emotional understanding of self vs others, capacity of empathy (as in the biological definition, understanding your perspective isn't the only perspective to exist) towards others, and higher order thinking, such as humans or dolphins etc

[brittle sky]

Sure, but what entity within the narrative of ow doesn't count there? Orisa displays all that in her voiceline with rein.

[shrewd pivot]

And Orisa had her personality core edited by Efi as a big point in her novel, trying to tweak Orisa's personality core over iterations. I would like to believe overwatch wasn't writing a child genius lobotomizing a sapient omnic lol

[brittle sky]

I think recognizing a phone tree primed to tell you what you want to hear anthropomorphized by our own social instincts and tech bros trying to sell you stuff is a useful skill. I don't think applying that in a narrative of an explicitly optimistic future to write off types of intelligence (especially ones where the text undercuts its own assumption of their lack thereof) is not the place to teach people, and the larger narrative motion to help people unlearn imagining unpersons is just as useful.

[brittle sky]

No I mean she displays all of what you just said in an immediate dialogue with rein

[shrewd pivot]

Chat gpt does too

I don't mean this in a mean way, I just mean for canon, best option bc of implication is that omnics were non sapient prior to the awakening

[shrewd pivot]

I agree, for example it would not suprise me if Echo is written to develop into her own unique being (an intelligence unlike awakened omnics or humans), just as Aurora had been a unique individual

[brittle sky]

Having to seek justification that an entity, unprompted, displays curiosity, uncertainty, theory of mind, perception of self and other in relationship, all in the context of intrinsic emotional desires as still not thinking or feeling feels an exercise in truncating empathy.

[shrewd pivot]

I mean I don't think it's bad for overwatch to explore the differences of sapience vs non sapience in robots, considering the awakening is key to overwatch lore.

[merry mason]

Yeah obviously orisa is sapient I feel like saying anything else is just splitting hairs

[shrewd pivot]

Orisa is built from the shell of an OR unit, not the brains iirc.

And if Orisa is sapient, Efi editing Orisa's personality core goes from a cute "just working out the errors!" Baymax, to a child in charge of and lobotomizing a Frankensteins monster. If Orisa is sapient, Efi editing Orisa's personality core is disregarding Orisa's autonomy.

[merry mason]

And honestly your just gonna have to grapple with that.

[shrewd pivot]

That ruins Efi's "optumistic future" Writing and makes it needlessly grimdark. Efi ignoring sapient omnic autonomy is antithetical to what Numbani represents. It doesn't make sense writing wise.

[brittle sky]

Again, that's seeming to deny humanity for the sake of emotional comfort. This is a complex story with shifting lore and many cooks. Unfortunate implications will happen. The depths of the process was also written by an outside writer with only so much guidance.

[merry mason]

Aw the writers should have thought of that before making her sapient but they didn’t

It’s not like using the fact that omnics are infant sentient computers against them to take away their will from them is impossible, though mostly done by villains

[shrewd pivot]

It's not emotional comfort, it's ooc writing for what Numbani represents. If Numbani's protector is a lobotomized omnic being raised by a human child, uh....???? That would be shut down by Numbani's laws because awakened sapient omnics are treated as equal citizens to humans under Numbani laws.

[shrewd pivot]

She's not written as sapient, she's written as an ai similar to Athena tho

[shrewd pivot]

Exactly, this is villain behavior, not hero behavior. I would like to think writers are not intending Efi as a grimdark child parent story abusing omnics

[brittle sky]

I'm saying orisa is displaying every of aspect of sapience in that one dialogue alone. Are we meant to ignore that or seek some way to dismiss that?

[shrewd pivot]

And Chatgpt can say the exact same things, it doesn't mean that chatgpt is sapient. There's a difference between non sapient JARVIS and a sapient robot like Zenyatta.

How would Numbani's laws allow a human to abuse an awakened omnic like Efi is using/changing Orisa? It doesn't make sense in canon for Orisa to be awakened sapience.

[brittle sky]

You're saying by nature we need to ignore the evidence of orisa's entire personality and interactions on the grounds that some chatbots can talk in natural language.

[shrewd pivot]

No, it's that Orisa's long novel explains that Efi edited Orisa's personality core and tweaked her into what she is today.

Either Efi is committing war crimes against awakened omnics and is somehow allowed to do this in Numbani to the point Orisa is "Numbani's protector"

Or Orisa is not sapient, and is a non sapient ai.

[brittle sky]

I'm not talking about where you think the sapience comes from for orisa, or what that might mean. Just that by all accounts orisa displays every metric of sapience in her in game dialogue.

[shrewd pivot]

So does Athena. And the god ais. And the junies Efi made. Even if INTELLIGENT that doesn't mean SAPIENT like how awakened omnics are sapient.

Again, it's JARVIS vs Ultron. JARVIS is not sapient but Ultron is. Scifi about robots often showcases sapient AND non sapient robots. Non sapient robots could be drones that are obviously non sapient or JARVIS logistics ai smart enough to convince you it's actually sapient when it isn't.

Early season Janet from the good place is actually a good example lol she begs people to not "kill her" but it's protocol done to avoid being shut down, she uses emotional manipulation as a non sapient robot. Later she does gain some kind of personhood, showing that sapience is emergent and that people should be allowed to grow. (Fits with the motif of the good place)

[brittle sky]

I think this is growing unhelpful, as any evidence of internality in game can only be expressed as behavior, and while her behavior repeatedly shows orisa is performing mental and emotional functions that reflect those metrics of internality and sapience, you are willing to dismiss all evidence as imitation. So we cannot have a meaningful debate about it, because you categorically regard evidence as invalid.

[shrewd pivot]

I mean. By your logic, that means Wreckingball's mech is sapient because it says the things it says, when in reality it is simply translating Hammond's speach...?

What's the difference between a translation omnic like Wreckingball, and Orisa who was programmed to have a personality core? Orisa without her personality core that Efi gave her would be no different than Hammond's Wreckingball mech ai

[brittle sky]

There's no agency in a translation module.

You have a vested interest in discounting the evidence to have a better perception of the lore's implications. I don't agree where that interpretation lands, and I further think you're getting there post hoc. But I think your enjoyment of a story you like matters more than me winning a discussion online (as in I care more that you enjoy the story more than I care about me convincing you otherwise), so by all means, think as you will. I'm sure as the lore reveals more about orisa it will evolve both of our understandings and theorizations of her character.

[shrewd pivot]

???
It's not at all about my personal enjoyment of the story. It's ooc writing, explain to me how Numbani would allow Efi to commit essentially lobotomy war crimes on Orisa if Orisa was sapient? How would Numbani accept Orisa as the protector of Numbani if Orisa was being lobotomized by Efi? If that could be explained then I could agree with you about Orisa being sapient.

And if a translator tool is not sapient despite sounding alive, then a robot made to do a certain task isn't automatically sapient just because it sounds alive and moves as if it's alive.

The Aurora awakening was key to overwatch's lore, and intelligence in ais can certainly exist, even arguable sentience in the cases of God ais, but full on sapience is Aurora's deal, she was canonically the FIRST truely sapient robot ever created bc of quantum mechanics.

[merry mason]

Have you considered that orisa consents to personality alterations

[shrewd pivot]

That's not possible with how the Orisa long novel was written. That's still endangerment, like a child saying yes to a lobotomy isn't true consent to a lobotomy.

[merry mason]

You reiterate lobotomy but I’m not sure that’s the best comparison?

[shrewd pivot]

Erasing your entire identity and perspective then.

Like the thing making Orisa seem alive is her personality core that Efi added.

Shutting down Orisa like they did in the novel after Orisa failed to be what she was needed to be, would not be moral if Orisa was actually sapient.

[wise grotto]

Yea no orisa is just a robot with a personality chip
Echo is at least borderline sentient but not quite there
Orisa just isn’t full stop

Orisas about as sentient as siri if she could tell you your an idiot

[shrewd pivot]

I recommend reading the long novel that Efi and Orisa have called "The Hero of Numbani", it makes it rather clear.

[brittle sky]

But the disconnect is here - you are saying this must not be the case because for it to be true would have negative implications for other parts of lore. It is an external pressure.

This is working from the basic evidence that as with all characters orisa articulates her characterization and experience through action and articulation, because that's how every character in every story expresses themselves. Her expressions show all the mental and internal mechanism you said qualify for sapience, not merely in achieving her ends, but in coloring her experience and perspective.

[shrewd pivot]

Then explain how Numbani, a country grounded on rights protecting awakened omnic citizens from human abuse, would allow a child human to ignore the autonomy of a sapient awakened by editing Orisa's personality core and shutting Orisa down for failing to meet goals?

[brittle sky]

You are categorically saying to ignore all that, that's Chinese room parrot talk. Which is as an argument makes it impossible to have an evidence based discussion of what behavior or internality might reflect how we regard her sapience, because it takes her lack thereof as a foregone conclusion and all evidence as just noise.

[shrewd pivot]

The evidence based discussion is that Orisa is canonically "Numbani's protector" (Numbani canonically has rights for awakened omnic citizens) and is Efi's creation. Please read "Hero of Numbani" it explains the points I am bringing up. I am engaging in evidence based discussion.

[brittle sky]

That whole discussion only even applies to one explanation for how orisa is sapient.

[brittle sky]

I have. I'm just not using a novel by an outside writer to ignore the evidence made since then in game.

[shrewd pivot]

So you are ignoring old canon lore, and I am contextualizing new lore as what is defined by old canon lore.

[dense garnet]

I think Orisa and Echo are sentient by our definition, just not in the Overwatch universe's

In the end, nothing really changes for us, the viewers. Orisa and Echo are alive by our standards, just not by some of the people living in the OW universe

[brittle sky]

I'm asking you to not presuppose and take a second to regard the actual evidence being written in front of your eyes. What of orisa's behavior and personality, other than the presumption that it's hollow parrot speak, disqualifies orisa from being sapient?

[dense garnet]

Because of the whole Enlightment event

That's just OW's interpretation of what it means to be sentient anyways. By our real life standards, they very much are sentient

Sentience is just a higher bar in OW

Kinda the same thing as how people in the universe don't consider the God AI's to be sentient tmk

They simply went rogue. In a way, you can compare that to Orisa and Echo and call them "rogue AI's" as well, except being rogue is by design for them

[shrewd pivot]

Echo certainly, and I can easily see her becoming her own unique entity in the future as she grows.

Orisa, what matters more is that Efi's love for Orisa is real, that Efi's hope for a safe future is embodied in Orisa. The gods, Orisha in Yoruba culture, are said to inhabit objects like shrines etc. Orisa in overwatch represents that belief in something greater, to fight off Doomfist.

[dense garnet]

I guess the question OW is asking is "is the ability to make your own free choices sentience?"

[shrewd pivot]

That's like saying what if the omnic roombas were sapient, like... OK. But writing implies otherwise. It's not impossible for writers to have messed up super badly and retcon Orisa to be sapient, but that destroys any sense of Orisa being Numbani's hero making sense in canon. IF Orisa is actually sapient, it's bad writing. If Orisa later BECOMES sapient after her whole overwatch 2 arc, that's fine but a bit confusing.

[dense garnet]

Omnics are obviously alive, but other beings like Rogue AI's, despite having free will, aren't considered sentient

Just by the people living in the universe

[brittle sky]

You arent answering the question.

[dense garnet]

I think Anubis and Chernobog should be considered sapient. Orisa imo is actually less sapient tbh

I think Orisa has a wonderful personality but that personality ultimately can't be rewritten by her own choice afaik. For example she can never choose to defect or join the other side, should she want to, because that's not what Efi made her for

Orisa is very much 1's and 0's but that shouldn't take away from her being any less important than everyone else

[shrewd pivot]

Ok, what implies Orisa's lines aren't sapient?

"Heroes of Numbani" showing us Orisa's creation, that Orisa had a personality core being actively edited by Efi, and that Orisa was shut down like a failed experiment instead of a sapient being.

The way Orisa talks in Overwatch 1 is extremely baymax and 'robot doing it's objective'.

Prior lore of Orisa is what deems her as most likely non sapient.

[dense garnet]

Orisa has free will but not complete free will imo

She can't decide to do things if it contradicts with her objectives

She has an active personality but she can't grow as an individual by herself

[brittle sky]

I remain asking, what in how she behaves and interacts in overwatch, formerly known as overwatch 2, demonstrates she lacks any of the capacities you qualified as the terms of sapience?

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah god ais have the ability to be sapient bc they cover so much data and connections it's akin to ant colony or beehive super-organism intelligence. So not sentient like humans, but sentient in the way an extremely complex ant colony could be.

[brittle sky]

I mean she does grow from her experiences. That's something she does in front of us.

[shrewd pivot]

Orisa is just like Echo in overwatch2.

And you do know spawn voice lines aren't canon-canon right? Like, Hanzo and Cassidy haven't met yet in canon despite having voice lines. We can get canon like "what's your favorite animal" from voice lines, but yeah.

[wooden drift]

What are we arguing about?

[dense garnet]

Is Orisa sapient

[shrewd pivot]

If Orisa is an awakened omnic with sapience or not.

[dense garnet]

She's obviously not an awakened omnic. She didn't exist at that moment

[wooden drift]

Well, she kinda isn't

[dense garnet]

But that doesn't mean she can't be sapient

I don't think she's sapient, but she's close to it

[wooden drift]

She created to numbani protector, I don't think she has full sentience and control to stop being one

[shrewd pivot]

I argue Orisa is not an awakened omnic and Orisa is not sapient, according to "The Hero of Numbani" -- Orisa is like a very advanced Alexa, not a sapient ai.

[dense garnet]

Yeah for example, what if Orisa found something out that would ordinarily make someone have to think and maybe even join the other faction

Would Orisa be capable of for example, switching sides

Or her morality

[wooden drift]

I don't think that was ever hinted

[dense garnet]

I think Orisa's morality is set in stone

That's what seperates her from awakened omnics imo

And sapient beings in general

[shrewd pivot]

Same, she has a personality core given to her by Efi.

[brittle sky]

Not canon in that they have not been said. They are however, what they would say in those circumstances.

[shrewd pivot]

Except for the meme lines, yes.

[brittle sky]

Not even the parameters here. Just whether she is evidently sapient as evidenced by her behavior in game, or not sapient.

[shrewd pivot]

By that logic Ganymede is as sapient as a human bc he hangs around Bastion, and whatever JPC is implying about base normal animals in overwatch.

Orisa walking and talking as if she's alive doesn't = alive. It's a scifi robot setting. Idk how to explain it.

I think it's odd to ignore the books when that is canon lore, but you do you.

[brittle sky]

I'm not saying she sapient because she's walking and talking

I'm saying her dialogue displays thoughts, motives, and other mental processes which check every box for sapience.

Again, lay out the material internal processes you think are needed for sapience.

[shrewd pivot]

Talking as if she's alive, yes.

[dense garnet]

I still think she lacks the ability for independent growth and evolution of morality

[wooden drift]

Damn, that's the most silliest subjects to argue about

[brittle sky]

I've already tried to disengage

[shrewd pivot]

Agreed, because her personality core was specifically edited to facilitate a specific morality/outcome in the long novel.

[brittle sky]

Ultra, lay out your checklist for sapience.

[dense garnet]

Yeah, she almost qualifies as sapient for me, but not quite because of her morality system

She only sees things in the way she was programmed to see things, and makes decisions based off that

[brittle sky]

So you're saying that she needs to show plasticity of values to qualify. I'm just trying to settle ultra's definition atm, but I appreciate your parameters, though I think digging into her dialogue will likely reflect a capacity for her values to be shaped by her experiences

[dense garnet]

I think that another thing about sapience is philosophy in general

I don't think Orisa can think philosophically like sapient people can

Philosophy is very much a cornerstone of humanity

I don't think Orisa is capable of that critical of thinking yet

At best she's like a child

The difference being she will stay a child

[brittle sky]

I mean, what counts as philosophy in that regard if you're trying to make that a parameter?

Like, if we're saying regard herself in abstraction, we have that

[shrewd pivot]

must have the brain structure to facilitate true concious thought and experiences, not the "Chinese room" chat gpt -- aka the being must ACTUALLY be experiencing REAL emotions and REAL conciousness, not just a machine pressing buttons

must be sentient, aka able to experience subjective experiences (including harm), like an insect understanding discomfort in a leg could mean a predator attacking is attacking it and thus the insect becomes stressed.

must have biological definition of empathy: ability to recognize your experience isn't the only experience, able to understand another being is seperate from yourself and that your experience is not universal, and thus emotional intelligence that stems from such awareness. Ie empathy shown in elephants, etc. Not only do YOU have subjective experiences, but you recognize others do too.

must have higher order thinking (plans ahead, etc, as seen in curiosity etc) to facilitate biological empathy. Ie animals that hunt in packs or animals that store food for winter.

I would argue young humans are sapient, so that means animals with more intelligence than young humans are sapient too. Ie, pigs, octopi, dolphins, gorillas etc.

[brittle sky]

I mean, she outright ponders the nature of evil and free will. that's pretty categorically philosophical

[shrewd pivot]

Sapience requires conciousness and I don't know if Orisa as is, personality core and all, has the capacity for true conciousness, or if its just a Chatgpt. That doesn't mean Orisa isn't an intelligent robot, but she is running on a program, and not conciousness and sapience like Bastion is.

[brittle sky]

• So, true experience is impossible to verify or disprove. What makes an emotion or consciousness real is beyond verification if we're going off empirical material.
• Sentient, understanding harm or discomfort, we can safely check that off - she has pain reactions to damage, and we're at a nonstarter if we claim those actions are simulations.
• Recognition of subjective experience, understanding that people have different experiences and information (theory of mind) and emotional intelligence. All covered by the Rein interaction:
  Reinhardt: Orisa! I heard you took down Null Sector. You've gotten strong!
  Orisa: Thank you. Do you truly believe so?
  We have new information, uncertainty as she compares it to her own self-perception, an awareness that Rein's thoughts and feelings are not her own, cares about whether his feelings are genuine (bonus points for awareness that expression does not equal reality), and is curious to verify this information. All that both requires awareness of herself and Rein and seperate beings with different thoughts and feelings, and further an emotionally driven (she looks up to Rein) desire to explore that dynamic.
• Curiosity we have previously established with Rein, we have huge planning ahead when she unprompted asks Zen if evil could ever be rid from the world. That's textbook big picture question. She speculates repeatedly that certain villain's behavior will be within the context of them being in prison, because she plans to arrest them. Abstraction, planning, and emotional drives behind how she engages in theory of self and other.

She draws emotional conclusions from interactions, is even sometimes left flummoxed by her emotions (Mei calling her cute catches her off guard not in an 'error' way, but a clear emotionally informed loss for words). She still shapes her opinions often in the context of Efi, and has pretty black-and-white morality, but this doesn't speak to limited capacities to me, but rather reflects a childishness that comes from inexperience. She uses her parent (efi) to consider the world, and defaults to deferring to Efi's perspective, like some children does. Moral simplicity or taking matters overly literally are similarly portrayed as results of inexperience, not lack of capacity. We see her formulate moral nuance in the zen interaction (but denying free will is also evil, so we cannot merely get rid of it to get rid of evil)

[shrewd pivot]

True experience: Yes you can actually prove emotion exists because of neuron activation and patterns. There are people today that actually lack certain parts of emotional empathy (not bio empathy definition bc all humans have bio empathy, but emotional empathy as a trigger to feel for another entity) due to brain differences. Autism can cause hyper-empathy or hypo-empathy. I experience hyper-empathy myself! And brain tumors can cause rage. Etc. Chatgpt can be proven to not be sapient.

Sentient: yes, but only if its not chatgpt statistics machine making these responses. A bacteria is not sentient, but a tree colony can be. A car having a warning light turn on does not indicate sapience, it is program. A chatgpt begging for its life is not sapience, it is statistics machine.

Recognition of subjective experience: Again, chatgpt says things that appear like this too, not proof of conciousness. Chatgpt waxes philosophy all the time.

Curiosity: ask chatgpt about free will. It will wax poetics.

It's not that Orisa couldn't be written later to be sapient, it's that "The Hero of Numbani" made it pretty clear Orisa was running on a program, not Aurora's awakening nor sapient conciousness. In fact, after Aurora's situation, ai laws were created to prevent anything like Aurora from happening again, which is why Echo was created.

[shrewd pivot]

Ngl I feel weird calling Efi Orisa's parent. Efi is a child, and Efi is Orisa's creator. It's more like a baymax situation, not parent to child like Mina saw Aurora as a daughter imo.

[near pine]

i hope emre can give us more lore on the conspiracy

[brittle sky]

We are not going to have neurons hooked up for a digital, fictional character.

The rest seem to be you just sayng because an LLM can (poorly) feign these things. You are using the presumption of True Experience (or in this case the lack thereof) to say she's faking it, so all evidence and all possible evidence must not count.

[shrewd pivot]

Then what's the narrative point of overwatch defining Aurora as "the first" sapient robot due to a once in a lifetime quantum mechanics incident?

[brittle sky]

You're also ignoring the clear difference betwen saying what will achieve a task in a way imitating subjectivity (which is what LLMs do) and things clearly useless to goals that only achieve ends that matter to a subjective experience (seeing if Rein actually thinks that, asking Zen if there might be a way to deal with evil as a sum total thing). She doesn't feign curiousity when prompted. Or rather, her curiousity is prompted by the same thing that prompts human curiousity - questions that arise from our internal processing of information.

[shrewd pivot]

LLMs have "thinking" prompts too though?

LLMs are statistics machines, and training data acquisition is still in line with a goal.

I'm not saying Orisa isn't written as if she's alive here, she's very much lively in dialog. I'm saying in canon she's got a programed personality core.

[dense garnet]

They're still doing this

I went to go eat lunch

[peak escarp]

what's the issue?

[brittle sky]

Just a specific point is running overly wrong

mostly because it's me and ultra writing it out.

and we are both... let's say detailed?

[shrewd pivot]

We can change topics ig. It's a discussion about if Orisa is canonically sapient or canonically non-sapient.

[peak escarp]

well the text tells us she's non-sapient because she didn't recieve sapience from Aurora's Awakening

regardless of how she actually behaves

if she is somehow sapient independant of the Awakening, that would have massive implications for the story

she would be of interest to Ramattra

[shrewd pivot]

And Efi reconfiguring Orisa's personality/Orisa being shut down for failing a goal is pretty harsh to do to a sapient omnic, if not outright illegal to do to a sapient omnic in a country like Numbani. Thus why I argue Orisa is not sapient in canon.

[brittle sky]

I mean, the subtext regularly undercuts the easy delineations with things like Echo, possibly the God AIs. I agree her getting emergent sapience without consequences would have weird knock on effects for the story. Getting around that with things like inherited awakening from the idina warbot parts has complications as well. I also think an exercise in identifying every emotional, internal, and subjective process that makes up sapience in her behavior, then discarding all that because such a conclusion would be inconvenient seems an exercise that feels both narratively uninteresting and intellectually cruddy.

[shrewd pivot]

I mean, I think what matters in Orisa's story is that Efi's love for Orisa is real and that Efi's hope for the future is real, and that Orisa embodies that.

Regardless, Orisa does represent hope for Numbani regardless.

[peak escarp]

compare Orisa, who is noted as being an amazing invention but otherwise not really noteworthy, to Bastion, who is an otherwise normal E54 Bastion warbot that a robotics expert thinks is notable for its behaviour

[brittle sky]

But what behavior or mental processes does orisa lack compared to bastion (or anyone else)?

I just think saying any time Orisa frequently expresses desires, opinions, wishes, fears we point and go 'but not really' feels weird and self defeating. If they intended to write her as a being with no internality and pure programmed responses, that is not reflected in the writing of her lines. What is reflected is somebody who learns, feels, thinks, plans, and has tangible desires she formed and chose.

[peak escarp]

the writing isn't very consistent is it

[shrewd pivot]

Monkeys paw curls: we get more omnic lore, but it contradicts, retcons, or creates unintended implications

But yeah I agree with the points about Orisa being written as very lively, especially in overwatch 2.

I just hope that any future Zen lore is good, fingers crossed.

[dusty wing]

itd be cool to see how powerful zen is in lore

[peak escarp]

probably not very

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah his orbs are just canonically meditation orbs. His ult isn't canon. He canonically floats tho, mysteriously. (It's a ref to 'cultivation genre' tropes of suddenly floating once mastering techniques lol) -- I wonder if Zenyatta's floating has to do anything with the Iris or something. I also wonder where the orb tech comes from, bc even in canon it's mysterious technology.

[wise grotto]

Orisa essentially just can’t fully be independent thats the line on orisa

[unreal osprey]

did they tell which turkish city emre will be from or can i find that anywhere?

[shrewd pivot]

It is lightly implied his parents are from/near Istanbul iirc, i might be remembering wrong tho

[edgy meadow]

the orisa rework/change of character happened in early ow2 so it makes sense the writing is sloppy

[grave saddle]

Could be kinda cool if zenyattas lore is expanded as him not just being the most “enlightened” omnic, but a focal point of the Iris. That he and he alone has the ability to channel the Iris and awaken other robots that had not been originally blessed by Aurora. Could provide a cool conflict between Rammatra and Zenyatta, being friends in the past and now Zen has the ability Rammatra wants the most but maybe won’t really use for philosophical reasons

[brittle sky]

I think him being enlightened through empathy, training, and connection to the universe seems more interesting than him being a chosen one

[grave saddle]

Definitely not suggesting he should be a chosen one innately. Just that his effort into his enlightenment and connection to the iris could be cool to make him this focal point

Adds a littleeee bit of sauce to his ult

[acoustic ice]

if normal verse doom gets overthrown by vendetta, then what happens to mirrorverse doom?

[brittle sky]

vendetta sued overwatch into oblivion

[acoustic ice]

and probably hates her dad

[wise grotto]

If he coukd awaken omnics I feel like it would be really really big of a deal and would kinda invalidate one of rammattras main points that’s of the omnics being a one generation race and every omnic life is essentially just the number ticking down one less

Mercy would be mirrorverses doom

I think we need a second mirrorwatch season to actually have enough characters to know what would have happened though imo

[acoustic ice]

God yes

[grave saddle]

That’s the whole point of it tho right? Like Rammatrra wants zenyatta to use this ability because they are a finite race but zenyatta has philosophical reasons to not play god. I do agree it would have to be handled correctly to not invalidate Rammatrras cause entirely

[acoustic ice]

Especially with Domina in the game, we could swap her and Junker Queen

[brittle sky]

does that mean mob boss jq is secretly a mirrorverse skin?

[acoustic ice]

nah i don't really consider it that, maybe a different au
i'm imagining mirrorwatch junker queen to kinda be like sym aesthetics-wise

[near pine]

oh i would LOVE it. i really enjoyed all the small details in the skins. like widows eye being synthetic, so ana didn't hesitate in that universe.

[acoustic ice]

mirrorwatch ana is my favorite ana skin

i can't ever use her mythic when mirrorwatch ana exists

[wise grotto]

It’s not the whole point rammattra thinks makinf peace with them is bad because humans have repeatedly killed omnics or used them in fight arenas as hate crimes and it’s killing there race slowly

[grave saddle]

It’s the whole point of my suggestion. That conflict between Rammatra and zenyatta

[wise grotto]

The thing is if zen could do that there would be no reason for rammattras invasion
No reason for his ideology because all they’d need to do is go repair the omnic and breath life back into them

Then suddenly rammattra would probably rather be a glorified emt with zen

[grave saddle]

I think you have missed the part of my suggestion where zenyatta refuses to use the ability. Hence the conflict

Regardless it was just a thought as I like the idea of zenyatta being more involved and Orisa gaining sapience because she’s a cool character

[wise grotto]

It would unironically just make zenyatta the more evil seeming one
It would in our eyes villainize zenyatta csuse he has the ability to save his race and would refuse to

Ramm and zen are very similar to magneto and Charles for a reason

Just with higher stakes

[acoustic ice]

still mad that mirrorwatch tracer has no voice lines

[grave saddle]

Yeah that’s why I just said “philosophical reasons” because I haven’t put too much thought into it lol. But I can imagine the power of god being something zenyatta has some reason not to use

[wise grotto]

To save others he would have more reasons to then not
Especially in the case of mondattas death

[grave saddle]

The power of life is sometjing that is very commonly shown in enlightened characters to not be abused. The ability to bring souls back to life is not something to be taken lightly, especially with a devout follower of Aurora who said “you get one life, choose well”

I literally only imagined the situation of Zen being so connected to the Iris that he could awaken Orisa. Even if it was a one time thing

[wise grotto]

I just don’t think it would make the race of omnics be the same impact especially in the world of Overwatch
It would by far make zenyatta a negative when you look at a universe that very clearly doesn’t care about the whole “playing god” tropes

He’d be both out of place ideologically and would be kinda seen as cruel with how little they ideology matters by ows standards

[grave saddle]

Just because other characters try to play god wouldn’t mean that zen refusing to is evil I feel

[wise grotto]

Pretty sure there’s 10 characters in the cast that would be dead if it weren’t for there enhancements

[grave saddle]

Plus to your previous point, even if the ability was permanent, it wouldn’t be able to bring “souls” back. The awakened omnic if repaired wouldn’t be the same omnic that died

You do only get one life

[wise grotto]

He need to be a different character in almost every way and would actively be villanized by how the story goes
Not objectively evil
But his ideology would just be at odds with the worlds current story telling

[grave saddle]

But that wouldn’t be my suggestion anyway

[grave saddle]

I do agree if Zen had the ability permanently and outright refused to use it in all situations. But I suggested it as an idea to really just bring Orisa sapience. A showcase of something Zenyatta theoretically can do in certain scenarios. Something that would directly put him at odds with Rammatra

[wise grotto]

Hell genji wouodnt have been accepted by zenyatta because genjis existence would go against zenyattas beliefs as example

[grave saddle]

Wdym? Zenyattas belief in this context is not creating life himself. Genji being saved isn’t creating new life

[wise grotto]

A character with a view like that could work but they’d need to be there own thing

[grave saddle]

Just preserving what’s already there

[wise grotto]

In this case it would be saving and preserving a race and culture

[grave saddle]

With the context of creating new souls. It’s not just saving a race

That’s playing god. Something I think theoretically could be philosophically opposed

But regardless, I do agree it’s a tough one for where the story is right now

[still hawk]

did you guys know overwatch has lore in it

[wise grotto]

Wait really
No way

[kind carbon]

yall what’s a good up to date video that covers all current Overwatch lore, and then one specifically for reaper?
Also Currently bouta watch a 4 hour vid that is supposedly all the cinimatica although it was posted 4 months ago so if there’s an even more up to date version of that I’d like it

[still hawk]

what yall think sombra widow reaper gonna do now

r they gonna become the besties faction

or maybe the friends forever frenzy

or or

the fun fiasco

blizzard gonna hire me now

[kind carbon]

I hope reaper blasts widow and sombra to pieces tbh

[still hawk]

bro

widow and sombra are baddies

i thought this was supposed to be the most advanced security system on the planet

[kind carbon]

You want him to hit it then kill em or some shit cus that’s weird

[still hawk]

no im saying reaper lowkey mid compared to them

no offense

i see you have a bias here

this is a losing battle i have chosen

[kind carbon]

ok so like.. why are we lying.

Be so fr the bitch who wants to look like thanos and hacky bitch are the mid ones compared to reaper

[still hawk]

reaper is just like eor donkey if he was given guns

but like before he turned into a depressed pile of dust, i liked him a lot

[kind carbon]

who

[harsh pivot]

Can anyone answer this question for me,

If Widows drug supply got cut off which is in game

What happens?

I know it maintains her skill and helps her suppress her bad memories

But without the drugs does her skin turn back to normal too?

[grave saddle]

I watched that same video and it’s very helpful

[kind carbon]

alright that’s good to know

[grave saddle]

Puts it all in chronological order to some decent degree

[shrewd pivot]

We don't know for sure since that was recent lore that she uses drugs. We can guess that without the drugs, her memories would resurface and she won't be as sharp as before.

And if Zenyatta could knowingly grant aurora's awakening but refuses to, that makes Zenyatta callous considering Ramattra just had a whole war that killed people over preserving the remaining omnics. And even if it was that Zenyatta later learns he could awaken more omnics but refuses, Zenyatta chosing omnic extinction is kinda wild to write, I wouldn't want that to be Zenyatta's lore...

[minor surge]

ughh is it likely for symmetra to get new lore this yearr 🥺

[shrewd pivot]

Domina lore may very well lead into Symmetra uncovering the truth about Vishkar's founder (creator of hardlight tech)

I would love Symmetra lore this year :)

[minor surge]

yes i would love that i feel like they take so long when it comes to the games lore

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah, pve being canceled was to blame for story stagnation.

Thankingfully each year going forward now we get new arcs in overwatch! 1 year = one arc.

[twilit patrol]

I'm hoping for Gibraltar's attack cinematic for s1 launch

[minor surge]

that's amaazing I just hope they start adding lore more consistently with the new dynamic they have

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah this year every season will bring a new hero, 5 in s1, and 1 in s2, 1 in s3, etc

6 seasons this year will complete this Vendetta arc.

[minor surge]

I'm afraid that's going to slow down lore progression for everyone else goshh it's just kind of boring only getting lore when a new character is released and the more characters they release the more things they'll have to take into consideration before releasing lore to make sure everything adds up I guess

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah i totally agree. I imagine each hero will add onto plot though, considering Mizuki will probably help Kiriko save her dad from the Hashimoto.

I just hope the "3 heros a year" to now "6+ heroes a year" doesn't result in shallow writing. Regardless, I am very happy to see more locations in the overwatch world explored! I am hype for new maps and new heroes from areas overwatch has not explored before.

[minor surge]

A utopaea map would honestly be so nice and I really do hope they explore vishkar as a company more because we haven't really been fed much regarding vishkar. I fully agree with what you said about shallow writing and it's honestly just getting more and more difficult for them to both write characters into the lore and expanding the lore for the characters that are already added. A ton of heroes each year is still nice thoo and I'm really excited for domina

[shrewd pivot]

Yeye same!

[wise grotto]

They are not doing 6+ heroes a year regularly they’ve stated there doing the 10 heroes this year for the 10th aniversery

[minor surge]

have they said anything about how many heroes thye are adding

[wise grotto]

They’ve never said they’ll change the normal pace they’ve only exclusively said that they’re doing this years 10 full heroes FOR the ten year aniversery

Specifically during the spotlight Aron himself said this during his opening thing

He wanted this year to be a BIG one and this is definitely a way to make it big

[shrewd pivot]

Ah, Pardon my wording. I do suspect 6 will be norm next year, but I said 6+ to include this year in the convo.

[grave saddle]

Again just an idea but it wasn’t that he already had it and it wasn’t that it was some permanent ability he could spam. Rather it was sometjing he used to awaken Orisa in some sad or heated situation and then did not pursue the power of a god. Which I think is totally fine for Zenyatta as a character to choose

[shrewd pivot]

Hm. I get the premise, but I think Orisa being awakened one day best suits a different route.

Zenyatta is very much optumistic to Ramattra's pessimistic after all.

[grave saddle]

Very possibly there is a better route for that moment yeah. I was only combining it with my desire for Zenyatta and Orisa to have some sort of prevalent story beat

Didn’t even know Orisa joined overwatch until voice lines ya know. I share the sentiment about struggling to expand lore on characters when they are adding so many but I’m sure it can be achieved

[shrewd pivot]

Zenyatta and Orisa focused lore one day would be precious imo 🥹 Efi and Orisa and Zenyatta definitely have an optumistic hopeful outlook for human omnic unity.

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah, Orisa and Efi joining overwatch was covered in a "heroes ascendant" story.

[grave saddle]

Fr

Yeah I haven’t managed to read all the heroes ascendant stories and alt comics because I had a little hiatus. But in my loose following I thought I saw the introduction to them joining being only in voice lines. Glad to know there’s actually a story there

[wise grotto]

I don’t think we have a reason to expect 6 every year
If it does become the norm I think there’s gonna be a bit of an issue another game hasn’t quite solved yet with rapid hero releases

[shrewd pivot]

Oh if its only 10 this year, then back to 3 a year starting next year I would be surprised

I honestly expected 4 heroes a year, not 10 this year lol so who knows what they will do next year

[grave saddle]

I think it will largely depend on the lessons learnt from this year. If they can release one a season and the players are happy with balancing, meta changes, and the lore.. don’t see why they would change that model

[hollow oar]

honestly i hope they only do 10 this year, then drastically lower the amount of characters dropped per year after (maybe back to 3, maybe a little more than that)
if we keep up the pattern of 10 heroes per year, we'll have an additional 30 heroes in 3 years down the line on top of our current 43- thats 73 heroes to balance and give well-written lore to. i'm worried it could get overwhelming fast, quality over quantity

[minor wedge]

i'm pretty sure after 2026 it'll be 6 per year

if they're sticking with the one hero every season thing

[shrewd pivot]

I wouldn't mind 4 per year after this year tbh

Gives them an off season to focus on balance and maps between hero releases

[past copper]

I doubt it. They're going to hit a dry spell after hero 10 is released

[shrewd pivot]

I also heard that devs are actually acknowledging the requests for Anran's face model to be changed. Please be real and please happen, Anran needs a face model that looks like she's the older sister of Wuyang.

[hollow oar]

i cant wait to hear all of emre's spawnroom interactions tomorrow

he better have some lines with freja

[spare wren]

I have a hill that I will die on now. Hammond has an australian accent that we can't hear because his ball is his translator. My evidence? He lives in Junkertown, has for years and is it's current reigning champion.

[hollow oar]

are hamsters even capable of having accents though?

[spare wren]

Not really? I just find it interesting that he totally would have one if he could speak English

[hollow oar]

humanized version of hammond would absolutely have an australian accent

[kind carbon]

Would omnics just eventually all die out? Either from running out of power or simply people killing them all

[shrewd pivot]

Yes, with no way to create new awakened omnics, awakened omnics are a "functionally extinct" species with no way to repopulate.

[past copper]

Her own voice actor acknowledged it too and agrees

I'm not a fan of the animation she showed up in, but it along with the comic, did make Anran look older as she should be

[shrewd pivot]

Yeah not a fan of the cell shaded 2d style either (I prefer the artstyle of the recent Doomfist vs Vendetta cinematic), but Anran should have looked more like her cinematic for sure. At the end of thr day, Anran should look like the older sister of Aran. Aka have a face that looks related to Wuyang and a face that looks older than Wuyang.

[past copper]

Too be fair, think the face design got mullied while four other heroes were being made

[shrewd pivot]

Which is all the more reason to be worried that overwatch is doing quantity over quality 😔 hopefully it can be tweaked eventually

[past copper]

https://www.reddit.com/r/overwatch2/s/Lu03TV6R8I

Yep. First time a VA has acknowledged their character needing to have their model changed

But I can see where she is coming from. There's a meme going around of Anran having Juno's face

[hushed jetty]

and thank god for that

the same face syndrome has been pretty bad recently

with the women, mostly

[digital linden]

the concept of showing her original design in the animation, one that ppl actively liked, then changing the in-game model to be just another pretty asian girl duplicate and to NOT anticipate any backlash

just glad theyre acknowledging it

[dense garnet]

Idk if changing is the right word

I think they were always gonna use that face for ingame

Regardless of the cinematics

[karmic crown]

I feel like that abrupt change on Talon was so bad

If we had more lore during these 4 Overwatch 2 years, it might have been good

[sullen girder]

You think the youkai will join ow? I mean, talons seems to be gathering numbers pretty fast so I was wondering if ow is doing the same (besides wuyang, anran and jetpack cat)

[karmic crown]

But come on, they just put a random character to defeat Doomfist and claim back Talon?

Just to initiate another lore arc

If we had more lore following doomfist on Talon and all he did

But suddenly he gets defeated

Idk if i liked that

And ngl

If Vendetta father was a more interesting character

But he was so ass

[wooden drift]

Who even had the same face except anran? I thought every other character were looking different from eachother

[hushed jetty]

people used to argue that ashe looks a lot like widowmaker

[peak escarp]

she looks similar to Juno

[hushed jetty]

anran looks a lot like juno and maybe kiriko

[wooden drift]

Yea, I saw these posts

And about brig looking similar to mercy

[peak escarp]

specifically in her default pose - when she's in motion the similarity is less apparent

[wooden drift]

Didn't helped that her pose in character select similar to Juno's

[peak escarp]

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/_MXorzhILEU?feature=share

Aaron has addressed it directly

[wooden drift]

Thats our sonic movie moment

[dense garnet]

Not just discussed it, pretty much confirmed they're gonna do it

My guess is during season 2

[wooden drift]

Maybe late season 1

[peak escarp]

I can understand it being something that's not an easy fix

you have to go through the artists, the riggers, the animators to make sure everything plays nicely together

possibly even updating sprays and other art

[wooden drift]

Sprays for new hero? Imagine that...

[peak escarp]

well, in the BP

[wooden drift]

I don't think Vendetta had any in bp or in the shop

Probably the same thing is with Anran and others

[peak escarp]

idk then

[past copper]

Just goes to show. If many people let their voices be heard, change can be achieved. Life lesson there people

[wooden drift]

Not always tho

[peak escarp]

depends on the subject

depends if it's doable at all

[past copper]

Certainly worked over the Adobe Animate situation

[wooden drift]

Depends on the people who are willing to listen for feedback

[wise grotto]

This is the first ever model change they made via complaints since I think maybe traver

Unless the tracer ass was never done

[peak escarp]

Hanzo's casual skin

[wise grotto]

That’s a cosmetic I’m talking base model
There’s also hogs kaiju skin for actual cosmetics

[wise grotto]

Yea that’s just a colour change

[peak escarp]

it's still something that got changed due to complaints

[wise grotto]

Vs anrans face being remodelled hence the model change part

[wooden drift]

Did people really complained about it?

[peak escarp]

his beard was actually 3D in the old version, the new version made it a texture

[dense garnet]

People are still complaining for Pharah's VA to be changed. Has been for a long time atp

[wooden drift]

Did she really said something super controversial?

[dense garnet]

She's very pro-Israel and uses Pharah for her Israel military propaganda stuff supposedly

[wooden drift]

I think if she did something like that with blizzard character, she probably would've been thrown out instantly

[weary quarry]

Is this a revert?

[peak escarp]

yeah I think Blizzard would jump on her for IP infringement

[dense garnet]

Yeah, I just look at what people say about her, but yeah her political views are a red flag for lots of people, rightly so

[wooden drift]

Like how it happen with beast boy va from teen titans

[peak escarp]

it was a change made to the skin shortly after it was released in 2017

because it didn't look like it did in the comic

[weary quarry]

I never noticed lol

[past copper]

Don't forget the change Zarya's winterfront skin got in taking the Z off her coat

[dense garnet]

Also changed Mei's boxing skin because of the dreads

Or maybe they removed that skin entirely

[dense nebula]

I literally saw that skin in game recently

She still has the dreads tmk

[dense garnet]

Ah rip

[weary quarry]

They didnt

Its an owl skin

[peak escarp]

it's not dreads it's cornrows

[fossil wren]

I wonder if we'll get a video introduction for the new heroes

[edgy meadow]

am i being gaslit. is that not how his beard already looks on this skin

https://gifconvert.vxtwitter.com/convert.avif?url=https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/HAQvtyGWQAAThA4.mp4

[peak escarp]

this is from 2017

[edgy meadow]

good PR move

[edgy meadow]

ah

makes sense

[edgy meadow]

i hope she didnt say that out of pressure

usually when shit like this happen some idiots can target the voice actor so i always get a bit worried

especially after following her stream during the spotlight which was really awesome to see her genuine excitement

it seems genuine but

[fossil wren]

Also, the update is tomorrow, I don't think there's time to make that change right now, but maybe in late season 1 or early season 2

[edgy meadow]

they said sometime in season one with no guarantee

[digital linden]

yep aaron said hopefully s1 so i’d anticipate midseason but i think the safer bet is s2

[edgy meadow]

knowing that the team likes to be optimistic about deadlines and not pessimistic its probably season 2

[digital linden]

i’d rather them get the design right

[edgy meadow]

unless they work their ass off to rush off the redesign asap

[alpine terrace]

im actually so surprised they addressed this and are willing to change it omg thank gosh

[alpine terrace]

i bought mma mei recently in the shop so they drgaf about that one i think

[edgy meadow]

i have complete faith in team 4

[edgy tree]

I saw the Giblartar changes

looks like all the problematic highground now has a simple way to get there

[edgy meadow]

gib rework looks gas

[crystal saffron]

even that plane?

[ruby portal]

sexy time

[edgy tree]

Yep the plane fell down somewhat so u can't camp there and there's a nice ramp to the highground under it

[crystal saffron]

i lwk cant understand why do people like 2nd floor maps

theyre so hard to attack

[edgy tree]

Cuz poke map

They like poke

[crystal saffron]

dorado,gibraltar,route 66

[crystal saffron]

they poke at much worse angle if tank cant play well

[crystal saffron]

these maps pretty much force tanks to play dive tanks aswell

[edgy tree]

Yeah but it's still a lot safer tbh

[crystal saffron]

since noone will even play sym and use tp together

[edgy tree]

Tracer for example usually has issues getting there

[crystal saffron]

wb attack 😭

[edgy tree]

They painfully attempt to take highground at all cost xd

[wise grotto]

Gibraltr was a dive map

[edgy tree]

oh yeah....

I do see more poke on it today though

[wise grotto]

I mean that’s more cause you can get away with it easier since most ranks can’t play dive

[edgy tree]

I wonder how it's meta will be now with how easy the acces to highground is

[wise grotto]

Honestly I imagine dive will still be good but rush will probably just become viable on the map

[edgy tree]

Yeah now having a Rein on 2nd point will not be as bad xd

The space on top of the ship is also fully visible from below now so that helps with people just stacking on it

[visual cobalt]

Thank You Marvel Rivals 🐐

I’m happy they are diving more into the lore btw

[wooden drift]

Meh, I think we would gotten the same things without marvel rivals

In slower pace, maybe

[visual cobalt]

[edgy meadow]

we already know that they were planning a lot of these changes much before rivals came out.

not gonna pretend like rivals had 0 influence on the game recently, but stuff like perks, stadium, and the shift into narrative focus are probably not a direct result

stuff like 10 heroes a year tho? that was probably the rivals influence

seeing that highly frequent hero releases get a lot of player engagement and trying to make it work

[peak escarp]

it's 10 heroes for the 10th anniversary

we're not getting 10 heroes every year

[wooden drift]

Yeah, I guessed tho

Then 5-6 heroes every year

[cosmic crest]

When are we gonna get Talon HQ as a map

That's something I've always wanted

[spare fox]

Rialto kinda

Talon is more like a "secret lair" kind of organization rather than an HQ kind of organization

people were theorizing that there's more to Malevento than meets the eye, too

[dense garnet]

I want a Null Sector map

[abstract owl]

I think its gonna stay as 3 every year

[wooden drift]

Nuh omnium map would be much better

I don't even know what null sector map would be about

[dense garnet]

Null Sector-controlled areas

Like a city that's filled with Null Sector stuff

[wooden drift]

But they left all the cities

[dense garnet]

They'll come back

[wooden drift]

And I think omnium could be much better and creative map

[dense garnet]

They can remake New Queen's Street so that it's Null Sector-fied and the Bot is a Null Sector bot

Now that they're doing story-based map reworks

[wooden drift]

Nuh, if they wanna keep the momentum going, one character every season is essential

[wooden drift]

I just don't see any reasons why would null sector would comeback to invade cities again

[dense garnet]

What else would they do

[edgy tree]

I wonder what other changes besides just looking like Talon owns it did they make to Rialto

[dense garnet]

Just sit around and do nothing like Talon did?

[wooden drift]

Well, rammatra got what he wanted. So, yeah

He's gonna sit down and do nothing

[edgy tree]

It was said they're gonna wait out the Vendetta invasion

watch humanity kill itself

[dense garnet]

That's lame. I love making cool character never relevant to the story again

[dense garnet]

I mean duh

[wooden drift]

Thats overwatch for ya

[dense garnet]

I envision Null Sector coming back in 2027

[wooden drift]

Or another baddie

[edgy tree]

Ig after "saving" all the Omnics they managed to grab they're gonna try to forcefully change how they treat em

[wooden drift]

I wouldn't mind if overwatch kept on making more villains

[edgy tree]

would be cool

[wooden drift]

I want evil monkey ngl

[edgy tree]

Villains/Neutrals usually get really experimental stuff

[fallow mantle]

I share a birthday with Emre!!

[edgy tree]

besides the new batch of good guys ig

[fallow mantle]

8 Nov and he's 44!

[wooden drift]

Damn hes old

[sullen girder]

Wait, I thought domina doesn’t work for talon, I just saw the talon video

[fallow mantle]

He HHAD to be at least 44 lol I did all the maths the other day

[wooden drift]

Vishkar works with talon

Obviously domina too

[sullen girder]

Not as old as sigma, last I checked, he’s the oldest guy in this game

[keen summit]

EMRE LORE

[wooden drift]

Damn, overwatch writting is this fire?!

[sullen girder]

Omg, talon is really working their numbers. Wait, doesn’t that mean sym is working with talon as well?

[pseudo siren]

https://tenor.com/view/fire-writing-writing-fire-his-writing-is-fire-is-this-fire-hold-up-gif-15400153686296022809

[wooden drift]

She probably doesn't even know about it tbh

And sym already kinda leaving vishkar

[dense garnet]

She's literally making energy shields for Talon's army

[wooden drift]

They taking their time with it for some reason

Make her leave them already

[wooden drift]

Lets forgive her...

[gusty cloak]

how do the new era skins in the battlepass make sense for lore? genji has his mask off and his face is normal?

[whole junco]

Real talk, I'm honestly really annoyed at Jetpack Cat's backstory. This is the laziest backstory in all of Overwatch's history that's just using the "oh but it's cute!" justification for lazy writing.

[gusty cloak]

in contrast to her, hammond has such deep lore

[whole junco]

Wrecking Ball does have really interesting lore, I originally thought his lore was lazy cause "oh he hitched a ride with Winston", but new comics and interactions proved to make him pretty damn interesting. But Fika just has... nothing

[gusty cloak]

they said she turned up in watchpoint gibraltor out of nowhere. i hope its like talon left her and she's some spy

an evil cat would be interesting

hammond is team overwatch right?

[whole junco]

Nah, he's a Junker

[gusty cloak]

oh

[hushed jetty]

this is surely some kind of cipher right

[gusty cloak]

honestly i wish they would've used brig's cat mitzi as jetpack cat.

[wooden drift]

And he's not really fond of winston

[whole junco]

Which means he's gonna be talked to by Mauga and try to be recruited for Talon, but I don't feel as if the Junkers would really side anywhere here, except maybe Roadhog with Talon given his super doomsday mindset

[wooden drift]

But wouldn't you have the same complaints that its just normal cat?

[lavish osprey]

Blizzard didn't have to go so hard on the Talon recruitement ad

[gusty cloak]

atleast mitzi would have more lore connections

fika just came outta nowhere

[whole junco]

There's so much more potential for lore as well there

Fika has, quite literally, nothing

[wooden drift]

Maybe comic would elaborate on her backstory more

I hope so

[shrewd pivot]

It seems to be a Cypher so if anyone wants to crack it haha

[dry pebble]

Where can i view the New characters interactions

Without getting in game cause im not avaliable

[wooden drift]

Ye, they haven't even used winston va for overwatch's one

[gusty cloak]

feels like a last minute decision with the lack of lore she has. her showing up in watchpoint gibraltor randomly is so lazy

[hushed jetty]

they arent documented yet i dont think

[dry pebble]

Chernobog cool as fuck

[whole junco]

I'll at least wait until the end of the year before fully bashing the cat, they have said that this season is a story with a beginning, middle, and end, so perhaps they are just waiting to expand upon the cat

[wooden drift]

Just give it a couple of days and that one YouTube channel would have em ready

[dense garnet]

Hammond is a Junker, potentially Talon if the Junkers get recruited

[hushed jetty]

WE MUST REACTIVATE CHERNOBOG ‼️

[hollow oar]

GRRRR I HAVE TWO HOURS UNTIL I CAN ACCESS EMRE UPDATE STUFF I WANT TO HEAR HIS VOICELINES NOW

[dense garnet]

I've been saying that you can't just train a cat to use a jetpack

[dry pebble]

I want Chernobog to be actually light hearted god program but people viewing him as literal satan due to previous Anibus events so he just connects itself to Emre in order to protect the kind he once adored

[hollow oar]

IM COMING FOR YOU EMRE YOU CAN RUN BUT YOU CANT HIDE

[lime geyser]

ow is so back

[wooden drift]

But if she says meow meow and use it flawlessly

[hollow oar]

PEAKWATCH IS HERE

[whole junco]

Yeah definitely not, either the dev team completely looked over Fika's lore, and/or there's gonna be lore introduced later throughout story

[lime geyser]

fr

[dry pebble]

I like to think Chernobog secretly seized to the Talon recruitment in order to sabotage their plans

[hollow oar]

maybe the kitty is just a smartypants

[dry pebble]

They are like anti heroes

[whole junco]

Then where's the lore on why the cat is a smarty pants?

[hollow oar]

but if chernobog isnt lowkey kind of evil, then why is emre so villainous when he gets possessed by chernobog?

[hollow oar]

wheres the lore on why you’re a smarty pants?
being a smarty pants isnt something that needs a backstory, its just something that comes naturally

[lethal path]

Like what is lore

[hushed jetty]

this is the question...

[dry pebble]

I also like to think over time he will gonna be over protective AI that backfires him his good deeds

[hushed jetty]

the thing is chernobog was supposedly shut down so the fact its even active is already odd

[hollow oar]

l o r e 🤤 🤤

[dry pebble]

True, it is reminds me of Karen from Detroit