Blizzard
Overwatch 2 officially unveils Kiriko and a Portugal-inspired map
As part of Tokyo Game Show 2022, Blizzard has unveiled the new character that will arrive with the first battle pass for Overwatch 2.
After rumors, leaks, and teases in previous trailers, Blizzard finally makes official Kiriko, a new heroine coming to Overwatch 2, through a presentation during Tokyo Game Show 2022.
Kiriko is a very particular support character, according to her developers in an interview prior to her reveal. In her presentation video, we can see that she is a character that seeks to mix the traditional side of Japan with the modern one, wearing "a street style, but also with nods to traditional Japanese clothing", according to the creative designer, Kyungseo Min. She considers herself the guardian of Kanezaka, mixing the healing skills she learned while taking care of the temple with her grandmother, but with the fighting skills and being a ninja learned from her mother.
"Kiriko is our support ninja," Dion Rogers, art director, commented to us. "We really wanted a gameplay that feels this way as you are playing with. She is very mobile, and has this really cool teleport ability."
As we saw in her trailer, Kiriko has abilities that allow her to heal and empower her teammates, part of her role as support. In addition to the aforementioned teleportation, she can stop certain damage her teammates may receive. Although we didn't see much of her gameplay, she was described as "a support that Genji players would want to play" and even similar to Zenyatta, being "a bit of offensive-minded support." Something that was highlighted is that "Her healing is really powerful as well. At first, feels pretty good. But when you find the nuance of it, the way it anticipates the damage in certain encounters, she becomes a really powerful healer," commented Dion Rogers.
The switch to Overwatch's 5v5 format made "being support was a little bit harder" commented hero designer, Piero Herrera. "The way we are responding is that we are making sure the new support heroes have defensive utilities. With Kiriko can use her ‘cleanse’ to heal herself if the player chooses to. These are some of the really subtle design differences that we are exploring to make sure that these characters feel really good even on the 5v5 format."
How will Kiriko be obtained in Overwatch 2?
Kiriko will be the first hero to arrive in the Overwatch 2 Battle Pass. The character will be available when you buy this pass -which costs 1000 Overwatch Coins, around $10. If you decide not to access this pass, you will get her when you reach level 55 of the free Battle Pass.
Kiriko, as well as all the upcoming heroes coming to the title, will not automatically be in competitive mode. This responds to two objectives that Blizzard makes clear: to give the opportunity to players who do not buy the battle pass to get the characters, as well as to give the development team time to adjust the heroes before they enter the competitive mode. "We have processes in place, we have a few weeks after the release that we can look at the numbers, look at the data, how the players play this character and then adjust before she is in competitive play," Herrera mentioned.
Traveling to: Portugal
During the presentation, a new map inspired by Portugal, called Esperança, was also revealed, being one of the most detailed maps they have worked on. In this map, we will go through a residential area near a small port. According to Dion Rogers, the main designer of Portugal is from the country so he "poured a lot of his knowledge on the map."
It is worth mentioning that this map will be available to all Overwatch 2 players and joins the list of new maps including Circuit Royal, Midtown, and Paraiso, to name a few.
Overwatch 2 will arrive on October 4 on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and Nintendo Switch.