Some Overwatch fans are pretty sure they have figured out what the next hero will be based on an short lore post that dropped yesterday, as well as some promotional images floating through the internet.
Yesterday, Blizzard dropped a new bit of lore relating to a new character, Efi Oladele, an eleven year-old inventor from Numbani. The interview certainly seems to be teasing something — the unnamed interviewer asked Efi what she’ll be doing with her grant money and she says, “Oh… I have an idea…”
But according to some fans, that’s basically enough information to glean exactly who the new hero would be. It’s not an adult Efi, who lead Overwatch writer Michael Chu has confirmed is definitely eleven in present day Overwatch, but instead her as of yet unannounced robot, Anchora, which is a spider shaped tank.
A spider shaped robot has appeared twice before, so this speculation isn’t entirely baseless. It’s appeared once in Sombra’s origin story video, pretty clearly in the lower left hand corner, connected to an image of Doomfist’s gauntlet.
This spider tank also appeared in promotional images in the background of panels during Blizzcon. In this panel, you can see it in the upper right hand corner at about 11:25.
This image reappeared today during Blizzard’s DICE Summit presentation.
Some fans also point to a 4Chan post that correctly predicted the Year of the Rooster event for the Lunar New Year. This post also said that the next hero would be a tank named Anchora, with a West African accent. YouTuber Hammeh is quick to point out that this might not be the most reliable source.
According to Hammeh, the 4Chan post also said to expect New Year’s skins for Genji and Hanzo and that the Year of the Rooster event would not be a major event, just skins. On the other hand, Hammeh points out that the lore of Numbani, a city with mech and human coexistence, lends some credence to the theory. So far the only concrete link the spider robot design has to lore is through the Sombra short, where it’s connected to Doomfist, a character from Numbani.
While some fans are excited for the prospect of Doomfist being the new hero, Jeff Kaplan has said that the new hero “is not who you think it is,” which he repeated today at their DICE Summit presentation. So why not an eleven year old and her spider robot?
It’s always interesting to watch fans try to untangle new information from even the tiniest bits of new lore. The theories about Anchora are pretty fascinating regardless of whether or not they turn out to real. In any case, Efi Oladele is a fun addition to the overall Overwatch story, and it will be cool to see how she fits in as more is revealed.
Comments
4 responses to “Overwatch Fans Believe The Next Hero Is A Robot Spider”
Jeff Kaplan has confirmed that the next hero is definitely not the spider robot from the concept art. Information is on the following Reddit link: https://www.reddit.com/r/Overwatch/comments/5vkady/previous_artwork_is_not_the_concept_for_24_jeff/?utm_content=comments&utm_medium=hot&utm_source=reddit&utm_name=Overwatch
Just wanted to point out that there’s pretty clearly a person’s legs dangling from the main body of the spider mech, so I doubt that would be made by Efi
There are two different “Spider” silhouette heroes. The one shown above is a bionic woman, not the mech made by Efi. Efi’s mech is much more bulky and is actually shown fighting alongside Bastion type robots.
If Ancora does turn out to be an actual character name, I’d say it’s far more likely to be the Greek hero linked to Illios that people have speculated about, rather than an African spider.
Ancora is Latin for Anchor, deriving from the Greek Ancyra. Ancyra is also the name of a real city (It’s in Turkey, called Ankara nowadays) mythologically founded by King Midas – the fella who turned everything he touched to gold
Maybe it’d make more sense For Anchora/Ankyra/Ankara to be a level – Maybe a city of gold, or if they went more literal, with interesting buildings built in and around rocks
or one with buldings built into rocks
http://tedytravel.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Ankara-Turkey-10.jpg