Overwatch’s latest character, the help hero Kiriko, is having a unique type of rollout. She’s the primary new hero to be included as a part of Overwatch 2’s battle move, which means that whereas many gamers have entry to Kiriko, others are nonetheless grinding away to unlock her. She’s additionally simply been added to one among Overwatch 2’s core modes, and her viability in aggressive gameplay will probably be examined within the coming weeks and months.

Kiriko additionally had a considerably uncommon path into the sport itself: She began as a bit of idea artwork supposed for Overwatch 2’s PvE part, which Blizzard plans to ship subsequent 12 months. Originally conceived as an enemy unit sort, Kiriko graduated to full hero based mostly on her sturdy visible design. She’s additionally been within the works in numerous incarnations for about 4 years, as Blizzard tried to show a drawing of a streetwear-sporting healer-ninja with a ghostly fox right into a playable hero.

Senior hero designer Joshua Noh instructed Polygon in a latest interview that Kiriko went by “probably four support kits’ worth of abilities, just trying to find what’s fun and what works in the game, especially with the new five-versus-five paradigm for PvP.”

Kiriko “started as just a really cool art piece that [character art director] Arnold [Tsang] drew,” Noh recalled. “He drew a whole bunch of ninjas [that] could potentially be enemies. And we we’re like, Hey, this one looks super awesome. Let’s try and make it into a hero.” Noh mentioned that Kiriko’s spirit fox was initially “sort of like a pet class in an MMO and follows you around” therapeutic your teammates. But that concept proved too troublesome to implement, and ultimately developed into Kiriko’s final means, Kitsune Rush, which offered technical challenges of its personal.

“There’s a lot of stuff happening in the background there,” Noh mentioned, explaining that Kiriko’s fox must navigate round in-game objects, gaps on the ground, and terrain. “Displaying such a big area as [a huge buff] is kind of a challenge in a game that’s already as visually noisy as Overwatch.”

Image: Arnold Tsang/Blizzard Entertainment

Kiriko’s unique design included a comically outsized shuriken that acted preferred a yo-yo or boomerang — a weapon that was ultimately repurposed for one more hero, Junker Queen, who throws a knife that may be recalled.

“It was very fun to use,” Noh mentioned of Kiriko’s shuriken. “But we ran into this problem where it created this very striking silhouette that looked very deadly, like a DPS player, and people kind of expected that weapon to really take people out. […] But one of the other challenges we ran into along the way with her [ninja design] was that all the abilities were really hard to translate to healer gameplay.” The crew experimented with a shotgun-like therapeutic weapon, however needed to keep away from magic or ninja tropes, Noh mentioned. Ultimately, they settled on therapeutic and cleaning talismans known as ofuda, which leans extra towards the religious than the magical, that use comparatively new homing expertise constructed for Overwatch 2.

Noh mentioned that Kiriko began out as a “trickster hero, and she had a lot of ways to kind of deceive the enemy team.” Early variations of her package included smoke bombs and a “ninja shadow clone ability” that gamers might swap locations with. But in the end, the purpose with Kiriko was to “try to incentivize DPS players a little bit to try to support,” Noh mentioned, “kind of like trying to attract all the Genji tracer type of players over to the support role.” (Overwatch 2 gamers are doubtless conscious that that well-meaning purpose has completed little to abate queue occasions for the harm position, however it was an admirable try.)

Kiriko’s again story and connection to the heroes of Overwatch is printed in a brief story penned by Christie Golden titled “Yokai,” and in an animated quick launched in early October. But in response to narrative designer Kyungseo Min, Kiriko’s position because the protector of Kanezaka and her ties to the Shimada brothers Genji and Hanzo, has been seeded in Overwatch since early 2021. The deathmatch map Kanezaka consists of references to foxes, the Yokai vigilante group that Kiriko is a member of, and the rival Hashimoto clan who run the Tiger’s Den bar in that neighborhood.

“We definitely wanted her to have some sort of tie with the Shimada brothers,” Min mentioned. “An early iteration was [that Kiriko was] their long-lost sister, however we ditched that concept as a result of we needed to make our worldview look somewhat bit greater, however nonetheless related. We landed on [Kiriko being] a household pal, like a niece kind of relationship between these two.

“Since we were working on Kanezaka, we’d already had her in mind and shaping her personality, and how she fits in with the Overwatch universe and the Shimada clan falling and the Hashimoto taking over… She’s just sort of a part of a youthful group of vigilantes protecting the community.”

Kiriko’s persona in Overwatch 2 derived from a wide range of sources of inspiration, together with Kaoru Kamiya, the kendo teacher (and love curiosity) from the manga/anime Rurouni Kenshin. According to Min, the narrative crew needed to match Kiriko’s persona, in some methods to her play type. Kiriko merges each offense and help, with an angle to match: “in your face” in a battle, but in addition conventional, reserved, and dryly witty.

“It was actually really fun trying to balance those two sort of opposing personalities,” Min mentioned. “I think we had a lot of fun actually trying to deliver that dry, sort of flatter tone, because we’ve always wanted to do it, it’s just very difficult to balance that in the soundscape of our game. You only have a few seconds to really like communicate to the players, so they have to be a larger than life… So to try to get [Kiriko’s] deadpan humor right was really challenging.”

Min added, “There’s [a Kiriko] interaction with D.Va that I really enjoy just because it really shows our optimistic future Overwatch world. They’re both very strong woman — they’re very blunt, both of them. So there’s one line where D.Va goes, ‘Can they get anything done without us?’ and Kiriko says, ‘It’s a full-time job being the capable ones.’ I’ve definitely had those kinds of conversations with my girlfriends, and I like being able to instill that into our world.”

Image: Blizzard Entertainment

Min mentioned that voice actor Sally Amaki, who has completed voice work for anime and is a member of the digital singing group 22/7, “brought [Kiriko] to life.”

“This is her first game work, so there was a learning curve, because vocally [games have] very different delivery,” Min recalled. “But she just was such a champ — she went through four-hour late night sessions like nothing and would be like, Oh, yeah, I have a concert tomorrow, because she’s part of a J-pop idol group.”

As for Kiriko’s future, Min was hesitant to say the place her story — and that of her Shimada brother friends — is headed. But with the Hashimoto clan, as seen in Kiriko’s animated quick, probably serving nearly as good cannon fodder for a PvE mode, one can think about the sport’s ninja trio teaming as much as clear up the streets of Kanezaka subsequent 12 months.

“She’s definitely going to be key in what is happening in Kanezaka, as far as the Shimada clan falling and the Hashimoto terrorizing the neighborhood,” Min mentioned. “The brothers are definitely not going to lie still, either, as the clan that overpowered them continue to terrorize what was once their territory.”