The speculation is over, we now know that Overwatch‘s new hero is a tank and she’s called Orisa.
Jeff Kaplan took the opportunity to reveal the new hero in his latest developer update. The 24th hero is called Orisa who is a unit called the OR-14 which was used for combat in the Omnic Crisis, much like Bastion. She was designed to fight the humans but many years later after peace has been struck and the city of Numbani was now at peace. However, a local villain called Doomfist started causing havoc. In order to protect the city against his attacks, Numbani citizens developed a more advanced version of the OR-14 called the OR-15.
Things did not go to plan, the OR-15s lost a significant battle against Doomfist at Numbani’s airport which explains the recent teaser shots and why the airport on the PTR was all smashed up. Numbani citizens gave up on the OR-15 but the young scientist Efi still had hope for the OR-15. She took the pieces to her workshop and created the next evolution which she called Orisa and created a single individual hero.
Orisa is a tank and her primary weapon is a Fusion Driver described as a projectile based machine gun with a large range and clip size. Alternate fire on the weapon sends out a single pulse which can bring targets into its radius for a short period of time. According to Jeff, you can even pull players around corners with it.
She also comes with a tank ability called Fortify which makes her tougher and prevents her from being affected by crowd control abilities. Next is Protective Barrier which moves out from anywhere she targets the ability and works like other barriers in the game.
Finally, her ultimate is Super Charger which is described as a “drum-like item on her back” which can be removed and thrown to the ground to damage boost any player in its line of sight. Enemies can kill the Super Charger so it will needs protecting or placed out of enemy sight.
So why another tank? Watch this latest Overwatch developer video to find out. Also check out her origin story video below. Also, note she is live on the PTR and can be taken for a spin now. There are large queues to get on the servers so be prepared fo that.
