I think it’s safe to say, most people love Easter eggs. Whether the chocolate or the gaming kind. The Easter eggs found in games come in several forms usually, either secret levels, perhaps some post-credit extra goodies, or simply a homage or fun reference to another game. Therefore it’s no surprise that Overwatch fans have been delighted this week, by the discovery a player has made that’s been hidden across several of the intro sequences for sharp-shooting, support character Ana.
Overwatch’s intro sequences are primarily designed to introduce the character who has been awarded Play of the Game. Each sequence is a few seconds long, but gives an insight into the character’s personality, traits and often abilities too. In short, they make the characters look good and act as a wind-up for the play footage that follows.
Until now, these have been one-off, short snippets that all depict a character going through a short range of motions or actions. Just recently though, player MirrorMaster uncovered something pretty awesome. Three of Ana’s highlight intros actually form a longer, complete battle sequence. If you want to see it for yourself, you need to play the following intros in the following order. Start with “Under Fire”, followed by “Locked On”, then “Guardian” and last but not least, “Shh…”
Leaping into battle and rolling to come up guns at the ready kicks things off nicely, followed by lining up a good headshot. Some quick thinking and even quicker trigger fingers are needed next to take out an enemy who has crept up behind her. Finally, her victim down, she stands over them victorious and makes that trademark ‘shush’ comment we all know and love. Ana it seems can hold her own in a firefight judging by these intros.
Another interesting thing to note here, is that these sequences also mirror some of the key actions that were depicted in Ana’s hero intro sequence. In this case, the poor victim who meets their match is McCree and he’s down for the count before she’s finished being introduced.
While she is depicted as support and works incredibly well in a team providing much-needed buffs and heals, it’s nice to also see her holding her own. Support characters that fold over like wet paper only get you so far, and Ana kicking butt and taking names is exactly what we like to see them able to do as well.
It’s an interesting discovery and one that begs the question of whether other characters will have sequences like this in the future. Though we’re sure players are already hunting through the existing ones to see if any other titbits like this can be found for other characters. Blizzard is renowned for its level of detail, lore and putting in sneaky references and goodies for players to find. Who knows what else there is out there just waiting to be discovered, we’re certainly sure they’re not done putting in things for us to find just yet.
