Every once in a while a game will come out and dominate every gaming news outlet from here to Osaka. For those of you living under rock with no consoles or PCs in sight, Overwatch is a team based multiplayer shooter from Blizzard Entertainment that has done just that. The story goes that Blizzard spent about seven years developing a new MMO, codenamed Project Titan, but when that didn’t work out, they put their considerable resources behind making smaller games, much like the extremely popular Hearthstone and its latest money-printing-machine, Overwatch. Overwatch was released on May 24th, 2016 to widespread acclaim. But why do so many people love it?

There is actually a whole backstory to this nonsense, but none of it is explained in the game. Look out this Friday for an Overwatch Let's Start Looking At. — There is actually a whole backstory to this nonsense, but none of it is explained in the game. Look out this Friday for an *Overwatch* Let's Start Looking At.

Most FPS, online or singleplayer, boot you into some scruffy-white-dude-McNormalface, a time honored tradition, going all the way back to DOOM.

CAN'T YOU IDENTIFY WITH ALL THIS ONE GUY

Overwatch, on the other hand, gives you an extremely colorful cast of characters, young, old, male, female, different body types, and many more skin colors than you would expect. A lot of people seem to have a hard time dealing with Representation, for vaguely (or not so vaguely) racist and/or sexist reasons, but I don’t see anything wrong with any kind of player being given the choice to play as somebody that looks like they do. It helps you relate to a character, livens the whole experience, and draws people in who are tired of always playing as pastydudewithstubble#1023.

This is not to say that Overwatch does representation perfectly, but it makes admirable strides in a medium plagued with the issue. — This is not to say that *Overwatch* does representation perfectly, but it makes admirable strides in a medium plagued with the issue.

In most online FPS, you play as somebody in body armor, maybe with a skull spray-painted somewhere on you, but little else in the way of characterization.

All of Overwatch’s heroes have individual backstories, emotes, highlight reel intros, lines they say to each other before a match, and design themes. Soldier 76 was the former leader of Overwatch before the governments of the world shut them down, so now he embraces anonymity to make the world a better place, one battle a time. Winston is a genius gorilla who designs and employs advanced technology, but isn’t above enjoying a banana with peanut butter. Ana is the mother of another member of Overwatch, Pharah, and an accomplished sniper and healer. Even if your whole team is playing as Tracer the time-traveling wisecracker, the power of her personality shine through her words, her weapons, and her poses.

Don't mess with Zarya. She will break you. — Don't mess with Zarya. **She will break you.**

Mei is the kind of character the devil would make if he felt like being ambitious that day.

Lastly, you can play Overwatch 5 million different ways. Although some will make me hate you (team of 6 Genji, not healing yourself as Bastion, playing as Mei), most of them work. You can choose from four main kinds of hero (Offence, Defense, Tank, and Support). Each Hero has abilities that expand their given roles in any match. Soldier 76 (Offence) can drop a quick AOE heal with his Biotic Field, Lùcio (Support) can push a whole team off a cliff with his Soundwave, or Zarya (Tank) can hold a huge number of enemies in place with her Graviton Surge.

I’d advise exploring new playstyles in Overwatch competitive play though; you’ll piss at least five people off.

Overwatch has a lot going for it, gameplay wise, but the ancillary factors are what push it beyond a typical Battlefield or Call of Duty multiplayer FPS. People like diversity in this media, they like characters with personality, and they like more than one way to do something. Time will tell if Overwatch can maintain its popularity and enthusiasm, but I think it’s got more staying power than 99% of multiplayer FPS.

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