I Kinda Think His Cage Fight Ult Is A Little Op, Not To Mention His Charge...

Blackwatch timeline

Ok, so, bear with me, this is going to take a lot of little points for me to peace together to make the bigger picture here.

So, we know that Gabriel Reyes worked as a police officer and was know for arresting lots of criminals, but then he didn't find his work having any sort of impact of the criminal rate and figured that to destroy crime he had to cut it off at the source, correct?

And he was born in 2018, making his 58 in the current (Overwatch) year of 2076. We also know the Omnic crisis started exactly 30 years ago, when he was 28.

Then (If we're going with the earliest years possible for everything) Overwatch was founded a year later and he was put in charge of Overwatch as Strike Commander when he was 29.

If we're approximating that the Omnic Crisis lasted about 3 ish years, then he was 32 when it ended and his Command was switched to Blackwatch.

He was 32 when Blackwatch was created!

The sting operation that resulted in Jesse McCree (or Cole Cassidy whatever you want to call him) joining Blackwatch took place when McCree was 17. Which leads me to the question of who was Gabriel Reyes even working with on missions before hand? Did he have a strike squad before he picked up Jesse McCree?

We also know there's about ten years age difference between Gabriel Reyes and Jesse McCree, which means McCree was 12 when Blackwatch was formed.

And Genji joined Blackwatch in 2066, which is only 10 years prior. Making Gabriel Reyes 48 and Jesse McCree 38. That is a huge age gap and what do we even know about what happened during that time?

Roughly a year or so later we know that Gabriel Reyes invites Moira into Blackwatch and she starts her experiments on him? But like, we know nothing about these experiments, only what they did. And if the short story 'Code of Violence' is being added into the mix, then we're led to believe that the initial experiments that Moira conducted on him did not have as dramatic effect. I don't really know what that entails, but it could mean that he could mist and move around a little bit, but was otherwise a full man. In the 'Code of Violence' short story it's mentioned that Moira is the one to find Gabriel Reyes after the explosion of the Overwatch facility, and to 'save' his life she pumped him full of the chemicals she used in her prior experiments, the results being Reaper. It meant his body became more mist like and he had to concentrate on being a full man almost every moment of the day, it also meant he was in constant pain and his anger was harder and harder to control. He also started to find gratification in the more gruelling and cruel acts. Or at least that was the impression I got from the story. But my point is, the most we have referencing the experiments Moira conducted on Gabriel Reyes are this picture:

And a paragraph or two in the story 'Code of Violence' which more focuses on his internal struggles immediately after the incident.

Then, (getting back on track, that was a bit of rant sorry) we know the Venice incident took place 8 years ago, when Gabriel Reyes kills Antonio Bartalotti and reveals Blackwatch to the world, and putting it under the investigation of Jack Morrison, Gérard Lacroix and Ana Amari. As seen in the end scenes of Retribution and in the photo below:

We also know that somewhere in between the next two years Genji moves from the Blackwatch divison to the Overwatch strike team including Tracer, Mercy and Winston. We also know that his cybernetics have been updated in this time. But, I'm not entirly confident on the idea that he was moved to Overwatch from Blackwatch, there's nothing that we know (or I've found) that supports that idea, other than him appearing in the Overwatch strike team during the Storm Rising archives mission and his updated cybernetics.

Then, 6 years ago the Overwatch Swiss HQ is blown up and Gabriel Reyes and Jack Morrison are presumed dead. The Petras act is ratified and Overwatch is disbanded.

A lot of investigation is put into Overwatch and Blackwatch's activities between the time period of the Retribution achieves mission and the Petras act's ratification. Which is a time period of roughly 2 years.

My point is, there are huge gaps in the timeline and not all the information is concrete, a lot of it is inferred from what we have. (Blizzard I beg give us more lore).

There's the 5 years between Blackwatch being founded and McCree being bought into the organisation, where we know next to nothing.

Then there's 21 years between McCree and Genji joining Blackwatch. What happened in those 21 years? Surely there are some important events to note in 21 years?

The later years of Blackwatch are less murky, but there's still no solid dates or years being handed to us by Blizzard and it's been 7 years! I mean come on! All the dates and ages I used in this are drawn from the Overwatch Timeline on the fandom Wiki, and those are only approximations that make sense with the ages we've been given for the current game.

Anyway, I just wanted to complain about this because I feel like I don't hear enough people complaining about it. It's probably the same for Overwatch, but at least we have more of an idea what the Overwatch organisation was like. We roughly know that there were a lot more foot soldiers than Blackwatch had, at least that's what I thought was implied every time it was bought up or featured. It's easier to fill in the gaps between the years as general peace keeping, but Blackwatch was supposed to handle the more rogue missions (Can't really think of a better word for it). There's only so much guessing and filling in we can do Blizzard!

If you read this far thank you, you're a real one.

fly monke fly

I realise I haven't posted in days and I have a perfectly reasonable excuse for that... Baldurs Gate 3 ✨

I AM DECEASED

Overwatch Custom Games are Horrible...

I don't usually spend much time queuing in overwatch 2, which I kinda miss ngl. I used to get so much done between queues in Overwatch 1. Besides the point though. The DPS queue was looking a little longer so I decided to take a gander at the custom games, since me and my duo partner are old 'the floor is lava' and 'murder mystery' pros (you don't get gems like those anymore...). To my horror, the first thing that pops up on the custom games menu is, and I quote, 'Sexual Harassment Simulator'????? Like what the actual fuck?? I knew overwatch was far gone, but this far? I am honestly terrified of overwatch men in more ways than one.

A Breakdown of all the Overwatch Anniversary events so far.

I'm in the mood to write lengthy paragraphs examining OW2 today, so let's go for it.

Just to clarify, my first Anniversary event was 2018, so I have just a wee bit of experience playing these events. Unfortunately, I didn't have the pleasant experience of playing the first anniversary event in 2017.

But, it's as good as any place to start, so what exactly did we get in the 2017 anniversary event.

Three new area maps were added, which I'm sure most of you are familiar with. They were Castillo, Black Forest, and Necropolis.

Not only that, but NINE FREE legendary skins were added during the limited time event, that anybody could pick up through loot boxes.

Not just that though, there were over a hundred unlockable items also released during that limited time. Ranging from skins that were lower than legendary, to player icons, to sprays, to voice lines, to emotes, highlight intros, and victory poses.

The 2017 Anniversary event was also the event that introduced dance emotes, which I'm fairly sure you just have to plainly buy no, but don't quote me on that.

WELL

Moving onto 2018

A new death map was released on the 2018 Anniversary event called Petra. Honestly, it blows my mind that Petra came out five years ago now. I remember logging on, and loading up deathmatch and getting lost out of my mind on this new map.

They released 8 legendary skins

and 3 epic skins

Including Lightning Tracer. Man, I remember just how much people hated this skin, claimed it was the ugliest skin ever made.

Personally, I think there are more than a handful that can rival it nowadays.

The 2018 event also introduced being able to buy past event items for all the events, not just anniversary.

Now that I've summarised all the wonderful gifts 2018 gave us, let's hurry on over to 2019.

This year, unfortunately, they did not release any new maps, (that doesn't mean they didn't realise new maps during the year, they just didn't release maps during the anniversary event).

But, they introduced another reel of awesome legendary skins. Except, there was only 6 this year.

Don't get me wrong. I love almost (egg head Pharah is the exception) and I physically screamed when I pulled Academy D. Va.

But, the delice shows when you compare things side by side.

No new map, and 3 fewer legendary skins.

Here are the epic skins as well, nothing special really though what can you say really.

Although, let me put it out there. I am not complaining. I got to play and earn all these skins for free and it was an absolute privilege that I did. I'm just pointing out the differences as the events progress.

2019 was also the first year to introduce legendary loot boxes for logging in. It was free and guaranteed one or more legendary. I'll just put it out there now, I absolutely adored these loot boxes. They were always the highlight of my game time when one came sliding quietly into my loot box tab.

Next up, 2020.

Now, looking at all of these event trailers together, I've released Blizzard made a very particular choice when displaying the legendary skins this year. Notice in the previous years they're usually grouped together and displayed like that? Well, not this year, because there's only 5 new legendary skins.

By displaying each skin induvial and using a highlight intro, it gives the impression there are just as many skins as usual. Very clever Blizzard, I'll give you that.

So far, we've gone from 11 legendary skins in 2017, to 5 in 2020. That number fell dramatically quickly.

2020 was also the first year to introduce the weekly challenges that became ever present in OW1 events.

None of them are really anything special. I remember being fond of the Widow one because of the gold highlights, but I also disliked the Sigma and the McCree ones because their eyes were covered.

Not much else to say really about 2019, the legendries are classics and it was the first anniversary event to use the weekly challenges, but that's it really.

2021 is where I really start to get pissed of at Blizzard.

Remember how I said before that showing of each skin specifically in their highlight intro was a cheap way of making it look like there's more content than there actually is? Well, it get's worse. At least in 2019 they specified that these were new skins.

In 2021, they just roll out the dance cutscene and introduce the new skins without saying they're introducing them, and combining skins from old events into the background. Maybe because it's late when I'm writing this, or maybe because I'm so used to seeing these skins in game, but I had to actually google a list of what skins came out in 2021 because I couldn't figure out the new ones from the old ones.

Anyways, I figured out which are the new ones, and here are your... five skins.

I won't lie. I'm not really a big a fan off... any of these. I suppose Funky Baptiste would be the best, but personally, the quality of the skins declined so dramatically. You can sort of already see it happening in 2019, but I don't think the delice is too noticeable until 2021.

But maybe that's just my personal preference.

These were the weekly challenges, and honestly, I love Tux Hammy. It's just so classically cute. The vibrant Echo is definitly a look too, just maybe not mine.

This is the bit where it gets a bit... trickier.

I'm going to have to make a second post because you can't post more than 30 pictures per post.

Is Reaper a COVID baby because he was born in 2018, and (hypothetically if COVID happened in Overwatch Universe) would have been turning 2 during the lockdown? Like would he have been one of those toddlers that didn't develop proper social skills at nursery?

I think about this sometimes...

Re-Watching Origin Stories

I was re-watching Origin stories and was only a few in when I came to Kiriko's.

Everything is you know, not making sense because of the age differences between her and the Shimada brothers, and then, it starts to just make even less sense.

She basically says in her story that she didn't pick either her mothers way of protecting people, or her Grandmothers, instead she combined the both into a more renegade style.

Cool, chill, whatever.

Then it shows this at the very end:

Like who are these people??

They all look pretty young, and by the looks it it they're all dressing up as Japanese spirits or Yokai.

Those are five sick character designs and all we've heard about them is this single screen grab and some possible references in the Yokai short story?

In the Yokai short story, three characters are mentioned, Ryōta, Nobuto and Sakura. We're introduced to them as Kiriko is meeting them for a festival.

We also learn that Ryōta and his friends do illegal jobs on the side to slight the Hashimoto gang - which are the group of thugs that run the area, Kanezaka, where Kiriko lives.

Here are the bozos in Kiriko's short:

This fight always gives me chills ngl, it's so well animated and staged, it's a wonder to watch.

Also, just have to point out a little line of consistency (that could also be considered laziness considering you've view on it).

But, this Bozo: (from Kiriko's short)

First appeared in Hanzo and Genji's short:

Which came out seven years ago now.

I guess it depends on your point of view. Would it be considered lazy because they couldn't be bothered to make another lackey. Or, is it consistent to use a character they'd already assigned to the Hashimoto group seven years ago.

Guess it can be a little bit of both.

Anyway, getting a bit off topic.

The Yokai short story basically depicts Kiriko stopping her friends from blowing up a warehouse in-case it caused collateral damage, and instead they just sabotaged the weaponry inside the warehouse.

She brings them around from the destruction by telling them a story she heard the Shimada brother's father tell them when they were younger.

At the end of the story they talk about forming a group of that strikes from the shadows at the Hashimoto, and the word Yokai was specifically mentioned.

Which is what these look like:

I'm not sure about the two women, but I'm fairly sure the green one on the right is supposed to represent a Kappa and the brown animal mask on the left is a Tanuki. I'm assuming the one in the back is supposed to be an Oni, sort of like Genji's skin.

So, could this group contain some of the members mentioned in the short story? Are some of them Ryōta, Nobuto and Sakura?

Just from names alone, I would assign the Oni in the back as Ryōta, the Tanuki as Nobuto and the girl holding the umbrella as Sakura.

It would make sense for them to be there if they were mentioned in the short story, which honestly, I feel like should have taken place during their little groups peak.

And included descriptions.

The writing of the short story was kind of weak as well and I just skimmed over most of it quickly. There were a lot of flowery descriptions and analogies, but other times things were too blunt and straightforward. It wasn't a thrilling read to say the least.

Although, it's difficult to make 6 pages good or thrilling, so I suppose they worked with what they had.

If the short story had taken place when the gang had all come together, and it detailed a more complicated heist against the Hashimoto it would have been a much more interesting read.

Plus Blizzard would have had the opportunity to develop more lore, instead of putting loosely put together ideas out there for the sake of time.

Trust me, I know what people will be willing to cut out and half ass all for the sake of meeting deadlines. I'm an art student.

So, I feel the writers are less to blame here and the Blizzard managements are more in the blame.

They keep mass producing these heroes with the bare bones of lore, and then chuck them into the game. It makes more sense for the newer heroes to have less lore, but some of the older heroes have just as much lore as the newer ones; less in some cases.

Surely the writing team hasn't been too pre-occupied with OW2, since well, there was a shortage of new heroes for years and the missions turned out to be... not what we thought.

I just don't understand how Blizzard can keep putting out these strands of lore and then not follow them up.

It drives me up the wall.

If Blizzard was a blanket they would have too many lose threads to count when it came to Overwatch Lore.

Just! Please give us something more concrete Blizzard!

Write more books, draw more comics, release more lore, release more lore centred events!

The Overwatch universe is a plethora of amazing stories to be told and Blizzard is missing on almost everything!

Ladies and Gentlemen... Overwatch men...

Can we like, not sexualise woman for just a moment??

Props to my bestie for saying it in the first place X

Flying Winston <3