Overwatch animated short has all the feels, proves Blizzard does lore better than anyone

Blizzard is going into overdrive with its marketing for Overwatch, and while its upcoming shooter may lack in the in-game story to add weight to its characters, its animated shorts do a fine job of setting the scene.

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The third Overwatch animated short, titled ‘Dragons’, is perhaps the most emotional one yet. It showcases cyborg ninja Genji, and Hanzo, the game’s only two Japanese characters. I won’t spoil the connection between the two characters because it’s well worth a watch, but let’s just say that the short adds some much-needed context to the characters, and does a fine job of filling up the game’s intriguing if vague universe.

The same can be said for both Alive, which has Tracer pitted against Widowmaker, and Recall, which sees Winston battle Reaper.

Few game developers and publishers flesh out their game universe’s like this, especially for multiplayer-only games. With games like Destiny we had a fascinating backdrop, but vague dialogue and little concrete backstory to add context. That improved with The Taken King, but it still lacked much in the way of narrative coherence.

Now of course, Overwatch doesn’t really need much in the way of a narrative, but with such a diverse character rosters, it’s great to see so much effort being put into fleshing out the world. We now have the context necessary to understand the battle…although I can’t help but wonder why Genji and Hanzo aren’t speaking in Japanese to one another.

Anyway, check out the wonderful animated short below. It should help you get primed for Overwatch‘s release on May 24 on Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJ09xdxzIJQ[/youtube]