Overwatch‘s latest webcomic adds some much-needed insight into one of its most prominent and popular characters.
Its character lineup has always been among the most diverse in gaming, and chances were that eventually Blizzard would reveal at least one of the hero lineup to be LGBTQ.
The studio confirmed that it would go down that path, and as expected, murmurs started spreading about which character it would be, and how Blizzard would make the revelation.
We now know that Tracer is the first queer Overwatch character, having been ousted in the latest webcomic, Reflections. In it, we see Tracer kissing another women — Emily.
These comics, along with the mini-movies that released prior to and shortly after the game’s launch, have little bearing on how the game actually plays, but that hasn’t stopped fans demanding more on the lore front, and this certainly fits the bill into giving the characters and the Overwatch world some warm backstory.
We eventually see Emily attend Winston’s Christmas party with Tracer, putting to bed the inevitable queries as to whether the two were actually more than “gal pals”: aside from the fact they share what is fairly obviously a passionate kiss, the two appear to be much more than friends.
Fans had been waiting for a reveal like this since November, when Blizzard first revealed (via Kotaku) that it would introduce a LGBTQ hero.
“We’re here to build a very diverse game,” artist Rachel Day said. “We’re looking globally, we’re looking for all different kinds of people, different body types, all of that. Maybe we’re not telling any romantic stories at the moment, but it’s a possibility for the future for sure. I don’t think that we’d want to exclude anybody from that kind of interaction.”
Keep an eye out for the inevitable overflow of Tracer fan fiction!