Did Blizzard Show Another 'Overwatch' Hero At BlizzCon 2016 Accidentally?

The Blizzcon 2016 dropped annual announcements for Blizzard games and the release of newest "Overwatch" hero Sombra on next week's PTR update. "Overwatch" fans may be wondering what lies beyond Sombra, the new Oasis map, the new Arcade modes and vastly improved brawls.

"Overwatch" heroes have been speculated from the promotional art and the animated shorts. Introduction of "Overwatch" hero McCree into the Blizzard game, for example was through promotional materials as cited by Polygon.

Decrypt the mysterious past of Overwatch's newest hero: Sombra.

Learn more @ https://t.co/JCSkZJGOzc pic.twitter.com/F5jb2jLXOc

— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) November 4, 2016

A number of "Overwatch" heroes of as yet unknown identity can be seen. Also seen is who some believe to be the "Overwatch" AI Athena as a playable hero.

The introduction of Sombra into the “Overwatch” hero roster has been said previously to be an addition into the situational support class category. When “Overwatch” was first released, there were only four support heroes.

Now with Ana and Sombra added into “Overwatch,” support would now be matched with the defence and offence heroes – all at six members. Therefore this would only leave the “Overwatch” tank group with a mere five heroes. It would then be reasonable to expect that the next “Overwatch” hero Blizzard might introduce (or if not next, then at least soon) would be a tank hero.

In the newest “Overwatch” animated short, “Infiltration,” introducing Sombra Blizzard fans can see during Reaper’s intrusion of the Volskaya factory an Omnic-inspired mechanoid. This is noticeably activating and using a shield very much like an “Overwatch” tank would as seen in the PlayOverwatch YouTube channel.

On its own this may not confirm anything. However, during the BlizzCon 2016 panel presentation on the “Overwatch” animated shorts, CG supervisor Shimon Cohen explained how the game assets were imported into the video editing tools and refined to produce the details needed for the shorts while saving on time and money.

One of the models on screen (among the recognizable “Overewatch" heroes Tracer, and now Sombra) while Cohen talks through “recreating the game models” was the human controlled mechanoid introduced in “Infiltration.” It could be that this model is in development as a new “Overwatch” hero.

Possibly, too, this may be the “Overwatch” hero mentioned for a 2017 release by director Jeff Kaplan. Then again this “Overwatch” hero sighting may just be an accident of coincidence.