Fans Desperately Wanted These New Overwatch Characters, So Why Are They So Disappointed With the Designs?

Overwatch recently announced a significant change for the franchise during the February 2026 Spotlight stream. First and foremost, Overwatch 2 is dropping the ‘2’ and just becoming ‘Overwatch’ again, with a restructure to focus more on story/lore-based seasons.  Overwatch also revealed that throughout the year, we would be gaining ten new heroes as opposed to the regular 3 per year rule. Furthermore, to kickstart the new story-based Season 1 ‘Reign of Talon‘, five of these ten heroes will be dropping on the 10th.

The heroes included in this initial drop are a mix of notable characters from the lore that fans have been wanting for a long time, original characters with connections to other individuals/organizations in the franchise, and even older, scrapped designs that have been revisited and developed into a new concept. These characters are Emre, Domina, Anran, Mizuki, and Jetpack Cat. However, while there is certainly some hype regarding them, many of these new characters have also received a lot of criticism from the community. The most prominent out of the group so far when it comes to this criticism has been Anran, so let’s start with her.

Why Fans Are Begging Blizzard to Change Anran’s Hero Design in Overwatch

Anran is the older, ‘perfectionist’ sister of Wuyang, and a member of Fire College at Wuxying University. She is set to enter the DPS role, which, considering the soldier-like approach of Fire College, is no shocker to fans. Anran, ahead of the other four heroes, is also first to enter the game, as she is currently available for hero trial until the 10th of February, when the other four will join her.

Anran has caused a lot of online discussion, as fans believe that her in-game character model does not accurately match her appearance in prior material, such as the comics and animated shorts. Here is a look at Anran in these sources:

However, after fans have seen her in-game model reveal, they have begun complaining that it doesn’t match previous depictions of Anran, and that she now appears to look more like Kiriko or Juno rather than having any defining features or shapes. Fans have been dubbing this the “Kirikofication” of female characters.

Anran’s Character Model in Overwatch

This has stirred up a whole lot of chatter in the community, some serious complaints, and of course, a wild collection of humorous memes and videos. One Reddit user even went so far as to try to make some edits to Anran’s character model to make her more accurate to previous depictions.

And honestly? It’s easy to see why fans are in so much agreement. She has a more defined nose and chin, a slightly more athletic and less dainty build, more of that sarcastic smirk to her, and a sharper eye shape – one of her key features that appears to have been somewhat lost in the development from 2D to 3D.

Take a look for yourself below:

Seeing such subtle changes have that much effect in helping her stand out and not get lost among ‘Overwatch same face syndrome’, fans are now calling out to Blizzard to make some tweaks to Anran’s character model before Season 1 – Reign of Talon goes live on February 10.

As for whether any of these changes will actually be made…fans will have to wait and see. However, if they truly are dedicated to listening to the community with these big changes, this would certainly be a good way to prove it and build rapport with their community.

Did Overwatch Push it a Bit Too Far With Emre’s Deisgn Developments?

Emre is a character who has been connected to Overwatch’s lore as an ex-agent, but missing in action for a number of years. He was even included in an old photo of the team together, where he can be seen standing with a younger Reaper, Soldier: 76, Ana, Reinhardt, Sojourn, an even younger Mercy and Cassidy, and kid Pharah.

As the lore of newer hero, ex-Overwatch member turned bounty hunter, Freja, has since been released, fans have learnt that Maximilien sent her on a mission to track down Emre after all of this time. She has since returned with him to Talon HQ, and he will officially be one of the new charcaters joining the roster.

Of course, his design was in no way expected to look just like the photo of his younger self. Not when all of this time has passed. However, some fans feels that Emre’s current design is uninspiring, and mashup of features found on characters who already exist – such as Genji and Cassidy. In particular, Emre’s most notable feature in the old photo was his Mohawk.

While his hair is still undercut on the sides, this in no way looks like a mohawk. He also has more facial hair than he was previously depicted with. Really, the only notable features that make him recognizable as Emre are the eyebrow shape and the top of his hair being pushed back in a similar fashion to how he once did with his mohawk.

Why Has Emre Gone Through Such Drastic Changes?

It’s still a strong design, and it works quite well thematically considering what we know about Emre’s backstory so far. It appears something has significantly brainwashed him, and it’s a lot to do with the heavy cybernetics he’s now equipped with.

Interestingly enough, fans have also connected the eye on his chest to that of the symbols Sombra is also familiar with, so this may be a hint of a new technology-based villain/organization also slowly being introduced into the lore, too. If so, that may be why Emre has been pushed through such a significant design transition – because he is essentially someone, or something else, now.

However, that’s not to say that a couple of tweaks to the design couldn’t have helped the two concepts meet in the middle, and offer something that is both nostalgic and familiar to long-time fans, as well as fresh and exciting in the way they seem to be gunning for Emre. Right now, it feels like Emre is almost walking that line of nearly feeling too distant, or different from the other heroes from his era. Keeping the mohawk, or even something as subtle as his facial hair, the same could have made all the difference.

Why Fans are excited for jetpack cat as a hero, but not the design

Jetpack cat is one of the most notable concepts for Overwatch, having originally been a design that had been in development for OW1, scrapped, and never revisited…until now, that is! However, with the reveal of Jetpack Cat as one of the next playable Overwatch heroes, fans were also shocked to discover that Jetpack Cat isn’t what they thought she would be.

Specifically, the original Jetpack Cat concept involves Brigitte’s fluffy white cat, Mitzi. This is one of her many cats, but her primary pet in the OW universe, and one she has been shown interacting with in many in-game victory poses, sprays, and even artworks for the game. This one below shows a young Brigitte stepping into the role of mechanic and designing some armor for Mitzi:

The original concept of Jetpack Cat was that as Brigitte continued developing her skills as a mechanic, she eventually designed Mitzi a custom jetpack. This would enable her cat to fly by her side in battle – but it was ultimately scrapped at the time by devs for feeling like it didn’t fit into the universe properly.

What Changed With the New Jetpack Cat?

Years later, and we now have the Jetpack Cat reveal – which is why so many fans were surprised, or even upset to discover that it isn’t our fluffy pal Mitzi piloting the machine. Instead, we have a different cat, a ginger and white tabby cat, complete with her own little set of safety goggles.

Rest assured, though, this Jetpack Cat is still one of Brigitte’s cats – it just isn’t Mitzi. Rather, this Jetpack Cat is a stray that Brigitte found at Gibraltar and adopted as her own. The cat’s name is Fika, and she has been the lucky one to take on the role of Jetpack Cat for the future, apparently surprising individuals with how impressively she has come to operate the machine.

Why Was Fika Chosen For Jetpack Cat Over Mitzi?

While it may be a bit disappointing that we miss out on Mitzi’s Jet Pack Cat, there’s probably a good reason why this move was made. As stated earlier, Mitzi is already involved in many victory poses with Brig, so it would likely seem a bit strange to have double Mitzi on your victory screen. And the other option is simply to get rid of those poses, which can’t really be done either. So the next easiest option is to create a new cat for the role, instead!

With Fika being a cat, it sort of opens up a new area that they can dive into with her skins and cosmetics. Rather than various themes and outfits that humanoid characters get, designers can have a lot of fun playing around with different cat breeds and markings for Fika, too, outside of her default skin.

Will Fika Get a Mitzi-Themed Skin?

While some people may argue that changing her patterns changes it from being ‘Fika’, but in reality, there’s not a lot that can be done if her body patterns aren’t being swapped out. What then, each one of her skins only gets a custom jetpack? Yeah, unlikely, right? This does mean that in the future, there could even be the possibility of a Mitzi skin for Fika, which would ultimately make a lot of fans happy.

Again, though, they may have to find a workaround when it comes to victory poses. Perhaps for a Mitzi skin, the victory poses could instead be swapped for Fika’s design. Alternatively, it could be cute to have a Fika take on a bad cosplay of Mitzi with white paint and a self-made hat to mimic Mitzi’s armor – much like the appeal of the cardboard skins.

No matter what, the rest of 2026 is shaping up to be a big opportunity for Overwatch’s reboot and the new characters. Of course, we still have five more hidden characters to be uncovered, so it will be interesting to see how fans come to see this next wave of designs in comparison.

The post Fans Desperately Wanted These New Overwatch Characters, So Why Are They So Disappointed With the Designs? appeared first on VICE.