Blizzard Announces New Overwatch Hero, Orisa

Published: March 2, 2017 3:59 PM /

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New Hero Orisa Overwatch

Orisa is Overwatch's newest hero, a tank who is playable on the Public Test Region on PC right now. Orisa is the third hero to be added to the game post-launch, and the 24th hero in total.

Rumors over who the next Overwatch hero will be have been circulating for quite some time now. Most recently, some players believed that a young inventor from Numbani named Efi Oladele would be the next hero. While that's not the case, Oladele was the tinkerer who upgraded Orisa and made her the robot centaur she is today, according to Orisa's hero page.

Check out the video below for Orisa's full character backstory:

As for Orisa's abilities, most of them seem to mirror/resemble other hero abilities already in Overwatch, of course with slight changes and deviations.

Her primary-fire weapon is the Fusion Driver, which is a projectile weapon with a high rate of fire and long range. This weapon would make Orisa the tank with the most reliable source of long-range damage. Orisa's movement speed is reduced while firing, much like D.va's.

Her weapon does have an alternate fire mode, called Halt! This abilities is basically a mini-Graviton Surge. When Orisa uses the ability, an orb fires out of her gun, and as the orb moves in a straight line, it slows enemies the pass close to it. Then, Orisa can trigger the ability again, and enemies are pulled to the orb for a short period of time. I suspect it will be a useful ability for pulling heroes off of high ground or for grouping enemies together for ultimates like Mei's Blizzard.

Orisa also has a protective barrier shield similar to Reinhardt's. However, unlike Reinhardt's barrier, she has to place it down. The rectangle-shaped barrier with curved edges is immovable after it is placed. In a developer update video, Jeff Kaplan said that Blizzard hopes that this ability will take some of the focus off of Reinhardt and make him less of a go-to tank.

The Fortify ability makes Orisa unaffected by certain abilities and ultimates that would normally affect a hero's movement. For example, when she triggers the ability, which lasts for a couple of seconds, she won't be stunned by Reinhardt Earth Shatter, nor will she be launched off of maps by Phara's Concussive Blast.

Lastly, her ultimate, the Supercharger, is a an object that Orisa can place on the ground. Teammates within a certain radius of her ultimate will have increased damage outputs. However, it's important to note that this ultimate is destructible much like Symmetra's.

PC players can play Orisa right now on the PTR server. We don't yet know when she'll be playable on the PlayStation 4 or Xbox One, but I expect the wait time to just be a few weeks.

What do you think of Orisa and her abilities? How do you think she'll impact the current competitive scene? Who do you ship her with? Let us know in the comment section below!

Have a tip, or want to point out something we missed? Leave a Comment or e-mail us at tips@techraptor.net


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More Info About This Game
Learn more about Overwatch
Game Page Overwatch
Platforms
PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC
Release Date
May 24, 2016 (Calendar)
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