Overwatch 2’s Mauga always had two guns — but it took time to get them ‘just right’

Blizzard revealed the newest hero to be a part of the ever-growing roster of its shooter Overwatch 2 at Blizzcon 2023. Throughout an interview on the conference, Polygon obtained extra particulars about Mauga, what gamers can anticipate from him, and the method of making a brand new tank.

“Mauga is a damaged-based tank, and how he sustains himself and his team is through damage,” stated lead hero designer Alec Dawson. He was designed primarily based on his weapons, along with his talents centered round doing as a lot harm as doable. The designers hope this give attention to harm will make him extra interesting to new gamers.

The group needed to guarantee his talents felt good when utilizing each chain guns, but in addition they needed to be certain that gamers couldn’t “wipe people out immediately.” To fight that, Mauga has an enormous unfold on each of his guns. On the identical time, this makes him a risk in shut quarters. “You don’t want to play with Mauga up close unless you know you’re going to take him out,” stated Dawson.

Mauga’s Overrun charging potential makes him nearly unstoppable, even in opposition to sleep darts. “He uses it to get where he wants to go,” stated Dawson. For a pleasant cherry on prime, each time Mauga immediately hits an opponent whereas utilizing Overrun, he’ll slam them to the bottom, gorgeous them whereas different close by opponents will probably be despatched flying.

Mauga’s final, Cage Battle, creates a zone that traps opponents and blocks therapeutic from the skin of it. What makes his final much more harmful is that Cage Battle stays energetic even when Mauga dies. Assist hero Lifeweaver can pull Mauga out of the last word, but the enemy gamers will nonetheless be trapped inside till the power runs out.

Despite the fact that he’s a tank, Mauga can do extra harm than some DPS heroes, stated Dawson. To counter that, opposing groups can assault Mauga whereas he’s reloading or has burned by way of his talents. “He’s such a big body that he really needs support. He needs a high healing output to keep him up at times.”

When it got here to creating Mauga, the dev group labored carefully with a tradition marketing consultant group to make sure the studio displayed him in a approach that will be respectful to the Samoan group. “We worked with a traditional tattoo artist from the Samoan culture to guide us. We tried to get as authentic as possible and as close to real as our engines could handle. And it turned out great,” stated hero design producer Kenny Hudson.

Picture: Blizzard Leisure

When Mauga was first being examined, the group initially had one iteration the place his proper gun solely dealt essential harm to enemies within the air to assist tanks struggle flying-based heroes. As time went on, the group scrapped that, and now the suitable gun offers essential harm each time an enemy is ready on hearth first along with his left gun. However the concept to have him use two massive guns was one thing the dev group always supposed to do. “We always kinda knew that he was going to be a tank with two big main guns, and we wanted to make them just as important and just as useful to players as the other one. We didn’t want one to outshine the other,” stated Hudson.

One of many challenges the dev group confronted was making the visible cues noticeable to gamers when Mauga makes use of his Cardiac Overdrive potential, which permits Mauga and his group members to heal each time they harm an opponent. So the dev group revisited an previous concept the place Roadhog’s potential would heal everybody round him. This helped them discover the “sweet spot” of not overwhelming the participant with an excessive amount of occurring display screen. “We don’t like throwing things away. Even if it doesn’t work out for a certain hero, it can come back later on for another one,” stated senior take a look at analyst Foster Elmendorf. To assist additional show their level, Elmendorf defined how Mauga’s final was initially D.va’s, which concerned her making “a dome of lasers.”

The group has been engaged on Mauga for some time. Initially, he was supposed to be launched in season 2 as an alternative of Ramattra, “but the team really wanted to take some more time to get the kit just right,” stated Dawson. Pushing Mauga again allowed the dev group to polish him up and guarantee his talents performed easily with each other.