ObscureWatch

We can see a (likely purposely truncated) PDF417 bar code as well as an ID number.

ID: 234985739

I couldn't get anything out of the bar code so I focused on the ID instead and ran it through a Cipher Identifier.

The website identified that the ID number was very likely a Morbit Cipher. It's a substitution cipher based on morse that needs a "keyword" to turn digits into letters.

When put inside a Morbit cipher decoder with "DRZIEGLER" (the very name of the skin) as the keyword, it gives "MME XN" as a result.

In french Mme is short for Madame so I looked for "Madame X" online and found an album by Madonna with that name.

Now what to do with "N"? Well N is the 14th letter of the roman alphabet. And the 14th track on the Deluxe edition of that album is called

Looking for Mercy.

The album was released on June 14th 2019, six months before Mercy's Recall Challenge.

Here's a link to the song

And here's a link to the lyrics

In this song Madonna expresses feelings of vulnerability and guilt, if she wants to survive this hell, she'll need proofs of compassion and understanding. Which is exactly what the Valkyrie short novel is about.

Is it really love if it hurts? Is it really pain if it's inside? On the outside I'm strong Hold my hand, please sympathize Hard enough tryna forgive Hard enough tryna live Please don't criticize (yeah) Please, please sympathize (yeah)

Is it really faith if I'm weak? Can you tell the truth when you live lies? I'm just looking for the signs Hold my hand, please sympathize Hard enough tryna forgive Hard enough tryna live Flawed, flawed by design (yeah) Please, please sympathize

Forced by the success of her technology to become an ideal that she struggles to embody, she lost herself over the years and let Mercy take control of Angela's destiny. Wanting to make the world a better, safer place, she designed a technology that others perverted and turned into a weapon, a source of harm. The purity of her aspirations has been desecrated by the ambitions of those who now use her life's work to make the world a far more dangerous place. She'll know no rest until she's restored the balance and stopped the evil she's inadvertedly unleashed upon the world.

Mercy's life is a tragedy.

Angela is just looking for mercy.

I hope she finds some.

So do I, Angela.

Somebody to teach me to love Somebody to help me rise above I need to survive I'm looking for Looking for, looking for, looking for mercy Looking for, looking for, looking for mercy I'm looking for, I'm looking for love Looking for, looking for, looking for mercy Looking for, looking for, looking for mercy I'm looking for, I'm looking for mercy

(Genji, that's your cue)

_____________________________________________________________

If you're interested in discussing the lore of Overwatch and diving into the many hidden clues (like this seemingly unimportant ID number), feel free to join my Discord server !

https://discord.gg/MHYXEWV

I am so glad the devs never stop hiding cool details for fans to find !

Wish there was some kind of "official" announcement so that the community at large would start looking for them :P

And it should because we’ve seen that name in game

In Numbani, a clothing store by that name

In Doomfist’s Origins as well !

But here comes the funky part

This brand’s logo (and name) is actually the 18th letter of the greek alphabet

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigma

All we know about Greece in Overwatch is through Ilios, the tourist paradise with a protected archeological excavacation site above the city.

We know one archeologist by the name of Ioannidis, he's updating Hamid Faisal in Petra about the progress of the excavation in Ilios. Ioannis is like the greek version of John and "idis" = son of. So his name is the greek equivalent of Johnson but that's irrelevant as he may not be Sigma at all

Aboard the Orca dropship (the spawn areas in Ilios) Athena warns us about Talon activity area, she fears they might be after the recently unearthed artifacts which are apparently statues of Hera Aphrodite and Athena. Athena seems to really care about this temple, it may be because it used to be a temple dedicated to Athena. In Homer's Odyssey, the city of Troy has a temple of Athena on top of the highest hill and another name for Troy is Ilios, hence Homer's tale being called the Iliad. So maybe A.I. Athena cares about the place because it used to be a temple to her namesake.

A statue of Aphrodite can be seen in Widowmaker's home, Château Guillard and a statue of Hera can be seen in the final point of Rialto inside Talon's base.

What's going on between Talon and those statues?

Upon spawning on Ilios, since Halloween 2018 Widowmaker says "Hm, I remember an eventful vacation here". The sunglasses she wears in her Côte d'Azur skin were added to Ilios right after Summer Games 2017, on Ilios Lighthouse next to a sunchair and a greek newspaper

The sunchair on Ilios Lighthouse

The Newspaper

The greek text says

“ Ο ΑγγελιοΦόρος Ήλιος

Πολλοί Φόνοι κατά Ιη διάρκεια επιθέοεων οτο Καρναβάλι  

—————–

The Messenger of the Sun

Terror During Carnival Attacks “

It's an article about the events of the Masquerade comic. Widowmaker is in Ilios, reading about her exploits in the news. That means this newspaper was printed right after the incident, therefore Widowmaker was sent to Ilios right after Doomfist took back control of Talon. It's her first mission with Doomfist as her boss. She's an assassin, she's only ever spent places where there's people to assassinate. Doomfist wants to start a war and first order of business is to send his top assassin to a tourist island in Greece.

How does all that tie with Sigma, an older guy with heavy cybernetics who may or may not be associated with an international company that makes fancy clothes for omnics? No idea for now.

I've completely missed the Sigma logo for years so there could be more clues out there telling us a bit more about Sigma as a potential hero.

I guess we'll know more soon ! This post's main purpose was to point out that there are clues out there that we missed, lots of them, we just gotta pay attention and connect them together :D

If Sigma ends up being 31, he'll have been teased in game (in the form of the Sigma logo in Numbani) for like 3+ years.

He isn't coming out of nowhere and that pleases me immensely

Always gotta have faith in Blizzard's creativity !

If you made it this far, you probably like rad clues. If you do you should consider joining my Discord server, we’ve got rad clues, lots of them, I swear !

No scar when he’s ~20 years old, questioning his choice to join the-not-yet-quite-so-openly terrorist Talon organization.

Still no scar when he’s ~30 years old (no official age whatsoever, just a guess) and a lieutenant within Talon’s ranks.

Suddenly, a scar is there in present day. Age 36. Talon deserter with Talon soldiers sent after him because he knows too much. On the run, trying to keep a low profile while still aiding people wherever he goes.

The scar looks recent, a few years old at most. It looks like a bullet grazed his skull. Did this near death experience force him to reconsider his involvement with Talon? Did it happen during a Talon mission? 

Perhaps on the contrary he got this scar after deserting Talon as one of his old terrorist colleagues shot him in the head and just barely missed. Can’t help but think about Widowmaker. Wouldn’t be the first time she missed a headshot on an important human target. One shot one kill yeah right.

Could also be one of his old squad mates under Cuerva’s command.

Either way this scar seems like a really important part of his lore as the concept art by Ben Zhang can attest

The scar looks a lot worse in terms of damage on the concept art.

What we know for sure is that someone recently tried to kill Baptiste and almost succeeded. 

- Déjà de retour, Mme Guillard ? Contente de vous voir.

- Vous demandez souvent « Les Saisons de l’amour ». Ce titre doit avoir de l’importance pour vous.

- Vous me rappelez quelqu’un. Un autre moine, qui était venu me voir chanter.

- Bonjour, cousin. Le chat grimpe sur le mur et scrute.

- Le cabaret Luna est un havre où les omniaques peuvent être eux-mêmes.

- Quelle rareté ! Je n’avais jamais vu une créature comme vous.

- Oh, qu’il est mignon.

- (amusée) Vil flatteur.

- Si vous continuez à me regarder comme ça, je vais devoir vous demander de partir.

- La sortie est par là, très chère.

- Un cow-boy ! Je n’en avais vu que dans des films. Vous êtes loin de chez vous, dites-moi.

- C’est rare de rencontrer un humain que la réussite d'un omniaque ne trouble pas. - Je ne vous effraie pas, au moins ?

- Vous me dévisagez, ma jolie. Vous aimez ce que vous voyez ?

Here's the translation and my guess as to who she's saying these to

- Back already Mme Guillard ? Happy to see you (to Widowmaker)

- You often ask for « Les Saisons de l'amour » (The Seasons of love). This song must mean something to you. (to Widowmaker?)

- You remind me of someone. Another monk, who came to hear me sing. (to Zenyatta, about Mondatta)

- Good day cousin. The cat climbs on the wall and watches. (Cousin? This sounds like a secret phrase with a hidden meaning, this is not a french saying)

- Cabaret Luna is a haven where omnics can be themselves. (???)

- Such rarity ! I've never seen a creature like you. (to Winston/Hammond or a future hero?)

- Aw, he is so sweet. (to Hammond in response to something Hammond had his mech say for him?)

- Oh you flatterer (addressed to a man). (to Reinhardt? Maybe McCree?)

- If you keep on looking at me this way, I'm going to have to ask you to leave. (to Zarya? Maybe Torbjörn?)

- The exit is right this way, my dear (addressed to a woman). (Zarya?)

- A cow-boy ! I've only ever seen cowboys in movies. You're far from home, aren't you. (to McCree)

- It is so rare to meet a human unfazed by a successful omnic. I am not scaring you, right ? (Genji?)

- You're staring at me, gorgeous(addressed to a woman). Do you like what you see ? (???)

As far as I can tell, the heroes involved in those interactions don't have voicelines to go with Luna's but if someone out there has access to the gamefiles as well, feel free to make sure ! Together we are strong !

So Mondatta came to see Luna. She sounds like a proud advocate for omnic rights, it makes sense that Mondatta met her. Perhaps she's part of whatever movement Mondatta was the leader of. Her cabaret seems to be a refuge for omnic revolutionaries too, I wonder if the revolutionary movement of Paris is part of something bigger, something that might be linked to whatever Mondatta was doing.

Widowmaker is a regular there apparently, she seems to always ask for the same love song, perhaps her and Gérard's favorite, proof that she still has feelings for him and is mourning him, her own way. In Masquerade, before heading to Monaco, she was in Paris. She took a flight from Paris to Nice as the boarding pass in Château Guillard indicates, Masquerade took place during the winter time (the carnival in Venice happens in February) so apparently she spends the winter in Paris and she goes to Luna's Cabaret quite often to listen to the same song over and over again. Poor Amélie.

I wonder who the "rare creature" is. I doubt it's Winston. There isn't a lot of super-intelligent talking gorillas/scientists out there (I assume) but he was part of Overwatch and as such he probably got such a media exposure that anyone would instantly recognize him. It could be Hammond, but "creature" doesn't feel right. He's very clearly an animal not a "creature". An animal 10 times the normal size he should have but an animal still. Perhaps this voiceline is for a future hero, one that would better fit this creature description.

I wonder who Luna is calling "cousin" too. An omnic? She would probably call him brother. Cousin sounds like she considers that person as part of her "family" but they're not that close, so perhaps a pro-omnic human? Either way, this person seems to be in on a secret Luna has, this cat stuff is suspicious.

Luna has 4 voicelines about cats.

- Good day cousin (addressed to a man). The cat climbs on the wall and watches. (unused)

- The cat climbs on the wall and watches. From this height he's not afraid to fall.

- If you followed the cat, you're in the right place my friends.

- Like a cat, one can tame me and I always land on my feet.

On the left, real promotional poster for the cabaret Le Chat Noir from 1896, on the right a poster that can be seen in Luna's cabaret as well as in the bakery.

I wonder what the arrow near the omnic cat's tail could mean. Maybe it has to do with the whole "following the cat" thing. Maybe you have to follow the arrow on the poster to get somewhere secret.

Following the cat, a cat watching from up high, climbing the wall, this all sounds like the type of things a secret society would say. Coded phrases. It makes all the more sense when you take into account the omnic revolution that is brewing.

https://playoverwatch.com/en-us/news/22904915

"Expect traffic delays and increased security presence near the Maison Marat over the weekend. A grand gala is being held to celebrate the recent passage of controversial omnic rights legislation."

You better believe this new omnic rights legislation isn't the kind that grants omnics any more rights, very likely the opposite. Otherwise, why would omnics organize themselves in secret revolutionary groups?

"Paris is a city of hidden gems, search out the speakeasies and hidden places as you roam the city. The right word might get you into a place you never knew existed. "

Maybe "the right word" has to do with cats. And mustn't be told to the door with all the graffitis, but to Luna directly? I can't think of a voiceline involving cats, or of anyone from our current roster of heroes who would feel like joining omnic revolutionaries. Well, except Sombra maybe. Ultimately, I think we're on the wrong track if we think using voicelines in different parts of the map will get us anywhere.

Back in the day, on Dorado, Bastion used to have a special voiceline when he would get close to a screen showing that the system had been hacked by Sombra as if he had gotten hacked as well. That was neat. Perhaps some heroes have special voicelines after they played a song on the piano or after they interacted with Luna or the door in a certain way. Time will tell I'm sure. Someone is bound to randomly notice something , like always.

Seeing as how those interactions Luna has with heroes haven't made their way into the game for now, I wouldn't be surprised if whatever the developers are teasing about the map won't be added to Paris until a further patch !

Bonus lore :

The police woman's voice that can be heard around the police station has 12 voicelines, 6 are just pure walkie talkie static and the other 6 are :

-Toutes les unités disponibles à l'Hotel Beau Ciel. Une cellule de la résistance omniaque s'y cache. Soyez prudents.

-Code 5. Suspect Jamison Fawkes repéré. A toutes les unités disponibles.

-Suspect repéré dans la librairie Carpentier. Voss, omniaque féminin d'1m60.

-Code 5. Suspect Mako Rutledge repéré. Le suspect n'est pas seul.

-Agent Bilodeau, répondez.

-Prêt

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-All units available to the Beau Ciel Hotel. A pocket of omnic resistance is hiding there. Be careful.

-Code 5. Suspect Jamison Fawkes spotted. To all available units.

-Suspect spotted inside the Carpentier bookstore. Voss, female omnic, 1m60.

-Code 5. Suspect Mako Rutledge spotted. The suspect is not alone.

-Agent Bilodeau, respond.

-Ready

Voss means fox in northern german. What a fantastic name. So badass and unique. Maybe she's the female omnic whose mugshot we can see in the police station

The bottom right one has a cross? That’s odd

Bilodeau is a french family name that comes from the name Billaud which may come from germanic word Biliwald meaning (likeable, gentle).

The french police seems to be using this system of communication so Code 5 simply means "Relay this information".

They're smart enough NOT to get too close to Junkrat and Roadhog, they're just relaying the information of their presence ^^

That's all I have for today !

If you enjoyed this and want to join the discussion and go on a hunt for clues, feel free to join my discord server !

https://discord.gg/SkVvhJN

A thousand thanks to Snowflake for making the video !

From the game files, texture file of all the stickers on Black Cat

Same cat ears !

Since Black Cat's release, we've had 12 months to figure out Paris was going to become a map. The skin contained "enough" clues to make a wild guess and think of Paris, or at the very least think of the cabaret vibe, and then of Paris.

Her dress looks like the curtains of a cabaret stage. Her shoes and that pearl belt also look very cabaret-ish. Her cleavage also has that cabaret vibe and look at the lace on her dress, on her mech and on her cleavage too. The hearts everywhere on this skin (even though hearts are already a big part of D.Va's design) could have made us thing of "Paris city of Love".

NOW it all makes sense.

It would have required gigatons of reaching in order to guess Paris out of that. But technically it was doable. Once you assume that everything is a clue (and this just confirms it), you start seeing things and all it takes is connecting the dots.

I like that it might be canon that D.Va is a big fan of Luna !

From the Patch Notes :

Paris, an elegant city of art and romance, is the home of our newest Assault map. Begin your journey at the Cabaret Luna, where the velvety alto voice of preeminent diva Luna charms movie stars, revolutionaries, locals, and tourists alike.

...D.Va IS a movie star !

The name of the skin itself is a cool reference.

Black Cat. Chat Noir in french.

There's a very famous parisian cabaret by that name.

And there's a very famous poster advertising that cabaret.

On the left, a poster we can see in Luna's cabaret as well as inside the bakery. On the right, a poster from 1896 advertising a tour with the Chat Noir cabaret's troupe of entertainers.

So yeah, with Blizzard, everything is either a clue for future releases or an easter egg.

They've been subtly hinting at a Paris map with a skin for an entire year and we completely missed it. Granted, it was kind of hard to guess. But it goes to show that they ALWAYS tease everything, months if not years in advance ! We're constantly surrounded by teases for things that won't come out for months or years and we don't even know it. Just how much is there out there for us to find ?!? Makes my head spin.

Wait

Hold up.

HOLD UP.

(from the PTR patch notes)

Paris, an elegant city of art and romance, is the home of our newest Assault map. Begin your journey at the Cabaret Luna, where the velvety alto voice of preeminent diva Luna charms movie stars, revolutionaries, locals, and tourists alike.

preeminent diva Luna

What if Hana picked the name D.Va because of her idol : Luna

...hot damn.

WHEN DOES IT END? Just how many layers are there?????

Blizzard, stahp. It's too much. We can't keep up !

That would explain so many things. D.Va is a nerd for Paris.

Phew. Wow. Okay then.

One more thing about Luna.

See the blue dot under her eye? It's called a "mouche" (a fly in english, because it's the size of a fly, kinda), it's a fake beauty mark made of fabric that was all the rage centuries ago in France and is still used in a few places, like cabarets for examples. It serves a specific purpose, depending on where you put it on your face/cleavage, it will have a different meaning. For example, in Luna's case, if you put it in the corner of the eye, it indicates to the people around you that you're the "passionate" type.

"Plus cruelle que la passion, n'éprouvant aucune compassion" she sings. More cruel than passion, showing no sign of compassion.

We get it, you're passionate x)

I'm passionate as well, about clues that is, and if you are too then you should join my discord server where we get real passionate about clues.

https://discord.gg/SkVvhJN

Papilio ulysses, that’s the easter egg. Ulysses is the roman name of Odysseus, the hero of the ancient greek epic poem by Homer, the Odyssey.

Long story short, in the Odyssey the greek army is at war with city of Troy and they manage to capture Troy using the stratagem of the Trojan Horse , which was Ulysses/Odysseus’ idea. Also, Ulysses/Odysseus was the human champion of the goddess of wisdom Athena at that time (she likes having human champions that she helps as long as they remain virtuous) and Overwatch’s Athena seems particularly worried about what is happening in Ilios, Ilios being the only map (the other two being Nepal and Lijiang Tower) where she lets players know a bit about why they’re here. On Ilios, we’re here because of Talon activity in the area, Athena thinks they’re after the recently unearthed artifacts (the statues of Athena, Hera and Aphrodite).

Now what’s the link between the Trojan Horse and Ilios? Well, another name for the city of Troy back then was Ilios.

*mindblown gif*

The Ilios butterflies, modeled after a species with bright blue wings (aka, the anti camouflage color), are the same color as the plants they fly around, making them really hard to notice (they’ve been around since launch, I’ve checked old footage, but no almost no one knows about them). Almost like they’re camouflaged, waiting for the right time to strike, like the soldiers inside the Trojan Horse of old, ready to take the city of Troy.  Which has me thinking the future greek hero of Overwatch could have some kind of camouflage ability, nothing like Sombra’s, more like actual camouflage that only works as long as you’re static even if you’re hiding in plain sight, Trojan Horse style. Idk, this is wild speculation.

There are pink, yellow and red flowers on Ilios, but only pink and yellow butterflies, no red butterflies for some reason.

Ilios is based on the greek island of Santorini and the pink flowers we see everywhere on the maps are very likely based on the real species bougainvillea which is found everywhere on Santorini. However bougainvillea is not native to the island, it comes from the rainforests of South America, Santorini being an arid volcanic island with 90% of its flora being dry bushes. Papilio ulysses isn’t native to Santorini either, it comes from the rainforests of Australia, Indonesia and other nearby tropical islands, it wouldn’t survive in the arid climate of Santorini (almost no native flowers on the island and way too dry anyway).

I think the developers picked this species solely for the easter egg, unless it’s a clue about the state of climate change in the world of Overwatch, allowing tropical butterfly species to survive in the dry mediterranean climate. Who knows...

Phew that was a lot of links to click on, I hope you’re not too mad about that :3

I hope you clicked on the first three links, they’re kind of important, if you haven’t, go do it now :D

That’s all I have on the Ilios Butterflies, I hope you liked it and will spread the word about them (and remember that you need to put the graphic setting called “effects” on medium at least, they don’t appear at all on low) !

They’re cute, they deserve to be noticed :D

If you’re open minded and if you enjoy wasting time hunting for the many obscure things the devs have put in the world of Overwatch, I have an all new discord server :D

Here is the door

Here is the plaque

When you get close to the door, the male park announcer says one of three things (there seems to be a timer of roughly 30 seconds between each voiceline and he says them at random, not following a noticeable pattern, you can get the same one multiple times in a row):

Staff only

...password?

Members only

(CLICK on the links, they’ll take you to 5s videos I recorded where you can hear each line)

I checked the game files of BlizzardWorld, those are the only voicelines linked to this door. The rest are general map flavor announcements/private jokes about Blizzard’s games featured in the park.

All of this is a reference to Disneyland’s own Club 33. A “secret” (although now well known, the word got out) club within Disneyland resorts reserved for an exclusive type of clientele. You need to be a member of the resort’s Club to be allowed in and need to give a password at the door, which looks like any other door in the park. Inside, you will find a starred restaurant, tons of Disney-related memorabilia and a VIP staff like in a luxury hotel, you can see what it looks like inside online, there are videos on youtube, just search for Disneyland Club 33. It is the only place in Disneyland that will serve you alcohol.

Originally Walt Disney wanted a VIP area where to invite investors/important people when they visited his park so he ordered Club 33 to be built. He wanted somewhere quiet to talk business and relax, an area off-limits for the general public. From the outside, it looks like there’s nothing special going on inside the house(s). It’s just one building among many, just like in BlizzardWorld.

And it’s exactly what is happening with this 131 plaque on that door and the park’s voice asking you for a password. Behind that 131 door is an exclusive club. 

Why 131? It’s a reference to  131 Theory Irvine CA, the address of the first “big” office space Blizzard moved into back in 1999 as you can see here in this timeline of Blizzard’s history since it’s creation , just press CTRL and F and then type “131″ inside the search bar, it’ll take you directly to it. Or scroll until you find it, if you’re brave ;D

Allgamers.com thinks 131 is a reference to an error message you can see in World of Warcraft in case of a corrupt data file. 

Quote :

“ This is probably the most obscure of the easter eggs in Blizzard World, but anyone familiar with World of Warcraft's doom-spelling error messages will appreciate the joke here. Error 131 specifically referred to a "corrupt data file" which plagued users around five years ago and intermittently since with complaints of missing or broken files crucial for launching the MMO. The joke here being that this door doesn't actually lead anywhere, as a prop door, and therefore its contents are missing or don't exist. “

This easter egg could have a double meaning, it would be so cool !

I wonder what happens behind those closed doors. Probably something shady, it’s Overwatch afterall :)

Credit to Discord users :

Dr.Tellurybot#9614 for telling me about the voicelines

Astyr#8396 for the Club 33 reference

Binge#4750 for the Theory 131 reference

If you’re open minded and if you enjoy wasting time hunting for the many obscure things the devs have put in the world of Overwatch, I have an all new discord server :D

https://discord.gg/Eg8pZdn

The newspaper on the rest chair, by the sunglasses (texture file from the gamefiles, this is the highest resolution available :/ )

Top part is, I assume, the old newspaper. The one on the chair is the bottom half, with the greek text. The bottom half likely replaced the top one (not that I recall seeing a newspaper on Ilios before) with the Summer Games update. 1 month or so after Doomfist and the Masquerade comic came out.

The greek text says

“ Ο ΑγγελιοΦόρος Ήλιος

Πολλοί Φόνοι κατά Ιη διάρκεια επιθέοεων οτο Καρναβάλι  

-----------------

The Angel of the Sun

Many Fears During Carnival Attacks “

(bad translation, would need a native speaker to translate it properly)

The picture in the bottom right corner is from the Masquerade comic

Yep, perfect match.

So, the newspaper is covering the events we see happening during the Masquerade comic. We can assume this newspaper is from the day after those events, at max a few days later. 

Widowmaker, (taking pleasure in) reading about her murders in the news. She’s never felt as alive as when she killed Mondatta, so she claims. So this is apparently a thing that she does, she’s low key self obsessed. That ain’t healthy, my poor Amélie, nothing moves her anymore besides killing :(

In Masquerade, Doomfist assembled some sort of Talon High Council and the comic ends with him stating that they have a war to start.

The sunglasses and the newspaper prove that Widowmaker was in Ilios a few days after the Carnival murders, it seems to be the very first mission she is being assigned now that Doomfist has escaped from his cell and taken back control of Talon. Doomfist is setting in motion the events that’ll eventually lead to this “war” that he wants to start. Widowmaker seems to be Reaper’s right hand. Her credentials are not high enough for her to be in the Council but she’s still a very important asset. I think it’s safe to assume they didn’t send Widowmaker on a vacation.

When you go towards the Orca Ship’s cockpit while on Ilios, Athena says 

"Over the past week Talon activity has been detected in the area. It is my belief that they are attempting to steal the unearthed artifacts that are excavated in the temple above Ilios." 

Until the 2017 Summer Games and the addition of those glasses on Ilios Lighthouse, we had no way of knowing what exactly Athena meant by “Talon activity” but now we do. Talon sent Widowmaker to pose as a tourist (so, her Côte d’Azur skin is canon). No way they’d allow Widowmaker to go on a break right after Doomfist told everyone they had a war to start. No way she’d want to go on a break either anyway x)

She’s on Ilios for a mission. She could be posing as a tourist while she gathers information. You’d think she’s the WORST person to send on an infiltration mission with her blue skin making her easy to spot, but hey, this is 207X, there are robots walking around, blue skin ain’t so weird.

The thing with Widowmaker is that she’s good at one thing and (as far as we’ve seen) one thing only : assassination. Who is/are her target/s on Ilios? On Petra, we learn that the nameless organization of archeologists is in charge of the ONGOING excavations on Ilios Ruins. Ioannidis is a name that pops up on the one of the map’s screens, we can assume he’s the one in charge of the Ilios excavation, Ioannidis being a greek name (meaning son of Ioannis, Ioannis being the greek equivalent of “John”, the man is basically a greek Johnson...possible Indiana Jones reference? Son of John...Jones, close enough?).

It seems he’s reporting about his progress on the ruins of Ilios to this Hamid Faisal person who could be the “boss”.

The question is : how do the statues, the temple, the excavation site and the archeologists fit within Talon’s war scheme? Why sending a highly trained assassin to a digging site? Why is Talon after those ancient greek artifacts?

The obvious explanation is that they want to steal then sell those artifacts to a client. But how would that start a war? Does Talon even need money? There has to be something more to those statues and artifacts that we’re not seeing right now. How would killing a bunch of archeologists help start a war? This makes no sense. Yet.

Would Talon have an asset as important as Widowmaker waste her talents on an errand like stealing a few statues? Maybe this is not about the money, maybe it’s about sending a message. What is an archeological site like Ilios but a testimony to mankind’s greatness, ingenuity, culture and ultimately, a beautiful heritage from the past.

Who’d want to destroy that? The obvious candidate is Null Sector. We don’t know much, if anything, about their motivations, but if I was a robot bent on destroying humanity, I’d focus on the mass murder aspect of the entreprise, of course, but I wouldn’t forget to make sure the symbols they value the most are turned to ashes. Maybe Talon wants to start a war by killing some archeologists, destroying precious heritage and making it look like Omnic extremists did it.

That would start a war.

But why sending Widowmaker, the highly trained assassin? She’s gotta be there because there’s a high priority target to kill, someone no one but her can get, maybe someone important who’ll come take a look at the statues, someone from the United Nations? The ruins are an internationally protected heritage site after all, it would make sense for some VIP to show up eventually, once the artifacts are all unearthed, perfect time to strike then. Maybe Athena is wrong, maybe Talon is not after the artifacts but after whatever big shot will come out to Ilios to pose for photos with the statues as the entire world watches while Widowmaker aims for their head. I think Widowmaker will be linked to the future greek hero’s background story. Hell, I’m certain she will.

This clue is 1 year old. Nothing new happened regarding Ilios (other than the Petra archeo-faction, but it’s still really vague, we just got a namedrop and that’s it). I guess, like with most clues, we just have to wait.

That’s all I have for you on this topic right now !

If you’re open minded and if you enjoy wasting time hunting for the many obscure things the devs have put in the world of Overwatch, I have an all new discord server :D

Tumblr didn’t let me upload my plays.tv videos of me shooting at the things because it didn’t recognize it I guess. Made them into gifs, still too large to be accepted by Tumblr so, here you have screenshots and if you want high resolution gifs, click on the links :D

Nothing spooky, just sparks !

Click here for a higher quality version

Click here for a higher quality version 

Click here for a higher quality version

So you see, they didn’t switch the blue sparks with pink ones, they added pink ones on top of the blue ones. It’s not a glitch, it’s deliberate. And it came just as Hammond was released. Which can’t be a coincidence. Could they be something that Hammond, the mechanic, built or kept from Horizon’s Lunar Colony?

I don’t know for sure what it could mean. It could be a map tease, a hero tease, an event tease. Pink electrical sparks are odd. Pink doesn’t belong in Junkertown x)

Those items themselves feel out of place. They seem way too high tech for the place. Everything in Junkertown is covered in dirt/dust/rust/others, but those three types of items look almost brand new. Did Junkers steal/find them somewhere and kept them without knowing what to do with them? Or do they serve a purpose? Junkers seem like the compulsive hoarder type. Bruce especially. Maybe those were traded/given to the Junkers by another faction or a company.

I’m sure we’ll find out soon™. Give it a year. Or three.

In the meantime, it reminded me of an old “fake leak” from may 2017

Link if it’s too small to read 

The part that’s interesting to me is the middle one  

>Bria Third quarter 2017. Concept but entering initial testing soon. Area denial Hero, think Mei with rapid wall ability. Designed to lock off certain areas of the map to assist her team, can't lock off multiple routes at once. Ult electrifies anything between two of her Wall bars

I know the leak is most likely fake but...what if...right?

Pink electrical sparks, electricity-based female hero...

Again, most likely fake.

Why on Junkertown? We’ve had 3 heroes linked to that map already, would they release a 4th? 

This does not mean it’s necessarily something linked to Junkertown. Remember the licence plate teasing Brigitte’s release date? That plate was on Junkertown and Brigitte has nothing to do with Australia whatsoever. There were also the movie claps on Hollywood teasing Brigitte’s release date as well and she has nothing to do with Hollywood either. Some clues are put on maps at random and tease entirely unrelated things I guess?

So, as with most “clues”, just wait and speculate in the meantime !

If you’re open minded and if you enjoy wasting time hunting for the many obscure things the devs have put in the world of Overwatch, I have an all new discord server :D

https://discord.gg/Eg8pZdn

This third teddybear is NOT there in regular King’s Row. It only appears in Uprising and it’s the only teddybear I found on the whole Uprising map.

Blizzard loves doing clues in sets of three. Three Moira books in Oasis and then the same three books in the Diablo Section of BlizzardWorld, three Hammond wall panel stashes in Horizon Lunar Colony, three ana wanted posters on Anubis and many others. I don’t think there are other teddybears out there but keep your eyes open :D

This right here is the texture file of the teddybear. All three bears have the same texture.

Notice the faded Overwatch logo? It’s on the bear’s chest, on all three of them.

See it?

My theory is that Overwatch was never a purely military organization, they likely also had a humanitarian branch who helped the dislodged population, the injured and the sick during and after the Omnic Crisis.

We know Sombra’s parents died in the Crisis. She was made an orphan by war young, probably around age 7-9.

The way I see it, Overwatch used to give those teddybears to children to help them cope with the loss of a parent and as such, young Sombra received one.

20+ years later, she still has that teddybear, which proves two things : Overwatch knows how to make quality plushies that won’t fall apart in 6 months and that’s really commendable AND Sombra never really got over the loss of her parents and has kept her whole life that bear who’s likely been her only “true” friend while growing up.

She keeps it on her bed. Not on a shelf, not on display behind glass, not in a toy chest or some random cardboard box, forgotten. No, on her bed. She sleeps with it, at age 30. And there’s only one teddybear. Not a dozen others that she’d have added to her collection over the years, just this one, that she was given by Overwatch when her parents died. It clearly means a lot to her. That bear is the cornerstone of Sombra’s personality and a daily reminder for her of the cost of war. Which is just, beautiful. It adds so much depth to her already rich character.

She probably looks at it every day and thinks about her place in the world, what she can do to make sure something like the Omnic Crisis never happens again. She’s on a mission and that bear is helping her stay focused.

 Well, that’s how I see it.

There’s also a theory by CowboyVigilante that I love because it add yet more depth to her relationship with the bear.  

Sombra could also be using that bear in a process called "Rubber duck debugging” which is a practical tip coming from a book called “The Pragmatic Programmer”. Basically when as a programmer you are stuck with code that won’t work, the idea is to explain the code line by line to an inanimate object, for example a rubber duck, which has zero knowledge of programming. By explaining the code line by line to “someone” who knows nothing about coding with very simple words, your brain will take another look, a fresher look, on what is wrong with the code and you’ll eventually pinpoint the problem, whereas, had you kept on going insane over what was wrong from your point of view, you’d have missed it. You just tricked your brain into thinking about a problem differently, congrats ! Best part is that this can be applied to everything in life, not just programming.

Sombra might be doing that with her teddybear when she can’t figure out how to hack something ! It would explain why she has kept the bear for 20+ years, he’s been her silent partner in crime all those years :D

She also might have hidden a USB drive inside of it, something with critical info?But that’s a massive reach and I don’t see what use she could have for it. Anyway there’s not much happening when you shoot the bear in game. The head pops off and that’s it.

The Overwatch logo on the bear’s chest and the fact that Sombra didn’t sew something on top of it, or removed the logo, makes me think Sombra is at the very least neutral towards Overwatch. She doesn’t seem to have anything particular against Overwatch as an organization, maybe it’s the only “good” one she sees out there, and her hacking skills probably provided her with the opportunity to see for herself what Overwatch was really about internally.

Remember the devs said that someone was working very hard to decrypt the old Overwatch Archives. It’s likely Sombra. Now we have to wait and see why she wanted those archives.

Emotes aren’t canon. However Zarya keeps talking about what happened to her village. Did she lose relatives in the Crisis? Probably. No confirmation about her family situation, we don’t know if she’s an orphan. 

In the emote, she opens a present and finds the teddybear which she then hugs tight until its head pops off. It could be just a joke about her voiceline “I want to hug you like big fuzzy siberian bear”. If I remember correctly, Russia has always refused Overwatch’s help during the Crisis. While I understand why they wouldn’t let a foreign military force on russian soil, I like to think they would still accept humanitarian aid. And Zarya might have received a teddybear after her village got destroyed by omnics, I don’t think only orphans are entitled to a teddybear. The emote could be a way to show that Zarya as a child grew up to “love” or at least see the good in Overwatch (hugging a bear with the Overwatch logo on its chest) and hate omnics (crushing a robot toy in disgust). Or maybe the emote is showing adult Zarya reunited with the teddybear she lost years ago? I’m reading too much into it.

The teddybear in the Uprising subway could belong to anyone. It could belong to the young child of someone who got it during the Crisis, or to another adult who, like Sombra, never quite managed to forget what happened and takes it around with them at all times. But it’s in the subway, on a bench. So I think it makes more sense that it belongs to a young child who was in the subway with their parents during the Null Sector attack, had to evacuate the city quickly and just left it behind in the panic.

Maybe Overwatch never stopped to give those teddybears away to kids, maybe through a kind of organization like Make a Wish that they would operate themselves after the crisis. Maybe the Uprising one is simply merchandise that parents bought for their kids. There are posters of Genji and Tracer in game, they seem canon, maybe Overwatch had a merch shop before they were disbanded x)

Either way, those teddybears are heavily linked to the suffering caused by Omnics turning against humans, be it Null Sector or older units during the Omnic Crisis.

If we ever see new teddybears added in game, or in shorts or comics, we can take that as a bad omen. I’m sure they’ll eventually become something, so many clues out there that seem random until something else is introduced and suddenly everything makes sense.

If you’re open minded and if you enjoy wasting time hunting for the many obscure things the devs have put in the world of Overwatch, I have an all new discord server :D

Ew. Blurry text. Ew.

This is extracted straight from the game files and it’s still too blurry to read.

Not worth my time.

Or is it?

Look at the top right corner.

I had noticed it months ago but dismissed it because I couldn’t get anything interesting when searching online for “Cloud Morris”.

But yesterday I thought “What if it’s not Cloud, but Claud?”

And Claud it is.

World, meet Claud Morris. Born in 1920, died in 2000, he was a british man known for owning multiple newspapers and being a true advocate for peaceful coexistence in the Middle East, especially the whole arab-israeli conflict.

He was one of the founding members of a non-profit organization and think -tank called the “Next Century Foundation” based in London and still in activity today.

He wrote a two-volume autobiography I Bought a Newspaper (1963) and The Last Inch: a Middle East Odyssey (1997).

There’s really not a lot you can find online about the man, other than two obituaries in big newspapers and since he died nearly 20 years ago, it’s hard to figure out who the man really was.

In game, the newspapers’ top right section says “A personal message from Claud Morris”.

Is Claud Morris still alive in 2070+ in Overwatch? Or is the newspaper quoting a famous thing Morris wrote? I couldn’t find any famous quote, or really anything he ever wrote online :/

But most importantly, assuming I have the right guy, why would the Overwatch team bring him up and “have him” write a personal message in ALL THE (small and local) NEWSPAPERS from around the world. Is Overwatch’s universe’s Claud Morris still alive and does he own all the newspapers still printing today (newspaper in 2070 Hmmm...)? And who is this personal message for anyway? Why make it personal if you’re gonna print it in newspapers worldwide? 

I guess they put it in all the newspapers because they wanted us to notice it. Either that or good old asset reuse. Maybe a bit of both ! Either way, I’ve noticed it, are you proud? :D

Now, it could be a different Claud Morris, several exist in the world. Would be a huge coincidence though.

Advocate for peace, newspaper owner, founder of an organization/think tank that works in the field of diplomacy and mostly focused on bringing peace to the Middle East, it has to be the man. Hell, he sounds like an Overwatch hero, all this optimism, all this passion.

“A personal message from Claud Morris” makes it sound like he’s still alive, and addressing someone in particular. A friend of his? Why in a newspaper. 

If it’s just a namedrop, it’s a bit of an awkward one :(

But I don’t think it’s the case. I think there’s a deeper meaning and we just can’t see the whole picture yet.

Like most/all of the obscure details I find in the game, I can only guess what the Overwatch Team’s intentions were. As great a dude as he seems to have been when he was alive, I don’t see why he was namedropped right there and in such a way. Is it a hint towards the Next Century Foundation? Should I try to track down copies of his autobiography or his old publications in the newspapers he owned?

How did the Overwatch Team even heard of Morris?

Why him when lorem ipsum or blurry text would have done the trick?

I don’t think any of the investigating we could do on our own would bring any answers, it’s too obscure, even for me :I

We’ll have to patiently wait for a developer’s answer. As Mei says, I'm sure there is a reasonable scientific explanation for this :3

Until then, make sure to always check out the blurry stuff in Overwatch it could be interesting, who knows !

If you’re open minded and if you enjoy wasting time hunting for the many obscure things the devs have put in the world of Overwatch, I have an all new discord server :D

https://discord.gg/Eg8pZdn

(free tin foil hat for all new members)

Impossible to get a good look at her from any of the three maps through normal means. This is what you see if you use spectator mode on Lijiang Gardens

And this is what you see from Lijiang Control Center

But then why was such a high resolution asset placed in such a seemingly random spot where no one can see her?

Well turns out it was done on purpose, so she could be seen in the background of the Hero Select Screen for the Defense team. I know “Defense” doesn’t mean anything on Lijiang as it’s a symmetrical control map, but “defense” and “attack” teams are still a thing, for spawns and whatnot.

Defense team’s Hero Select Screen

There she is ! The attack team has a different background though

Attack team’s Hero Select Screen

So there you go, this is why she was placed in this specific spot.

You can see she was already there in the beta days easily, just look at the hero select screen :D

She was not added recently at all. Yet, I couldn’t find anyone mentioning her online. She’s one of those many things hiding in plain sight that most of the community doesn’t know about. The more obvious something is, the easier it is to overlook. Could you name even half the cities on the airport arrivals screen in Numbani’s first attack spawn just remembering them, without looking that up online? Yeah, me neither, yet it’s literally right in my face when I spawn ^^

Before I noticed she was in the background of the hero select screen, (I noticed her while flying around in spectator mode, using a glitch to escape the skybox) I thought she had been added during Year of the Dog’s Lunar New Year event (because of the cute animal logo above her that could be a dog). But the fact she was there since Beta makes me think she’s probably an early character’s concept that didn’t make the cut, at least not as a fully-fleshed out character.

EDIT : HAMMOND.

Still, it would be nice to know if she used to have a name back in development or what the Overwatch team was considering her as. Maybe she was never meant to be more than a billboard ad. But it’s a surprisingly detailed unique design for an ad that’s used only once in the game and for a purpose that’s quite not clear since barely anyone ended up seeing/noticing her.

It doesn’t add as much “flavor” to the map as the happy squid, the soda girl or the giant friendly-looking pig, and all of those are present in multiple places throughout the map. It’s also really, really, really interesting that she’s on the only ad without a single chinese word.

It looks like she’s wearing a qipao/cheongsam, but a really “haute couture crazy designer” one.

I’ve looked at hundreds, maybe thousands of chinese/vietnamese/thai fashion dresses and nothing comes close to what we have here, but hey, I’m probably/definitely not looking for the right thing anyway, hard to find the proper key words, I’m totally out of my element on this one. I have no idea what to even call her hair style or the “tiaras/crowns” she’s wearing but it reminds of me traditional chinese theatre. Worth looking into.

Designer Guo Pei does crazy things and her work looks like it could have been the inspiration behind that dress but no luck so far.

The metallic-looking pieces on her arms and legs sure look futuristic. Doubt there’s anything in traditional chinese culture about that but I’d love to be wrong.

Her crazy long hair makes me think about the Red Yao People, a “tribe” of sorts in China whose women only cut their hair once in their life, when they’re looking for a husband. They let their hair grow their whole lives after that, and the average length is more than 120cm if I recall. They take amazing care of their hair, washing it with cold water only, using a homemade recipe for shampoo out of fermented rice water, tea seed oil residue and dried grapefruit peel . The women don’t get grey hair until they’re 80 years old. Could our billboard lady be from that people or is it just hair extensions?

If you zoom in, you’ll see it looks like she has the same “electrical circuit” body augmentations as Antonio and Sombra (look at the thick black lines on her face) but these could be make-up too. Her earrings are interesting, they’re diamond shaped/square and look like typical Lunar New Year decorations but I don’t know anything more about them.

I’ve also tried to identify the artist who drew her but nothing, needle in a haystack. 0 results for a reverse image search of course. However, among the artists known to have worked for Overwatch that I’ve checked out so far,  Miki Montlló (who did Roadhog’s comic Wasted Land) looks like the closest match.

The cute minimalist animal logo above her looks like it’s a brand’s logo. A clothing brand most likely? No luck with that logo either :/

If she’s teasing a future hero (and I’m absolutely not saying she is), that would be one hell of a premeditated tease.

EDIT : YES SHE WAS. HAMMOND. FOR YEARS. YEEEEE !

So yeah. This is all I have for now. Sorry. Really wish I had more on her. It’s clear that I’m obsessed with her T_T

I did that in MS Paint, trying to get rid of the pesky pink squares. Didn’t come out too good, hard to figure out what is “pixel noise” and what’s a legit border, but oh well :I

Hopefully someone out there, reading this, will know more than I do and we’ll finally figure out more about who she is.

Until then...next time you’re on Lijiang Tower Defense, picking a hero, think about her and point out her existence to your oblivious teammates so they can all go “omg who cares” in unison :D

Love it when that happens ♥

You can’t go there as a hero, you can barely see the licence plate even if you know it’s there. But in spectator mode, you can squeeze in and this is what you see from up close

CALIFORNIA  88GNAKD

I spent dozens of hours trying to make sense of it. I like spending dozens of hours trying to make sense of things that aren’t really worth trying to make sense of. It’s a healthy hobby of mine.

HAL-fred Glitchbot’s name is a pun, it’s based on Alfred Hitchcock, the famous british director.

I've learned that Alfred Hitchcock, despite his obvious genius, was actually a deviant intimidating man who was especially rude and abusive towards women, including his lead actresses, behaving in ways he couldn’t get away with nowadays. So I thought, maybe 88GNAKD stood for “BaBy Get NAKeD” since it was on the licence plate of his trailer and a movie set trailer seems like a good place for abuse to take place. Hollywood sex scandals involving movie directors are a very real issue. From the outside, it doesn’t look like it’s happening but if you look close enough, if you really look for evidence, you’ll find some. A bit like the licence plate. Hidden, in the shadows, yet very real.

But yeah, you know, nah. I really doubt that’s what the Overwatch team was going for with this, even if Glitchbot sounds like a real jerk.

As often, good old Occam’s razor prevails. 

88GNAKD most likely stands for 

1988′s comedy The Naked Gun : From the Files of Police Academy.

(19)88 G(un)NAK(e)D

The plot : An international terrorist group filled with enemies of the United States plots a conspiracy to humiliate the USA by assassinating the Queen of England during her visit to Los Angeles. The Queen will attend a baseball game and the terrorists plan to use a device to control the mind of a player, have him get close to the queen and kill her. Incompetent and goofy police detective Frank Drebin is on the case to make sure this doesn’t happen.

Now why would the Overwatch team add this detail to Hollywood?

The movie and the map are both set in California, roughly in the same area, around Los Angeles. In the movie, the police has to make sure nothing happens to a VIP from England, in game we have to make sure nothing happens to a VIP whose name is a pun on a famous british director. Glitchbot needs to be escorted by a squad of bodyguards everywhere, even on studio property because of controversies over the fact he’s an omnic director. You don’t assign a squad of bodyguards to someone unless they’ve received death threats. 

It’s safe to assume the threats comes from humans with anti-omnic views. I’m sure there’s the human equivalent of Null Sector out there. To appease tensions, it seems like the movie studio has set up a system of “mandatory human hiring quotas”, which isn’t to Glitchbot’s liking. Dude is really vocal about how much he dislikes humans, calling them “lazy bums” and mocking his own audience/fanbase for having horrible taste in movies (ironic self burn), which is probably why people want to hurt him.

 I know I do.

A bottle of water in Hollywood costs 600$ as seen here :

This crazy inflation on prices suggests that the global economy is hurting real bad. Probably because millions of omnics have replaced millions of humans in the workforce, to the point where this “mandatory human hiring quotas” system could actually be applied in all countries to guarantee some degree of human employment and avoid riots. But what is there left for a human to do when there’s an actual army of job-stealing tin cans already doing everything better than humans ever could? Maybe hopeless governments are down to make laws forcing some/most companies to hire humans even if there’s no tasks left for them to perform, paying people to do nothing all day or having them do bullshit work to keep them busy like in labor camps, that’s one sure way to create inflation, and have people unhappy. If the government makes sure everyone has a well-paying job and all sectors are in great shape, then money’s not worth anything anymore and cost of life goes through the roof. I guess. I’m no economics expert ... and it shows x)

Regular humans can’t compete with omnics. And that may be why a very loud, human-hating, influential, rich, arrogant asshole like Glitchbot is receiving death threats and needs protection (but so far we have no proof of any death threats, it’s just, very, very, very likely).

A bottle of water being worth 600$ when food seems cheap in comparison could either be a joke on how inexplicably expensive bottles are in real life, or indicate that clean drinking water has become a bit of a luxury item in the 2070s, which might very well be the case. Mass pollution and overpopulation being the likely culprits.

The device used in The Naked Gun : From the Files of Police Academy to control someone’s mind and have them want to kill someone they love, care about or at least have no reason to hurt (at the end of the movie, when the bad guy is beaten, the device is accidentally used on the detective’s love interest and it takes an emotional speech to have her snap  out of it) makes me think about how Talon brainwashed Amélie Lacroix into killing her husband Gérard, also a detective, of sorts (more like a spy, or someone in charge of a surveillance agency, maybe the Schengen Intelligence System).

It’s also very similar to how Anubis takes control of nearby omnics in Pharah’s comic Mission Statement.

Now I know that the Naked Gun series didn’t invent the concept of mind control x). But it’s interesting to note that the Overwatch team put a reference to it in a map like Hollywood. Talon being the OW Universe counterpart of the unnamed international terrorist organization from The Naked Gun, the licence plate could be a hint that Talon will eventually try to assassinate HAL-fred Glitchbot using a similar device to take control of the mind of someone close to him. Like Doomfist says, they have a war to start and they value people like Katya Volskaya who can “keep the fight going”. Assassinating Glitchbot and making it look like humans from an anti-omnic extremist group did it, that would be a good way to start a war.

...

Am I reading too much into this?

Most definitely. 

But crazy speculations are fun, aren’t they? Not as fun as getting actual lore but, y’ know, second best thing !

If you’re open minded and if you enjoy wasting time hunting for the many obscure things the devs have put in the world of Overwatch, I have an all new discord server :D

https://discord.gg/Eg8pZdn

(free tin foil hat for all new members)

As a bonus and reward for scrolling so far, here’s something from the game files of Hollywood :