Call it “The Great Butt Controversy of 2016.”
If you didn’t see it pop up all over the internet last night, here’s the deal: There was some hubbub around a specific Overwatch character pose that some found out-of-character and sexualized, so Blizzard announced that it would be changing it around. The result? Some players claim it’s pandering to an oversensitive crowd, while others applaud the studio for being willing to make adjustments.
The pose in question was one of the character Tracer looking over her shoulder and accentuating her backside. In a thread on the official forums, one poster mentioned concerns that this pose turned a “fast, silly, and kind” character into a “bland female sex symbol.”
After some discussion, Game Director Jeff Kaplan announced on the forums that the pose would be changed, saying that the art team had been struggling with it and wasn’t completely happy with the pose either.
“We’ll replace the pose,” Kaplan said. “We want everyone to feel strong and heroic in our community. The last thing we want to do is make someone feel uncomfortable, under-appreciated or misrepresented.”
He followed up his initial announcement with a longer explanation into the decision, stating, “We wouldn’t do anything to sacrifice our creative vision for Overwatch, and we’re not going to remove something solely because someone may take issue with it. Our goal isn’t to water down or homogenize the world, or the diverse cast of heroes we’ve built within it. We have poured so much of our heart and souls into this game that it would be a travesty for us to do so.”
