Key Takeaways
- Blizzard faced backlash on Twitter for using a character's feet to advertise a new skin.
- Despite the strange tweet, Blizzard may have been addressing a long-running discussion about the character's feet.
Video game advertising was the Wild West, with shock value and explicit sexual objectification front and center. In the 21st century, things have gone from shocking to downright bizarre.
relevant
Overwatch 2 would love to bring back 6v6, but why stop there?
If Overwatch 2 were to revert to the original Overwatch, there are a lot of changes I'd like to see.
Things have changed, however, and Blizzard appears to have missed the memo and is being criticized for using the character's feet to advertise a new Overwatch 2 skin.
“Yatagarasu Kiriko has a gripper???”
Tweeted from the official Overwatch Twitter account, the Blizzard team decided to advertise Yatagarasu Kiriko's new skin using “gripper,” which is another term for feet. The tweet instructs players to drop a paw emoji if they are “so excited for Kiriko's new skin coming in Season 13.”
The marketing team knew the tweet would cause a stir and posted it at 1:30 AM ET/10:30 PM PT. And that is exactly what happened. There were more than 1,300 comments in the first hour after posting.
Many comments criticized Activision Blizzard for being “weird,” with dozens asking the account to “delete it right now.” “There's a reason they posted this tweet late at night. They're trying to take advantage of a down market,” said one commenter's best guess at the whole situation.
Perhaps there is one situation that could save Blizzard from any backlash. The company is simply using tweets to address a debate that has been going on for years. A quick Google search of “Kiriko paws” (sorry) will show numerous conversations on Reddit and Blizzard forums about the character's dog, but it's not clear which dog it actually is.
It doesn't make Overwatch's tweets any less weird, but at least there's a reason behind them.
Now it's time to delete your browser history.
Overwatch 2, the sequel to Blizzard's popular team-based hero shooter, features a roster of over 35 players and over 20 maps. It features a reduced team size of five with the aim of creating faster, more action-oriented matches, and PvE elements are added to the available options.
