Overwatch 2 Unveils New Hero In-Game — With Some Big Story Implications

Blizzard announces the arrival of Warnings 2another hero, a character codenamed Space Ranger, for her arrival in the next season of the game. Earlier this week, with the release of Warnings 2In the game’s modern Transformers crossover, a (slightly) mysterious object has appeared on the Dorado map: an empty escape pod that presumably carried a Space Ranger back to Earth.

This escape pod contained several clues to the Space Ranger’s identity, which Blizzard hinted at last year’s BlizzCon. A Morse code message and a photo taped to the inside of this escape pod suggest that the figure may be an ancient colleague of Mei’s—or at least someone who he knows Have.

Shortly after discovering the escape pod in Dorado — it’s right in the attacking team’s spawn room — players deciphered a secret message coming from the spaceship. It reads as follows:

J HAS LANDED

TRYING TO TRANSFER TO RPT

WAITING FOR AN ANSWER

“J” may be a character named Jiayi, who is referenced in one of Mei’s voice lines in Warnings 2. On the Lijiang Tower map, Mei will sometimes say, “My friend Jiayi works here. She and I had a great time in graduate school. Maybe too much.”

Lijiang Tower is the headquarters of Lucheng Interstellar, the Chinese company that built the Horizon lunar colony, where Winston and Hammond come from, in Overwatch’s story. Lucheng Interstellar was apparently also involved in the creation of the Mars colony; two parachutes connected to the escape pod in Dorado have the Lucheng logo and the words “Project Red Promise” on them, indicating an expedition to Mars.

A picture of Mei and someone who may be Jiayi is taped to the inside of the escape pod. However, Overwatch fans have also speculated that the “J” could refer to another character, Jiayi’s daughter, considering that Jiayi, like Mei, would be in her 40s. The Space Ranger artwork we’ve seen so far suggests that the modern hero may be younger.

Either way, Mei seeing an ancient friend (or her friend’s daughter) would be good news for the character. All of her other friends they are dead.

Photo: Blizzard Entertainment

Space Ranger hails from a colony on Mars and will be a “highly mobile support champion who will have a lot of vertical mobility,” the developer said at BlizzCon 2023.Warnings 2: “What’s Next” Panel. She’ll be armed with a burst-firing astute submachine gun and retractable shoulder-mounted rocket launchers.

We don’t yet know the Space Ranger’s true identity or her final name, but it’s likely that Blizzard will continue to reveal modern details ahead of her arrival in Season 12. Warnings 2which should be available in mid to slow August. When it is available, Space Ranger will be Warnings 2The 41st hero and the ninth helper.

If Blizzard continues to release pre-release versions of modern heroes like they did with Mauga and Venture, perhaps they’ll get their hands on Space Ranger in the coming weeks, if only to test them out.