'Overwatch' director on the game's diversity: 'normal things are normal'

The Overwatch developers' goal was not to make a diverse game, but an inclusive one.

Overwatch game director Jeff Kaplan spoke about Blizzard's hit competitive shooter game at the D.I.C.E. Summit Wednesday, discussing some of the design decisions that led to the game's colorful cast of characters and the team's overall goals for Overwatch.

You can watch his whole discussion (starting at 7:25) here:

"I think it's really interesting that people think that diversity was the goal of the Overwatch team when it was not," Kaplan said. "What we cared about was creating a game in a game universe in a world where everybody felt welcomed. And really what the goal was was inclusivity and open mindedness."

Part of making everyone feel welcome in Overwatch was creating a variety of heroes, not only with unique mechanics and models, but with unique backgrounds and origins.

"We wanted there to be heroes that felt approachable to each person," Kaplan said. "We all like different things, we're all attracted to different things -- that's one of the beautiful things about humanity and making a game on planet Earth: how awesome the differences are."

One of the characters Kaplan highlighted was Ana. Ana was the first hero to be introduced after the game's launch, and she is an older Egyptian mother who happens to be a sniper.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

Kaplan points out that there aren't many games that feature a character like that, and having so many different characters and locations in the game makes it feel like anything is possible for players.

"You might be from somewhere that we haven't represented yet in Overwatch but you could imagine there being an Overwatch hero or an Overwatch map from your area and it seems totally plausible," he said. "It seems like at any time I could be represented in the game."

Kaplan also talked about how elements from outside the core game have helped open further avenues for inclusion, like when Blizzard revealed the game's cover star, Tracer, was in a same-sex relationship in the comic "Reflections."

"'Reflections' happened to reveal that Tracer had a girlfriend at home, not a boyfriend like some people expected," Kaplan said. "And this is all part of what we on the Overwatch team think of as 'normal things are normal.' It's important to show normal things as normal, so they become more normal."

Kaplan spoke about how this instance and Overwatch as a whole strays from the first-person shooter norm. He said when looking at the box art of some of the most popular shooter games in recent years -- games he admittedly loves -- he noticed a trend.

"The trend seems to be 'grizzled soldier dude,'" he said. "It made me think about just how different Overwatch was in so many ways that when I look back on the past 10 years of great shooters... It's very different to have an LGBT character on the cover, and also one who's a female, so it's something that we're pretty proud of."

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

With so many different characters representing so many different aspects of humanity, it's no wonder that an Overwatch hero could become a symbol for people.

"At the end of January something very special happened," Kaplan said. "There was an international march for women's rights that took place all over the world. The thing that really caught our eye was that in Seoul, Korea, during the march somebody was flying this flag that had the symbol for D.Va, who is our character from Korea who in some ways challenges stereotypes and in some ways embraces them."

D.Va has become a symbol for a group of Korean feminist gamers called For D.Va -- AKA the National D.Va Association -- that is fighting for a non-sexist world.

"In no way do we aspire to be a political game," Kaplan said. "We have no political motivations whatsoever, but it's fascinating to see that the values of the Overwatch team are being embraced and owned by the community in their own sort of positive way."