Overwatch‘s Torbjörn is the focus of the game’s latest video preview. Torbjörn is the game’s equivalent of the Team Fortress 2 Engineer — and veteran Team Fortress 2 players will recognize the turret-based gameplay immediately. That said, Torbjörn certainly appears to have more to do in combat such as tossing armor packs for allies, and he collects the resources required to build up his turret via killing opponents rather than picking up resource packs throughout the map like one might pick up ammo or health. Today’s video takes place on the Watchpoint: Gibraltar map revealed at PAX East. Torbjörn is playing defense.
I have to admit, even after watching this video wherein he racks up a monstrous kill streak, I’m not convinced the character will be particularly exciting to play. His turret does most of his offensive work for him (as you’d expect of a turret-based character) and his other contributions are the rapid rate at which he can provide his teammates with armor packs; certainly, he isn’t a weak character, but he isn’t an exciting one to watch, either. Since you can’t see the perspective of his turret, it’s difficult to gauge how significant a role it played in his team’s victory. By how quickly his ultimate charges — the ultimate charges based on your damage and healing — and that significant kill streak, it’s safe to say his turret was dishing out the pain, but it’s only through UI elements that we can see its effect.
No doubt, there will be players who will love this character. I might even come to love playing him myself. I don’t feel a video does him justice, though. Spamming armor packs kept his team alive, but most of what we saw was a man throwing items on the ground.
