Overwatch 2 lead hero designer Alec Dawson joined a pair of content creators and their fans to discuss the upcoming Roadhog rework today, Nov. 13. And when talking about experimentation for the tank’s new ability, one idea that was left on the cutting room floor left everyone laughing.
While Roadhog’s new ability, Pig Pen, is a deployable trap that does a combination of damage and crowd control, it can also be used to help execute a potential one-shot combo, once again returning that powerful aspect to Roadhog’s kit.
But, according to Dawson, there were numerous other ideas that his team tested out, including something similar to a hysterically silly fan-theorized ability Dawson referred to as “Butt Slam.”
“We went really wide early on,” Dawson said. “We did even, I think there were a lot of theories about ‘Butt Slam’ and things like that, we actually did something where Roadhog was jumping into the air and slamming down. It felt a little odd overall to how he was playing and added complexity to his kit.”
The idea is that, given his size, if Roadhog were to jump in the air aggressively, akin to the Ground Pound ability the Nintendo’s Super Mario character is known for, he would probably disrupt those around him and generate some sort of crowd control effect.
In the end, the team took the approach of trying to consider how Roadhog players enjoy playing the hero and what the team could do to enhance that experience, which led to the inclusion of Pig Pen, and the re-establishment of one-shot potential for the hero. Given that the upcoming new hero Mauga’s ability Overrun has a similar crowd-controlling stomp to it, it makes sense that the team would try to give Roadhog something a little bit different to spice up his kit.
Roadhog’s rework is set to go live in Overwatch 2 tomorrow, Nov. 14.
