Blizzard announced back in August that it would be changing McCree’s name in response to allegations levied against the character’s namesake, developer Jesse McCree, and others as part of an ongoing Activision Blizzard lawsuit. On Friday, Blizzard revealed what the new character’s name will be. He’ll be called “Cole Cassidy” from now on, and Blizzard’s also provided some background for the character to help ease the transition into his new name.
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The new name was announced on social media this week in posts from the Overwatch accounts where we learned of the new name and some insights into the character’s struggles. The Overwatch hero has to “be honest with his team and himself,” according to the new lore info, which apparently means adopting his true name.
“The first thing a renegade loses is their name, and this one gave up his long ago,” Blizzard said about McCree (who we’ll from now on refer to as Cole Cassidy). “Running from his past meant running form himself, and each passing year only widened the divide between who he had been and what he had become. But in every cowboy’s life, there comes a time when he has to stop and make a stand. To make this new Overwatch better – to make things right – he had to be honest with his team and himself. The cowboy he was rode into the sunset, and Cole Cassidy faced the world at dawn.”
Referring to the character as Cole instead of McCree will likely take some time for players to get used to, and there will inevitably be those who prefer to use the old name anyway even though the official name has been changed. Blizzard acknowledged that name changes like these “take time to roll out correctly” and said that it would be delaying the new Overwatch arc meant to revolve around the character to give time for the changes to set in.
“In the near term, we had planned to kick off a narrative arc in September supported with new story and game content, of which McCree was a key part,” Blizzard said months ago. “Since we want to integrate this change into that story arc, we will be delaying the new arc until later this year and instead launch a new FFA map this September. Going forward, in-game characters will no longer be named after real employees and we will be more thoughtful and discerning about adding real world references in future Overwatch content.”
This text included with Cole’s new name may be the start of the new arc Blizzard teased previously, so expect more about the hero to be shared in the future if that’s the case.
