Mei (Overwatch)

Dr. Mei-Ling Zhou, commonly referred to as Mei ( ), is a character who first appeared in the 2016 video game Overwatch, a Blizzard Entertainment–developed first-person hero shooter. Originally conceived as a Canadian bounty hunter named "Frostbite" who encased her targets in ice, she was changed due to the developers feeling a light tone was necessary for the character, and redesigned her as a cute, Chinese scientist. Voiced by Yu "Elise" Zhang, Mei is stationed in Antarctica as part of the efforts of "Overwatch", a global peace-keeping force, to monitor climate change. After being revived from cryopreservation, she helps the reformed group combat a global threat, utilizing a pistol that can either generate ice beams or generate ice constructs, accompanied by her sentient drone Snowball. Since her introduction, she has appeared in various spinoff media related to the franchise, including comics and merchandise, and later in another Blizzard developed title, Heroes of the Storm. Mei as a character has been well received since release, particularly by Chinese audiences. Her appearance as a full-figured woman has also received praise, cited as a point for female diversity in gaming. However, criticism arose when the game's sequel seemingly slimmed her figure down. In 2019, due to the Blitzchung controversy involving Blizzard, Mei's image was used to express support for Hong Kong during protests occurring within the country, pushed as a "pro-democracy" symbol on social media platforms and displayed by protestors outside the BlizzCon 2019 event.

Conception and development

Mei was first announced in October 2015 at BlizzCon; along with D.Va and Genji, she was one of the last heroes who was introduced into Overwatch prior to its official release. The concept started from a desire to have an ice or cold user in the game's roster. This extended as far back as the original pitch for Overwatch, "Prometheus", with the proposed character "Frost", a fully masked figure with a winter coat armed with an ice axe and able to generate ice patches and walls. Though the character was excluded from the finalized planned roster, the concept was later revisited by artist Justin Thavirat as a character codenamed "Frostbite", a Canadian mountaineer bounty hunter that would that would capture her targets in ice. While the development team was excited by the idea, her design came across as too intimidating, and feeling the game had too many "serious" characters redesigned her with a lighter tone in mind. Assistant Art Director Arnold Tsang drew several drafts modifying the design. Game director Jeff Kaplan suggested making the character possibly Chinese, wanting to avoid nationalities stereotypically associated with chilly environments such as Canada or Norway, and Tsang took inspiration from China's Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival to flesh out this aspect. Lead writer Michael Chu after considering her intended abilities suggested making her a "plucky, nerdy scientist kind of character" that manipulated ice to get to hard to reach locations in the field, much to the development team's delight. With artist Ben Zhang developing her equipment, she was originally armed with a large two handed cannon carried underhand. However, Tsang felt it and aspects of her outfit made her silhouette resemble another character too much, Zarya, while other developers felt it seemed too refined for her character. Her weapon was revised to seem "cobbled together" and hand crafted, changed to a one handed pistol which not only made her silhouette unique, but also freed her other hand for abilities and gestures. A sentient drone, Snowball, was added to give her a fun "sidekick" to interact with, with Zhang creating several designs, including one resembling a rabbit, in an attempt to find something "endearing but not overly expressive" that wouldn't be distracting during gameplay. Her personality was partially inspired by her voice actress, Yu "Elise" Zhang. During a recording session, after she flubbed a line she told both Chu and the sound engineer "Sorry, sorry, sorry." Chu felt this was a great line for the character, and added additional lines to portray Mei as apologetic, both sincerely and sarcastically, for her actions in-game. Additionally the animator assigned to her, David Gibson, drew inspiration from characters such as Rapunzel and Giselle from the films Tangled and Enchanted respectively, namely their "Disney princess vibe" but also their innocent and clumsy aspects that made one want to "spend time with [them]" according to Gibson. Additional influence came from Yomiko Readman of the anime Read or Die at Tsang's suggestion, with Gibson adding an aversion to fighting but being forced to do so to Mei's character.

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