Hanzo

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

According to the character's fictional biography, Hanzo Shimada is 40, and was formerly based in the fictional Japanese town Hanamura. Hanzo belongs to the Shimada family, a clan of assassins. As the eldest son in the family, Hanzo was bound by duty to inherit the Shimada empire from his father, Sojiro Shimada. From an early age, he was trained for that responsibility and showed skill in martial arts, bowmanship and swordplay. Upon his father's death, the clan elders instructed Hanzo to straighten out his younger brother Genji who was following a carefree, playboy lifestyle. When Genji refused, the clan elders forced Hanzo to kill him. Though, unbeknown to him, Genji was saved by Overwatch doctor Angela Ziegler. The act of killing his brother broke Hanzo's heart and drove him to abandon the clan. The lore states that Hanzo currently travels the world, 'attempting to restore his honor and put the ghosts of his past to rest.'

In Their Own Story

In May 2016, Hanzo made his first appearance in Dragons, the third in a series of animated shorts. In the short, Hanzo returns to the Shimada castle in Hanamura to honor his brother Genji on the anniversary of their fight and the resulting latter's apparent death. Despite numerous guards being present, he is able to easily overpower them before they can alert anyone else. While making offerings at his brother's shrine, a man appears from out of the shadows, whom Hanzo presumes was sent to kill him. The two fight evenly matched until Hanzo, out of arrows, attempts to use Dragonstrike to defeat his opponent. To his surprise, the assassin is also able to use the Shimada dragons and turns them against him. Defeated, Hanzo coldly accepts his death. The assassin spares Hanzo and reveals himself to be Genji, alive after all these years. The cybernetic ninja tells Hanzo that he has forgiven him for having attempted to kill him. When Genji attempts to leave, Hanzo draws out his bow, labelling him a fool and stating that 'real life is not like the stories [their] father told [them]'. Despite this, Genji said that he still believed in his brother and had hope for him before leaving. With Genji gone, Hanzo returned to finish his offering. Hanzo made his first appearance in the digital comic 'Tracer: Reflection', which was released in December 2016. In the comic, which is set during Christmas, Hanzo is depicted with a different style than his appearance in the game. This includes him wearing an earring and a nose piercing, in addition to having his hair in an undercut style. In the comic, he's shown staring at a strawberry cake inside a shop with a little boy behind him.

Reader's Guide

Hanzo is classified as a damage character in Overwatch. He is a sniper and wields the 'Storm Bow'. His bow has an infinite number of arrows that can be fired in succession of one another. Alternatively, the arrows can be charged up for one second for a higher damage output and higher arrow velocity. Hanzo has two attacks relating to his bow. The first is 'Sonic Arrow', which allows him and his teammates to see the location of their enemies that pass within a sphere of influence from the point of impact, and the second being 'Storm Arrow', in which Hanzo can fire five arrows at full power in rapid succession. Hanzo also has the ability to 'Lunge', dashing forward if he is in mid-air. Hanzo's ultimate ability is 'Dragonstrike'; when using this ability, Hanzo fires a single arrow that releases two dragons that travel in a straight line, passing through all walls, until the end of the map. Any enemy caught in the line of fire and touching the dragons takes continuous direct damage, which can kill most unprotected characters within seconds. Hanzo also has a passive ability called 'Wall Climb' that allows him to scale walls. When Overwatch was first released, Hanzo had two normal abilities, the 'Sonic Arrow' and the 'Scatter Arrow' that would split into five separate arrows that would ricochet off walls from the point of impact. The Scatter Arrow was found by Blizzard and players to often be too powerful, able to take out tank characters with normally high damage in a single shot. After a period of testing on the Public Test Region from April 20, 2018, the new kit was introduced on May 3, 2018. This kit replaced the 'Scatter Arrow' with 'Storm Arrows', the ability to fire six full-powered shots in rapid succession, along with a mid-air dash move. These changes were designed to bring Hanzo to be more a front-line character.

Did You Know?

• Hanzo's 'Demon' skin during the 'Overwatch Halloween Terror' seasonal event in October was inspired by Hattori, who was also known as 'Demon Hanzo' because of his tactician abilities.
• Hanzo and Genji's story arc was inspired by the documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi.
• Lead writer Michael Chu described Hanzo's storyline as 'will-he, won't-he fall to darkness' and stated that Hanzo is 'real interesting because he can be a hero and a villain depending on your point of view'.
• In the English version of the game, Hanzo is voiced by Paul Nakauchi.
• Hanzo was added to Heroes of the Storm in December 2017 as part of the 'Dragons of the Nexus' event.