"Hanzo Main" Insult Explained: Here's what that viral 'Overwatch' tweet is all about
Unless you're an avid Overwatch player, the viral tweet that shows a disciplinary slip given to a child for calling another kid a "Hanzo main" is probably leaving you scratching your head. Don't worry. We're here to be your guide through these difficult times.
"Hanzo main" insult, explained
In Overwatch, a competitive multiplayer shooter made by Blizzard, teams of six fight against each other to capture an objective point or escort a payload. One team is usually trying to achieve an objective, and the other team is usually trying to prevent them from achieving it.
The thing is, there's a roster of 23 — soon to be 24 — characters that players can choose from. So, naturally, there are some team compositions that work better than others. Therefore, when a player is obsessed with playing one character and is unwilling to switch to form a better team composition — called "maining" a character — it often comes off as stubborn and selfish. And those who main the character Hanzo have a particularly bad reputation.
It's not clear exactly why Hanzo has such a bad reputation, but it probably has to do with the fact that he's a character who requires a highly skilled player to really be effective. Unlike other characters, Hanzo tends to work best as a lone wolf, so there's often the perception that he's not really contributing to the team's composition as a whole. This becomes particularly irksome when a team has a hole in its composition that so desperately needs to be filled, but that last person on the team decides to go for Hanzo instead.
So, there you go. Someone stole some poor girl's pencil and her only recourse was to call him the worst name she could think of: a Hanzo main. The Overwatch Twitter chimed in soon after the tweet gained major steam, saying that while they don't support using "Hanzo main" as an insult, they liked her ferocity.
Interestingly enough, this isn't the first time the term "Hanzo main" has been thrust into the public eye.
Anti-Trump billboard called him a "Hanzo main"
An anti-Trump billboard that went up last year compared him to a Hanzo main, saying that he's the kind of guy who mains Hanzo and "complains about team comp in chat." That particular billboard was put up by a super PAC funded by Cards Against Humanity.
Next time someone cuts you off on the road or takes way too long to order their coffee at Starbucks, you have a new insult to add to your repertoire.
But you've been warned: You might get sent to the principal's office.
More Overwatch news and updates
For more on Overwatch, check out the rest of what Mic has to offer. Here is a list of our predictions for what seasonal events might appear in 2017, a look at a very funny but naughty meme on the Overwatch subreddit, an interview with the creator of an awesome new Overwatch zine, a full explanation of the different types of health in Overwatch, our definitive ranking of every Overwatch hero, a roundup of awesome gender-bent Overwatch cosplay and a giant Overwatch FAQ for beginners.
