Echo

 is a Damage hero in Overwatch.

Overview
Echo is an evolutionary robot programmed with a rapidly adapting artificial intelligence, versatile enough to fill multiple battlefield combat roles.

General Strategies
Strengths As her occupation suggests, Echo is a flexible hero who can fit into many compositions and adapt to many situations. She can dive alongside her tanks, flank the backline, pelt her enemies from the sky, or focus her attention on busting enemy shields to free line of sight for her team. Thanks to her high omni-directional mobility, Echo can threaten from many positions and circumvent shields to poke at the vulnerable backline or pick off targets left weak by her teammates with her Focusing Beam.

Weaknesses Hitscan heroes, such as McCree and Widowmaker, are Echo's biggest threat. Be careful with your Flight and Glide when there's a hitscan on the enemy team or you'll make yourself an easy target. Another vulnerable spot for her is how easy it is to put yourself into a poor position with Flight. Watch where you're flying and make sure to fall back into your team, to natural cover, or to a position where you can't easily be cornered and killed.

-

General Tips
 * More than any other, Echo benefits greatly from understanding how to play other heroes. This knowledge is critical to getting the most out of Duplicate, and since Echo can utilize a lot of different playstyles - from flanking to diving - the familiarity with the play styles of the other heroes will help you adapt to any situation.

Flight
 * Always cancel Flight as soon as you're done using it to begin the cooldown as quickly as possible.
 * Flight is Echo's only means for survival. Do not use it frivolously, and avoid having it on cooldown right before engagements whenever possible.
 * For positioning, you can often use Flight for a short time and then use Glide to reach your desired position. Go into custom games and practice using Flight and Glide in combination on the various maps.
 * Similarly, when returning from spawn, consider using Flight to launch yourself into the air and then cancel it and Glide so that your cooldown will be back by the time you return to your team.
 * Use Flight to position yourself before using Duplicate to take surprise angles your duplicate-target might not otherwise be able to reach.

Focusing Beam
 * Cancel your beam as soon as there are no more half-health or below targets to start the cooldown as early as possible. The damage dealt by Focusing Beam on targets above half health isn't good enough to warrant delaying the cooldown -- you'll do more damage via primary fire.

Sticky Bomb
 * If you only land some of your bombs on a hero, you can use Focusing Beam to finish your target before they can heal.

Duplicate
 * Be careful when using your ultimate at low-hp if you're under fire. You can be killed in the brief time you're transforming and you'll lose your ultimate.
 * If possible, use your cooldowns before Duplicating to get some extra damage in. By the time you're out of Duplicate, your abilities will be refreshed.
 * Duplicating tanks is often a good idea -- you get full HP when transforming and when reverting back to Echo. Tanks also have powerful game changing ultimates that are risky to charge, but when duplicating as Echo, you can be much more aggressive and quickly charge ults.

Positioning
 * As a general guideline, Echo is typically best at fighting enemies from mid-range; her primary fire is harder to aim the further away she is, her Focusing Beam has a 16m range, and landing Sticky Bombs is easier.
 * Be mindful of turrets. Torbjörn's turret has a long range and can be a serious threat to you if you boost out of cover. Symmetra's turrets are capable of even more DPS than Torbjörn's, and the slowing effect will make you easy to hit. Avoid charging blindly into areas you suspect are being covered by Symmetra.

Communication
 * Like Pharah, Echo makes for an excellent scout due to her ability to get a bird's-eye-view of the battlefield. On many maps, Echo can fly high enough to peek over obstacles and get an idea of where the enemy team is grouping up/going to push through.
 * If your Sticky Bombs seriously injure a target, but you can't follow-up with your Focusing Beam, call out the target for your team to follow up on

Story
Echo is an evolutionary robot programmed with a rapidly adapting artificial intelligence, versatile enough to fill multiple battlefield combat roles, able to reconfigure herself on the fly (quite literally) to adapt to new situations. For the first time, Echo is seeing action as a full-fledged team member. But as she is exposed to new people, new ideas, and new situations without her creator to guide her, no one knows how she might evolve in the future.

Much of Echo's personality is based on Doctor Mina Liao, her creator. As she continues to adapt, free from the confines of a lab, those around her will decide whether Echo will remain an echo of her creator, or become her own person.

Origins
"You are my life's work. You will be everything I dreamed."

- Mina Liao to Echo

The Echo Project was initiated by Overwatch scientist Doctor Mina Liao, who dreamed of improving upon the original omnic designs. Liao's firmly held belief in the potential artificial life and its power to transform the lives of humanity for the better formed the basis of the project. She talked with Commanders Jack Morrison and Gabriel Reyes, pitching the idea for an adaptive robot that could adapt to any niche an Overwatch strike team might need while in the field. Morrison, though reluctant to move forward with the idea, greenlit the project after Liao gave her word that it wouldn’t get out of hand.

Due to Overwatch's restrictions on artificial intelligence research and development after the Omnic Crisis, Liao was forced to limit Echo’s capabilities. What she created was a multirole, adaptive robot that could be programmed to learn different functions: anything from medical support to construction: but had serious limits to its independent decision making. Critically, Echo had multiple layers of protections, failsafes, and security to keep it under control. Echo was used successfully on test missions alongside Overwatch strike teams, but Overwatch leadership was reluctant to put it into full service.

However, the truth was that Liao had programmed Echo with a powerful, general artificial intelligence that learned by observation. After thousands of hours in the scientist's presence, much of Liao’s behaviors (including her speech), were adopted by the Echo robot. This secret that was known by very few, including Blackwatch agent Jesse McCree, who had, at times, been assigned to guard the scientist. The more Echo evolved, the more she really adapted to all of her team members that she was around all the time&mdash;watching them, learning to do what they did, the way they did it. Echo's ability to modify her behaviors, reconfigured herself, and learn from those around her made her the ultimate mission aide and a potential liability, as her sentience developed and she began to question her place in the world.

When Liao was killed in attack on an Overwatch facility, Overwatch's leadership was reluctant to continue pursuing such a dangerous project without its progenitor. Fears existed as to the robot's adaptive learning personality. All development on Echo was shut down, and the robot was placed into quarantine. After Overwatch shut down, the United States government took possession of the Echo robot.

Reunion
"Hey there, cowboy. Welcome back, partner. Mmm...how long have I been gone? Far too long."

- McCree reactivates Echo

Years later, after a recall order initiated by Winston, Echo was being transported from Hurlburt Field to Davis–Monthan Air Force Base She was placed in a crate on a military freight train. However, the train was derailed by the Deadlock Gang, but they were incapacitated by McCree (who in truth, had manipulated the gang's leader into derailing the train in the first place). He then proceeded to reactivate her. Echo was unaware of how much time had passed, and was taken aback to see that McCree's left arm had been replaced by a cybernetic graft. He evaded telling her the details, but informed her of Winston's recall of Overwatch agents, that while he'd been summoned, she was the one that Overwatch needed. He then departed on a hoverbike, saying that he had some business of his own to attend to.

Zero Hour
"Hello Winston. Echo!"

- Echo and Winston reunite in Paris

When Null Sector attacked Paris, Echo was among the former Overwatch members who turned up at the city to repel the attacking omnics. Flying above the battlefield, she was able to take out scores of Nullifiers with her sticky bombs, and later, distracted the Null Sector Titan, evading its missile barrages. The Titan was destroyed and Null Sector's attack thwarted, leading Winston to declare that Overwatch had returned. Echo took her place among the team, this time, as a full-fledged member.

The Battle of Rio
"Echo, checking in from the shuttle. Looks like you have Null Sector's attention. I'm tracking them...coming under heavy fire!"

- Echo When Null Sector attacked Rio de Janeiro, Echo flew the team's shuttle. She provided support to Tracer, Reinhardt, Mei, and Lúcio as they fought their way through the city's streets to the Null Sector command ship. The ship was destroyed, and Echo brought the shuttle around, allowing the strike team to board it through its rear hatch while hovering in the air.

Achievements
Note: While playing as Echo, it is possible to earn achievements for other heroes while Echo is using Duplicate.

Trivia



 * Echo is Hero 32 and the eleventh new hero and the final hero added to the game before Overwatch 2.
 * Echo was inside the payload in Route 66 (although she could not be seen). She was later removed alongside the release of the Reunion animated short.
 * Her original concept name, Iris, may be related to The Iris, a concept connected to omnics.
 * Her concept design appears alongside other heroes in the holovid on display at the Overwatch Museum during the Overwatch cinematic trailer.
 * Echo's 'face' is a holographic projection. This would allow her a wide degree of facial expressions, similar to other robots like Snowball as opposed to omnics, who are generally more static in their facial expression.
 * Some of her voice lines use Singlish phrases, which is an English-based language in Singapore, where Mina Liao is from.
 * Echo is the most advanced piece of technology in the setting.

Pre-release
Echo, initially named Iris, was first conceived as a hero for the pitch meeting for Prometheus, which became Overwatch. Her initial design was taken from unused Project Titan concept art, and she was one of the marquee heroes prominently featured in the Prometheus "hero lineup" key art. In the original Prometheus pitch deck, she had the following abilities: Particle Beam, Speed Boost, and Shield.

In early concept art for Echo, her design featured both the Athena and Vishkar Corporation logos at different points, but they were only added to fill in empty spaces on the design and did not accurately reflect her lore. The design was seen in the intro cinematic for Overwatch, where she was depicted as being a cyclopean omnic.

According to Jeff Kaplan, Echo is a very important character and a large story is going to unfold that involves her. Though choosing to remain vague, he indicated in 2019 that the development team was very interested in making her a playable hero.

In October 2019, Echo was seen among other heroes in leaked Overwatch 2 artwork. During the 2019 BlizzCon, she is shown in the cinematic trailer for Overwatch 2, Zero Hour.

In March 2020, she was announced to be the 32nd playable hero in the game.

Audio
Echo has over 750 voice lines, accounting for both her own lines, and duplicated lines from other characters. The developers started with some key words and phrases. Geoff Garnett was told that she should sound like a fighter jet, per her being the most advanced tech in the setting as an adaptive robot. Servo sounds were avoided, as it was deemed that they wouldn't fit her aesthetic. There was a collaboration between the game team and the cinematics team to determine what she was going to sound like in Zero Hour.

Once her cinematic feel had been defined, the team’s challenge became how they would take Echo’s fleeting appearance in a cinematic and expand it into a medley of audio bites? This included the issue of "floating footsteps" (as in, to alert other players that she was nearby in-game), and how the voice lines of other characters would be represented through her duplication ability. For the former, Garnett chose tonal, whiny noises that sounded like a footstep presence, rooting her as being physical, but sounding less physical as she got further away.

After nailing down the core aspects of Echo's sound palette, Garnett then addressed the implementation of her voice acting. As an adaptive robot who can replicate the likenesses and abilities of others, her voice lines opened an avenue of expression distinct from all of the game's other heroes. Scott Lawlor, the audio director of Overwatch, pitched an idea: What if Echo were to replicate not only the other heroes’ models and talents, but their voice lines, as well? While the Overwatch team was excited about the idea, it meant a formidable task lay before Jeannie Bolet, Echo's voice actress, who was responsible for nearly double the amount of voice lines spoken by the game's other heroes.