Politics and video games intersect: Billboard portrays Trump as the worst of ‘Overwatch’ players

There’s no escaping politics; even in our cozy virtual worlds, there’s no such thing as refuge. The peculiar mixture of the nation’s most absurd presidential race and a popular video game has resulted in an anti-Donald Trump billboard inspired by “Overwatch,” Blizzard Entertainment’s popular team-based shooter.

The creators behind the billboard, recently spotted in Orlando, Fla. are a super PAC known as the Nuisance Committee. The super PAC is the brainchild of Cards Against Humanity creators. Their goal? To “drive Trump nuts.”

The billboard reads, “Donald Trump mains Hanzo and complains about team comp in chat,” followed by a link: “trumpisnotateamplayer.com.” While the billboard may not make sense to the majority of people, it will to the 20 million players of “Overwatch.” To us, the very idea of a Hanzo main is petrifying; they’re the bane of the “Overwatch” community.

The witty billboard was spotted by the University of Central Florida.
Credit: Jason Paradise/@UbiParadise via Twitter

For those that don’t know, Hanzo is a defense-based archer that supports his team of six from behind the frontlines. In casual play, Hanzo players are decent to have on a team because casual players are less experienced in dealing with Hanzo’s sporadic arrows. However, in competitive play, Hanzo players are scolded as experienced players on both ends know how to pierce through his defenses, rendering the character near useless.

A match with a Hanzo will almost always go down the same path. Their teammates will tell them to switch to another character, but the player’s huge ego will prevent them from listening to their teammates. They proceed playing Hanzo, in the hopes that they’ll make a big break and save their team. They’ll refuse to switch off Hanzo, yelling “he’s my main!” through their microphone. In a game where the main concept is being able to switch characters as players please, the idea of “mains” is non-existent, only adding to their teammates’ discontent.

The match ends with a defeat. It should come to no surprise to Hanzo players when they face defeat, yet they are the ones that complain about their team and blame them for their loss.

This is where the connection lies between Hanzo players and Trump. As the billboard suggests, they are the worst kind of people, the people you’d hate to have on your team. You wouldn’t wish them upon your enemy. They are the embodiment of salt. They are ignorant. They are not team players.

The comparisons don’t end there. The site has other examples that draw parallels between Trump and Overwatch’s most hated and obnoxious characters. To emphasize this, there are illustrations that portray these characters as Trump. From the campy Bastion to the agonizing and agile Genji, Trump does it all.

One example draws parallels by portraying Trump as Reaper, a character many Overwatch players hate facing.
Credit: Daniel Warren Johnson/The Nuisance Committee

The website also includes common dialect of Hanzo players, or players who can’t handle a loss; one example being, “The screen has input delay [lag].” Each of these quotes symbolize Trump’s words and actions, such as “The other team is using hax!” being a metaphor for Trump constantly accusing the media of being “dishonest” and working against him.

It all accumulates to a statement that says “only one campaign in this election has a team that works together,” referring to Hillary Clinton’s “Stronger Together” campaign. In “Overwatch” context, a team with Trump would be a hot mess, while a team with Clinton would be communication-oriented, strong, and united. The page ends with a call to action, encouraging voters to vote for Clinton in November.

The billboard, most likely an attempt to engage Overwatch’s big community, has found its way online and many players have laughed and agreed on how uncanny the resemblance is between Hanzo mains and Trump.

Max Temkin, one of the masterminds behind Cards Against Humanity and the Nuisance Committee told Mashable, “We picked ‘Overwatch’ because — honestly the main reason is we’ve been playing a lot of ‘Overwatch.’ The game is really fun but also it’s super contemporary. For me it’s the most exciting new game that’s happening in the space right now.”

As a result, it has also brought more awareness about the election to the video game community, a community that has nothing to do with politics.

This Overwatch-inspired billboard is not the only anti-Trump billboard by the Nuisance Campaign. Back in September, a billboard in Chicago read, “”If Trump is so rich, how come he didn’t buy this billboard?” followed by a similar link – trumpdoesntpaytaxes.com.

The witty humor found in Cards Against Humanity is reflected in the Nuisance Committee’s anti-Trump campaign. In the weeks leading up to the election, there will be more sightings of billboards of this nature, no doubt.