It was most peoples (including mine) incorrect assumption that Hammond, the most likely candidate for Hero 28, was an ape just like Winston. After all, they both came from the same test facility on the moon.

So, when Blizzard revealed this teaser tweet today, I expected a reveal of Hammond in all his simian glory.

Only, Hammond isn't an ape at all.

Hammond is hamster.

Hammond, the hamster.


Wait, what?

He rolls around his insanely lethal escape pod (ball?) much like any pet hamster would, only he laughs like something out of an ACME cartoon after unleashing rounds of hot lead into the enemy team.

After writing several speculation articles about Hammond THE GORILLA, I suppose it was my error (and the rest of the Overwatch fanbase's) to assume all of the test subjects at Horizon Lunar colony were Gorillas. In hindsight and according to the lore, Dr. Zhang, a researcher at the colony, once complained about the usage of smaller test subjects when Hammond escaped inside the vents shortly before the uprising.

So smaller was actually code for hamster and I'm sure everyone at Blizzard HQ is having a good laugh at the communities shocked reaction. The cherry on top of all of this was a Reddit post that, whether seriously or not, actually predicted the Hamster reveal in its entirety:

Well played stmaurer -- you are either incredibly perceptive or known someone on the Overwatch dev team!