Update: Sombra's "November 1 attack" on the LumeriCo power plant in Overwatch's Dorado seems to have been completed. At 8:00 pm EST, the LumeriCo website's power meters reached 100 percent, presumably indicating a power plant meltdown. ARG players expected this to be Sombra's long-awaited reveal, but it instead pointed to yet another "wait-and-see."
The arg-discussion Discord channel was predictably pissed at this turn of events, feeling tugged around yet again by the seemingly never-ending Sombra mystery. However, examination of Sombra's message revealed a new "misdirection" page.
It seems that Sombra's attack on the LumeriCo power plant may not be her end goal, as the above message points to www.volskayaindustries.com/. As of this writing, the trail stops there, as examination of that page has yet to reveal any secrets. All signs continue to point toward a Blizzcon release for the hero, but we still don't have any information about Sombra's abilities. The game detectives continue to tug at the corners—check out Reddit, or the Discord ARG channel to try your hand at helping out.
Original Story Below:
A leaked image of the Overwatch hero Sombra suggests that her long-awaited reveal will take place at BlizzCon. Originally discovered at gear.blizzard.com, the picture has since been taken down, but Reddit never forgets, and there's no doubt that it bears a striking resemblance to what we've seen previously.
No other information accompanied the image, but the original filename—bzc16_sombrafineart_1_1.jpg—certainly suggests the most long-winded gaming ARG ever is drawing to a close this weekend. It's also "signed" by John Polidora, a senior concept artist at Blizzard, and the timing is right, too, as BlizzCon begins on Friday November 4th. If nothing else, it's no secret that a lot of fans think Blizzard has seriously overplayed this ARG reveal, and I'd be willing to bet that the studio is anxious to wrap things up.
Speaking of which, there also appears to be some movement in the Sombra ARG. Last week, plans for a November 1 "attack" on the Lumerico.mx website came to light, and sure enough, it now appears to be underway. An internal email from Valeria Valderrama to Maria Jimenez says (via Battle.net forum translation), "It seems that someone is manipulating our internal correspondence. Perhaps you've seen some seemingly random emails to argo a normal text message characters. Initially we thought that this was due to some sort of data corruption, but my team found evidence that these alterations were made deliberately by someone outside our network. What you want to do?"
Another email states that, because of "security violations," Jimenez will be the only person with full access to the terminal during the planned activation of a new nuclear plant at Dorada, also set to take place on November 1. That provides both a reason, and an opportunity, to do something, although precisely what, and how Sombra fits into it, remains a mystery for now.
Ironically, the rush to figure out what's happening appeared to actually bring down the Lumerico website briefly. It seems fine now, but for a few minutes I wondered if perhaps the real world had overtaken the one that Blizzard has so carefully constructed for us. To that end, it's worth noting that as the Sombra ARG winds to what will presumably be its stunning, epic conclusion, there's an awful lot going on and things are bound to start happening more quickly. To get the full picture, keep your eyes on Reddit, or dive deep into the Discord ARG channel.
