Deconstructing the Cyber Demon Genji Mythic skin with the Overwatch team

news.blizzard.com:

Cyber Demon Genji is the first of its kind: our debut Mythic-tier skin. Mythic skins soar a tier above Legendary, pushing the artwork, animation, and special effects to levels we hadn’t incorporated in our skins to this point! 

We chose Genji for the first Mythic skin for several reasons, but it ultimately felt very natural to build this skin for one of the most beloved heroes in the game. I mean, who doesn’t love the little brother dragon who was rescued from the edge of death to become a lethal, cyborg-ninja who ultimately found his purpose in peace and harmony?  

Genji is a complex hero, both in story and playstyle, and building a Mythic skin for him was a new process with many additional layers. To give you an insight into this new process, we’re joined by parts of the team that made this skin a reality: 

Let’s start at the beginning: square one of creating any skin for Overwatch 2, including Cyber Demon Genji! 

Concept art is where creative ideas materialize on paper, and for Cyber Demon, it served as a launching pad for every part of development that followed. There's no shortage of creativity on this team, so we started by sketching out the scope for this project.

We tried out many different concepts on different heroes to draft a process for creating a Mythic skin. “The initial concept art started out similarly to a Legendary skin, with a unique theme,” says Fang, “From there, we pitched ideas for things like variations, customizations, and possible effects.”

“Our direction for the skin revolved around the cyberpunk theme for Season One,” explains Fang. 

These unique themes help guide the design, and then we refine the skin around secondary themes that fit with Overwatch. “For Genji, we incorporated Japanese artwork