Heroes Of The Strom Ditches Tychus Findlay's Cigar To Meet "T" Rating

Fans of the StarCraft franchise will know who Tychus Findlay is. If you aren't a fan of that franchise, Findlay is one of the big heroes of StarCraft and his signature item is the smoldering cigar always perched in his mouth. Findlay is part of the crew in the cross-franchise multiplayer online battle arena game Heroes of the Storm that launched in beta earlier this month.

Players of the beta of the game have noticed that the Findlay's signature cigar is missing in this game. Anyone wondering where it went might be interested in hearing that Blizzard removed the cigar so that the game could meet the varying criteria to be granted a Teen rating in different regions.

Blizzard notes that during development if a Hero and Skin can be used in all regions it's a "huge win" for development. Since there were regions where Tychus couldn't smoke and get the T rating the options included making two skins with one having the cigar and one not, or simply removing the cigar. Blizzard chose to ditch the cigar.

If it had made two different versions of the skin, Blizzard says that it would mean more data management with duplicate of assets consuming development time. Blizzard says that the decision to ditch the cigar was made based on productivity. Blizzard also notes that the appeal of Tychus shouldn't hinge on a cigar anyway.

SOURCE: NZGamer