We all thought that omnic design was a physical body for Athena, but it seems like it was actually a completely different Ai.
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Her looks clearly based on old hero concept called Iris.
Maybe she’s still somehow connected to Athena (McCree mentioned Winston for a reason), e.g. Athena could be her replica without body. Or both AI have the same root.
I don’t see how you concluded that she’s completely different AI. We’ve seen her like for 30 seconds only.
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It makes sense that it was a different A.I. because Mccree was carrying her on a datachip this whole time and she doesn’t know what has happened over the past several years.
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I think it makes sense to have Echo instead of Athena because Athena is the announcer voice and it would be weird to hear her and play her etc.
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In that sense sure they’re different. I’m just saying they could be two instances on the same base AI. One was used as assistant, while other was granted a body and worked as an operations agent, hence they had different experience.
They can be not related as well of course. Anyway, if Echo is gonna be a hero 30 we’ll need to wait until the next year at least for more info.
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hey, i have one question, everybody is mentoning that echo person/dude/omnic and that is driving me crazy, could you explain me who that is pls 
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Blizzard and Michael Chu! You have a lot of explaining to do! 
And I knew it wasn’t a bomb! I was surprised how easy it was to open the casing though. I thought they needed Sombra to hack their way in or a key. This to me is part of Recall as at the end, McCree mentions “Say hello to the monkey”. Agree that it’s not Athena as that AI is already with Winston. The only possible connection I can see is if Athena was on that chip but it seems too complicated as it may mean we lose her at base and as announcer.
And as mentioned… Iris from the old concepts.
https://d1u5p3l4wpay3k.cloudfront.net/overwatch_gamepedia/c/c1/Iris.jpg
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They could be using a spin on the NATO phonetic alphabet. With Athena being the prime (A) and Echo being the 5th version. Alpha, Beta, Charlie, Delta, Echo.
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Echo is the android thing? In the Reunion cinematic That Mcree got out of the pod
Yeah it would be weird to hear her voice echoing all over the place.
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My bet would be Echo is like Athena’s predecessor or something. Given Echo was locked away in that crate, maybe it/she (do robots have gender in 2018…) got lost/stolen/whatever, Winston made Athena as a replacement, and now McCree salvaged Echo?
Referring to Marvel: Something similar to the Jarvis/Vision where Echo is just the embodiment of Athena.
God knows, we’ll definitely hear more (I’d bet a few hundred on Echo being Hero 30, after what Jeff said)
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I suspect Echo is close to what their name hints at: they’re an echo of the Athena AI. Perhaps now their own independent being, or perhaps not, but originally a copy of Athena experimenting with a physical body; an echo of the AI within the material world.
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I think that shes another God AI with a body. Maybe she was the AI of Blackwatch like Athena was for Overwatch so thats why McCree treats her as a partner.
The only difference between Echo and the Athena-body (besides the face mask) is the symbol. Echos symbol looks like the ones whats in the computers of the Petra map has.
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i can play my paragon main again
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YASSS. I was waiting for someone to say something. Muriel had a Glow up because that trash company gave up on the game. Now she’s Echo 
Can you buy a book with the concept art from project titan to overwatch, also with how the characters developed? I saw some YouTube ideos with that content but I really want to have that. Like this info of Iris. I find it super interesting with the different approaches and what they thought about it or changed the names and designs etc.
I already have “the art of overwatch” limited edition and everything I got till now, but there is much stuff missing.
Maybe Athena created her as a backup help for OW in case she gets shut down or her existance would be considered too dangerous.
I mean Echo seems to still have her logo.
That “Athena-body” is actually early concept Echo:
In the old picture… Sometimes what an artist like Arnold does is say, ‘There’s too much white space, I want to put a logo on,’ so he just put the Athena logo on the model. And the community embraced that model as being Athena. Athena is actually Winston’s AI, which is a separate thing - this character is separate from being Athena. The players also know Athena as the narrator of the competitive matches as well. But this is Echo, who is somebody completely different.
Source: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-11-03-the-big-overwatch-blizzcon-interview-with-jeff-kaplan
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So this is probably a serious stretch. but a small theory popped into my head upon seeing her and learning her name.
Echo is a copy of (or somehow transferred conscious) of a human OW member and that’s why, unlike any other omnic we’ve seen she has a face. Her name is Echo because she’s an “echo” of the person she once was.
And again, total stretch but my first thought was Liao due to the one likely image of them:
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