Hero Mission: Chinese Overwatch clone turns Winston into a panda and McCree into a woman

Overwatch may already have a significant following in China, but a new free-to-play mobile game announced in the country looks suspiciously like Blizzard's beloved hero-based shooter. Spotted by Reddit and Neogaf users earlier this month, the Chinese mobile sim called "Hero Mission" seems to be taking quite a bit of inspiration from Overwatch's vibrant cast of heroes and other content from the maps to the iconography.

One character called Mechanical Angel: Sofia, for example, is a blonde, winged healer looks incredibly like Overwatch's Mercy, but dons bikini bottoms instead of pants.

Some Overwatch fans on Reddit and Neogaf have dubbed the Chinese game "the worst rip-off ever".

The Reinhardt clone, called The Last Knight: Don Quixote, merely swaps a sword for a hammer. While the Lucio clone is given a different skin tone, McCree is now a dual-pistol wielding woman.

Meanwhile, the genetically-engineered gorilla and scientist Winston is now a panda.

Soldier 9527 in the Chinese sim is a combination of Ana and Soldier 76.

The game's hero skins are also ridiculously similar to some other franchises. The Hanzo clone's alternate skins, for example, look a lot like copies of Rambo and Assassin's Creed.

The Winston clone's skins borrow from World of Warcraft and Kung Fu Panda. Meanwhile, other skins look like the Stormtroopers from Star Wars, Solid Snake from Metal Gear.

The Roadhog-like character also looks like Immortan Joe from Mad Max: Fury Road.

While rip-offs from Western titles are not uncommon, it is not immediately clear if Blizzard will approach the game's developers over copyright infringement.

In the meantime, you can check out the rest of the characters and some gameplay footage from Hero Mission in the video embedded below.

Overwatch is out now for PS4, Xbox One and PC.