• Developer – NetEase Games
• Publisher – NetEase Games
• Release Date – December 5th, 2024
• Available on – PlayStation 5/Pro, Xbox Series X/S & PC
• Reviewed on – PC
• PC Hardware – Windows 11, GeForce RTX 3090, Intel i9-11900K, 32GB RAM

Oh my God, another new hero shooter. Except this time, you can be Spideyman!

Picture, if you will, Overwatch but packed chock full of all your favorite Marvel heroes. Marvel Rivals is a fairly standard take on the formula with excellent art direction and familiar game play. The hero variety is great and is going to expand as developer NetEase Games continues to add new heroes to the mix as well. Gameplay is also very solid, playing all up in Mantis’ face as Iron Fist feels fantastic for example. Diving in with your K’un-Lun Kick and beating someone to death feels amazing and healing your brain-dead Spider-man using Cloak and Dagger feels like an entirely different game. Damage dealers are varied and all play differently. Healers feel self-sufficient and impactful, and tanking really can feel like being a meat shield. As usual, the game requires a lot of teamwork to be truly successful, and even when you are losing, you get to stare at the absolutely ridiculous ass they gave all of the heroes. Really can’t complain there.

Like many games in the genre, Rivals is free to play with an optional paid battle pass and micro-transaction shop system. You earn free currency called Chrono Tokens by playing the game. These tokens can be used to unlock non-premium portions of the battle pass. Achievements allow you to unlock an additional higher tier of currency called Units. The premium currency, Lattice, is the cash money Disney is looking for.

At the time of writing, there are four main game modes. Quick match, Competitive (available after you reach level 10), an “Event” game (Jeff’s Winter Splash Festival currently), and an arcade game mode called Conquest. There are 8 maps with varied environments and game modes ranging from a Spider-man themed Tokyo 2099 to a Hydra Base called Hell’s Heaven. Each map has individual missions that need to be completed but they follow the standard formula; capture/defend this spot (Domination), move or stop a vehicle (Convoy), or a mix of the two (Convergence).

As is tradition with hero shooters, competitive matches are for people who want to sweat it out and be angry at their teammates for not locking in a support or tank. Competitive matches are 6v6 and have open roles, so anyone can play any character, with no duplicates on one team (and potentially 6 damage dealers). At Diamond III (the fifth rank from the bottom) the game allows teams a chance to ban a hero before the match starts.

The game consists of three classes of heroes: Vanguards (Tanks), Duelists (Damage), and Strategists (Support). Many abilities will feel familiar if you have played Overwatch or other hero shooters. For example Star-Lord feels like Tracer, Storm is a damage-oriented version of Lucio, Hawkeye is Hanzo, Hulk is D.Va, etc. The heroes also have Team-Ups that give special abilities or stat boosts based on the combo of hero abilities. For example, Thor, Storm, and Captain America team up with Voltaic Union allowing Thor to infuse the others with “Thorforce” while receiving a stat buff himself.

One neat thing about Rivals is the game is filled with lore. As mentioned above, Voltaic Union is a team up based on Thor as he partners with Captain America and Storm because they have picked up the legendary hammer Mjolnir, so fans of the comics and Marvel universe will be happy. Some skins even list first appearances in their associated comics.

At this point, there is no real “meta”, so the game is still fun regardless of which hero you play. I imagine with the open role queue and competitive format the community will likely come up with best picks and enforce the hardest, most cancer inducing games imaginable. But, while people are still figuring the game out, it’s pretty fun. No modern wonder of gaming, but fun. Maybe it is also a little broken and needs some tuning (Add a role queue so I am not getting stuck in four damage dealer games, please. Also, nerf Hawkeye.)

The game does need some significant balancing though, and that is mainly what is keeping it from receiving a higher score here. We will have to see if the game can maintain the hype and if the developers can provide enough additional content and updates to keep players engaged, dummy thick squirrel ladies not included. If you enjoy hero shooters and are looking for something to keep you busy, Marvel Rivals is certainly worth a shot. Being the amazing price of free, there is nothing to lose in giving it a try. Unless of course you get stuck in the endless loop of buying shit in the micro-transaction shop because you just HAVE TO HAVE that Scarlet Witch Multiverse of Madness skin.

6/10

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All images are captured in game, credit to Bad Habit Gaming and NetEase Games.