The continued success of Marvel Rivals will definitely be studied for some time to come. After all, it had ten million players in one day; the player rate on Steam is consistently in the 200K+ range, and as time goes on and more people dive in, more are likely to stay due to the buzz and swathes of new characters that are coming. Obviously, due to the nature of the “team shooter” genre it’s in, there are plenty of comparisons to other franchises, including one from Blizzard that you may remember. However, NetEase has made it clear that while it is similar to other team shooters, it won’t mimic everything they do.
For example, one of the key differences within this Marvel title is the freedom to choose whatever character you want from the game’s roster and dive right in. That means, if you wanted, you could have a team focused solely on attacking, defending, enduring, etc. You will never be restricted to a certain role because your teammates have taken the other roles you like.
In an interview with Dot eSports, creative director Guangyun Chen noted that the idea of a “role queue line” won’t happen:
“Right now, we’re not considering a role queue. The team’s goal is to offer a wider variety of team composition through team-up skills and their own designs, to let people play their Marvel superheroes rather than limiting players to choosing a role.”
One might think this would hurt the game in the long run, but Chen notes that things have actually been going pretty great:
“From the data we’re seeing in our back end, things are going pretty solid. We want people to have a Marvel experience where they’re free to select what they want. [Since the closed beta test] things have been rational and within expectations. In our Competitive play recently, there is a lot of different compositions emerging from players and we’d like to continue to monitor these fun compositions and how they impact our game.”
This freedom truly gives Marvel Rivals an edge over its competitors because since there are no role queue lines, the only “lines” you have to wait on are having enough players to play a single match. To be fair, the game is going through changes, but it’s the natural kind of “balance adjustments” to help make the game better. Looking at you, Jeff The Shark.
So, for now, go forth and have a blast playing your favorite Marvel character or role.
