Marvel Rivals Review

Online team based shooters have been in a really bad place lately. Overwatch 2 managed to disappoint its fans, with Blizzard constantly “rebalancing” the game and cutting on the much promised single player content, while Concord could be considered one of gaming’s greatest failures, the overly expensive project being shut down only after roughly 2 weeks.

Suffices to say, when Marvel Rivals was announced, people weren’t overly excited. And for good reason. It felt like another cash grab that nobody wanted, now with Marvel characters. However, to everyone’s surprise, when the game launched, players discovered that Marvel Rivals is not just another tired formulaic team based shooter… it’s actually a pretty good team based shooter. An actually enjoyable, faithful to the source material team based shooter, and overall a pretty damn good game!

Now, to properly explain what this game is all about: Marvel Rivals is the newest free to play 6v6 online third person shooter that took the internet by storm. It is NetEase’s take on the superhero genre, featuring 33 Marvel Heroes. The cast ranges from super popular superheroes like the Avengers (Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk), the X-Men (Wolverine, Magneto, Storm), to more obscure ones like Peni Parker, Luna Snow, Magik and… Jeff the Land Shark, an adorable hybrid between a shark and a dog.

This is already a rather generous roster, where each character is unique in its own right regarding their abilities and their playstyle.

The first thing that struck me is this game’s presentation. I strongly believe that the first impression is very important in a videogame, and Marvel Rivals’ style managed to charm me from the first menu opening. However, what made the difference here was the costumes: these are not the overused costumes from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, although you do have the option to buy them as alternate skins. No, the costumes from the game are the ones from the comics and old shows. Even the hero design can differ from the usual approach. For instance, you play as “old king Thor”, an aged version of Thor who is canonically at the peak of his powers.

Since the game also taps in the Multiverse storyline, where heroes from different ages/versions show up, this is a wise approach from the developer’s side.
Plus, since the game is third person, the costumes and skins are in full display for the players.

The unique features don’t stop here: each character has unique interactions with each other before the start of the match. You can expect Captain America to interact with the Winter Soldier, or Thor admonishing Loki, or everyone losing their minds over how cute Jeff the Land Shark is. It adds a layer of detail and immersion to the game when you see the characters interacting like that.

There are several game modes in the game. If you want to learn how to play the game, you have a very detailed Tutorial that teaches you the basics. Furthermore, Practice Mode lets you experiment and learn each character, together with various situations and matchups. You also have an Arcade Mode, where you team up with players versus various activities.

But of course, the most important part of the game is the Quick Play mode, where you join with other 5 combatants – either friends or randoms – against 6 other players in one of the game’s two main modes (for now). Convoy asks one team to escort a payload from point A to point B under a time limit while the opposite team tries to stop the convoy. Dominion is a King of the Hill type of battle where both teams fight over a common area. The team that controls the area the most amount of time wins. There are various maps from the Marvel universe for both modes and while their number is small now, the developers promised to add more maps and game modes with further updates.

The heroes themselves are separated in 3 classes:

• Vanguards are the defenders of the team, their aim is to tank as much damage as possible while their teammates retaliate. Usually these are the heavy hitters like Thor, Hulk, Venom, or Groot.

• Duelists are the main damage dealers and usually the ones that get the highest amount of kills. They are rather squishy though, so it’s the Vanguard’s job to protect them while they zap around shooting enemies. The duelists are characters like Iron Man, Hawkeye, Wolverine, or Squirrel Girl.

• Strategists are the support/healing class in Marvel Rivals, tasked to heal the damage inflicted by the opposing team. They are vital in the game, each team should have at least one healer like Mantis, Cloak&Dagger, Rocket, or Adam Warlock.

In order to have a chance at victory, your team must be diverse enough so that the characters can support each other. While 2 Vanguards, 2 Duelists and 2 Strategists is a good idea, some characters are currently quite overpowered. Adam Warlock alone is more than enough, with his healing, damage dealing, and resurrecting abilities. Likewise, a good Magneto or Thor can tank all the damage by himself while the team can focus on getting more duelists into play.

An unique addition to this game are the team-ups. Some characters have special synergies with each other, giving another layer of advantages and strategies to the game. If Adam Warlock is paired with the Guardians of the Galaxy, for instance (Star-Lord, Mantis, Rocket), these characters can be instantly revived on the spot with no additional skill required. Also Captain America and Thor team-up means that Captain America can throw lightning infused shields at the opponents for a limited amount of time. Sometimes, these team-ups can prove vital to your team’s success.

After you level up enough by earning experience from matches, you unlock Competitive Mode. You can compete with others in Ranks, aiming to get the highest rank possible. In Competitive Mode, team synergies are more important than ever, a single weak teammate can mean losing the entire match. Be proficient, however… and you can even become the MVP of the game!

The trophies in Marvel Rivals can be challenging at first glance. While some are easy, like winning 100 matches, playing with Luna Snow on 5 different maps, or assist the Avengers 10 times with Hawkeye, some challenges require more careful preparation and team synergies. While difficulty is subjective in this game, one of the hardest trophies is “Justice for All!”, where you have to defeat 3 enemies during Captain America’s ultimate, “Freedom Charge”. Captain America is a very mobile vanguard, but his damage is lower than that of other characters, so this trophy can be a real struggle for inconsistent teams.

Another trophy that can be buggy even is “Rage Uncaged”, where you have to do a triple kill with Wolverine’s “Last Stand” ultimate. The trophy is very specific, Last Stand being a 2 parts ultimate, where Wolverine lifts his enemies in the air and then slams them into the ground. If the enemies are not lifted in the air first, then the trophy will not unlock.

Finally, there are the trophies that are map dependent, which might be the most difficult of them all. Black Panther can be a platinum breaker with his “King of the Dead” trophy, which requires you to score a triple kill on the “Hall of Djalia” map. Since the maps are randomly picked at the start of each match, it can take a while for the map to be selected. Paired with the fact that Black Panther is a difficult character to use, you might spend some time trying to get the trophy to pop.

For this reason, getting the platinum with friends is way easier than trying to achieve everything solo. A friendly Groot that can root the enemies in their place can really trivialize things, or a Thor that can buff your Captain America just enough so you can get that nasty triple kill. However, if you are as stubborn as the author of this review, you can do everything with random players. It might take a while longer, but it’s perfectly doable.

In conclusion, Marvel Rivals is a great game that proves that the team based shooter genre is not dead, it just needs some fresh quality entries. It might need a bit of balancing since it’s still a rather new game, but the upcoming patches together with new DLC characters show a lot of promise and fun along the way.