NetEase Games is likely celebrating thanks to the success of Marvel Rivals, which launched last Friday and garnered over 10 million players in only 72 hours. Its success is all the more intriguing compared to the market hold that Blizzard’s Overwatch 2 has, not to mention the failure of other hero shooters like Concord.
Speaking to VideoGamer, Rivals game director Thaddeus Sasser said he believed Concord didn’t “bring any unique value” that would cause long-time genre fans to move on. He also outlined the “switching cost,” where players invested in a game like Overwatch with skins and other cosmetics wouldn’t move on.“I’ve already invested in Overwatch. I’ve got 15 skins for Pharah. I’m not going anywhere.”
However, even with the success of Rivals, Sasser says it’s “really hard to tell ahead of time” if something will perform well. “As a game developer, you’re always worried until the audience has responded,” he said. “The truth is that I don’t think anybody can accurately predict this, or the game industry would be radically different today.
“There are a lot of games that come out that people are like, ‘It’s going to do well,’ then it flops, or people come out and ‘It’s going to flop,’ and it succeeds amazingly. So, I think it’s really hard to tell ahead of time and you’re always worried about that.”
The “trick” is to provide players a reason to check out one’s game. Marvel Rivals has an advantage on that front, thanks to its stacked roster of superheroes. “I don’t know about you, but when I heard the concept, I was like ‘Oh my God, I want to go be Storm in a game’, ‘I want to go be Doctor Strange in a game’. I want to be those heroes in the game. That sounds awesome.
“And, of course, my mind immediately leapt to all the cool possibilities you could have with that. That’s what I think will pull people in as well. If we’ve done our jobs well, they’ll love what they play and want to play some more.”
Marvel Rivals is available for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC. It recently received a new patch fixing several bugs and issues, but another one with new content is on the way. Season 1 also starts next month and will bring new maps, heroes, and cosmetics (though the exact quantity is unknown). Stay tuned for more details and updates.
