Released late last year, Marvel Rivals has been one of the industry's biggest success stories. A free-to-play super hero team-based PvP shooter, the game features an impressive roster of characters pulled from all corners of the Marvel universe.
Since its release, Marvel Rivals has reached over 40 million players. It's one of the rare success stories we've seen involving a live service game. So it's interesting to hear that it almost didn't happen. In fact, if NetEase CEO William Ding had his way, Marvel Rivals would've been canceled before it even released.
In a new Bloomberg report detailing William Ding's effort to cut jobs at NetEase to maximize profits, it was revealed that the head honcho was against paying Disney for the rights to use Marvel characters. He even had artists begin creating original characters to use instead.
Doing so probably would've made Marvel Rivals a much more generic team-based shooter and even possibly feel like a clone of Overwatch. Although the game's premise has already drawn comparisons to Blizzard's franchise, the use of Marvel heroes has helped differentiate the two.
Thankfully, Ding did not get his way and NetEase ultimately went the Marvel route, but the short-lived decision “cost the company millions of dollars and was emblematic of the abrupt changes ushered in by the CEO.”
NetEase has denied these claims, stating that they've "enjoyed a close partnership with Marvel since 2017."
It's crazy to think that a single person's decision could've completely altered the course of what turned out to be one of this year's biggest games. But while Marvel Rivals has found incredible success, it unfortunately did not stave off layoffs.
This past week, it was reported that NetEase's Seattle-based design team was laid off. According to a NetEase representative, the layoffs were made to "optimize the development efficiency for the game."
"We recently made the difficult decision to adjust Marvel Rivals’ development team structure for organizational reasons and to optimize development efficiency for the game," a NetEase representative said. "This resulted in a reduction of a design team based in Seattle that is part of a larger global design function in support of Marvel Rivals. We appreciate the hard work and dedication of those affected and will be treating them confidentially and respectfully with recognition for their individual contributions."
NetEase assures fans they will continue to invest more into the evolution and growth of Marvel Rivals, but Bloomberg's report paints a much different picture at NetEase, where hundreds of staffers have been let go and dozens of games have been scrapped. At least Marvel Rivals made the cut — for now.