Marvel Rivalsalmost never came out, according to a new report. It’s no surprise right now howMarvel Rivalshas become so popular: it adapts an incredibly well-liked piece of IP into a game that’s in equal parts fun and challenging. Content updates have come at a near-constant pace, with new maps andcharacters coming toMarvel Rivalsseemingly without slowing down since its release. It entered into an oversaturated but stagnating market, and took the world by storm - but it almost never was.
According to a new report byBloomberg,NetEase CEO William Ding almost canceledMarvel Rivalsbefore it came out- at least in part due to the strength of the IP behind it. According to the report, Ding opposed the need to pay Disney in order to use Marvel characters inRivals, and attempted to convince the designers of the game to create original characters instead to save them the cost. A spokesperson at NetEase denied this claim, but other NetEase workers paint a worrying picture of a demanding work environment.
Also according to Bloomberg, Ding “frequently changes his mind” on major decisions like these. He’s also been reported to ask employees in China to work long hours, with some claiming they were at work until 9:00 PM (albeit with breaks, but still).NetEase recently enacted layoffs at its Seattle studio, leaving the director and lead designer ofMarvel Rivals, among many others, out of a job. A NetEase spokesperson described this decision as having been made for “organizational reasons,” but one thing is abundantly clear:even such a big, successful game asMarvel Rivalsencounters major issues.
Things like these - layoffs, major last minute changes - are the stories you expect to hear coming out of studios that have just released massive flops, not games that have been hovering near the top of Steam’s most-played charts for multiple consecutive weeks. Ultimately, we can’t really know why so much of the Seattle studio was laid off, or whether Ding really tried to makeMarvel Rivalsan original IP - regardless, it’s a shame to see the developers suffering after such a big success.
