PlayStation 5 played
Talking about Marvel Rivals without mentioning Overwatch from the very first lines is difficult and pointless. Everyone understands why this game exists, and after dozens of hours spent in it, you find a lot of similarities between the projects. However, Marvel Rivals is not reminiscent of the current Overwatch, whose confused developers are not confident in their own ideas. The Chinese copy, as many call Rivals, is similar to the release version of Overwatch – the authors of which have not yet strived for an ideal balance, have not thought about e-sports and have not survived several scandals and high-profile dismissals.
⇡#Feels like home
In many ways, the game is really too similar to its main source of inspiration. Here, too, there are teams of six people, as it used to be in Over. The same modes, including escorting the cart and capturing points up to two victories. Well, there’s no need to talk about the characters – when you try out the next hero at the shooting range, associations immediately arise with someone from the Blizzard shooter. However, it is not in all cases fair to say that someone stole something from someone else. Here is Doctor Strange – they won’t take away his portals because Symmetra already puts them in another game? Or Bruce Banner, first shooting from a dead pistol, and then turning into a big Hulk – similar to D.Va, but you can’t call it theft of an idea either? Maybe Blizzard itself was inspired by Marvel comics…
Some skins were created specifically for the game, while others were taken from old issues of comics.
There are no clones here, except that the Black Widow looks like Widowmaker – she also doesn’t really know how to do anything except shoot with a sniper rifle. For the remaining characters, they either came up with something new or very successfully modified the abilities of the Overwatch heroes. For example, Luna Snow does not run, but skates – parallels can be drawn with Lucio. However, she heals allies not with an aura around her, but with shooting. What’s funny is that some players unfamiliar with Overwatch, when controlling Lucio, at first for some reason shoot at their comrades in the hope of healing them – and in the case of Luna Snow (as well as other support characters), this is exactly what should be done.
Some of the heroes combine the skills of different Overwatch characters, and fans of Blizzard’s shooter will probably be especially interested in them. The Winter Soldier, for example, shoots from a revolver and pulls targets with a hook – a hybrid of Cassidy and Roadhog. And fans of “tanks” will love Magneto, who combines Sigma, Zarya, and Reinhardt: he raises a rectangular shield, protecting him and his team, and imposes energy barriers on himself and his allies, and throws spheres that explode when they hit the target . Moreover, they gave him a sword for melee attacks! At the same time, there is no feeling that such a “Frankenstein monster” is difficult to control – at first you get confused with the buttons, but you quickly get used to it and begin to actively help your comrades.
Missing and giving the shield to the wrong person is not as easy here as in the case of Zarya. Although, perhaps, the experience of playing for such characters affects
The most unique were the popular characters, for whom many Marvel fans even download the game. Spider-Man flies around the map, shoots webs, attracts targets, can crawl along walls, and his spider sense tells him when enemies are nearby – literally a jack of all trades, but at the same time he turns out to be one of the most complex characters for the game. Venom attacks with tentacles and can retreat with the help of them, and also gains bonus health when receiving damage (when its corresponding ability is activated). Loki creates copies of himself and can change places with them. Well, Jeff the Land Shark is the cutest character, diving under any surface and shooting healing water.
Compared to the release version of Overwatch, at the start of Marvel Rivals there are significantly more characters – as many as 33. And already in the first season they were joined by the “Fantastic Four” – at first only Mister Fantastic and the Invisible Girl, but the Human Torch and the Thing will be added in February . At the same time, the balance is more or less normal – it’s worth adjusting the Iron Fist, Moon Knight and a couple of other heroes a little, but otherwise everyone, plus or minus, is equally useful and strong. In any case, the game is now at a stage where neither players nor developers are seriously thinking about balance. For now, it’s just fun to switch between heroes, shoot each other, learn abilities and remember where first aid kits are – as in any team shooter, you shouldn’t rely solely on medics, they may not be around at all.
To climb to high positions, Black Widow can accelerate and jump high
⇡#New rules
Moreover, if in Overwatch the lack of “healers” and “tanks” in the team was so annoying that Blizzard introduced a role-based game, then in Marvel Rivals they don’t plan to add anything like that – and, it feels like, it’s not necessary. This is partly due to the fact that there is no such obvious division into classes. All characters belong to one of three categories (defenders, duelists and strategists), but there are no downright boring fighters like Soldier 76 or Angela, they all have some interesting “trick”. In a team, someone always takes a “support” (that is, a strategist) without someone else’s guidance, because it’s fun to play as Luna Snow, Jeff, and Loki. The only “double” fighter – Cloak and Dagger – also belongs to this category, and he is so unusual that many want to learn how to play for this couple.
All the strategists are fun to manage, and among the defenders and duelists there are also those who provide support – that is, even a team without “supports” can stand up for itself. Storm speeds up allies and increases their damage with an aura, Peni Parker immobilizes enemies, and so on. But the most interesting thing is the joint techniques that become available when there are combinations of certain characters in the team. Let’s say you play as Loki or Thor, you die, but you have Hela on your team. Once Hela finishes off any enemy, you can instantly revive. Or take the Scarlet Witch – being the daughter of Magneto, she gives him her chaos energy, which significantly strengthens his sword. There are about a dozen such combinations here – they are not very strong, but for the sake of variety they encourage you to switch to certain heroes in some matches.
Playing as a strategist, you can always immediately see which of your teammates needs help
It’s not just the heroes that make Marvel Rivals good – the cards are also successful. Since this is an existing comic universe, each event is explained in a plot-driven manner. You don’t just capture a point – you attack a laboratory for creating super soldiers. And while accompanying the cargo, you either take the statue of Bast to the meditation hall, or rescue Spider-Zero from a power prison, or deliver essence underground for Nall. This does not affect the gameplay, but what is happening makes a little more sense – after all, even in multiplayer games you want to see narrative elements, and here they are.
However, first of all, the cards are interesting because of their destructibility, which is also implemented in an unusual way. When it is added to shooters and action games, destroyed buildings almost always remain that way until the end of the match, but here they are restored over time. So the destroyed wall behind which the sniper was hiding will only remain like that for some time – perhaps after a couple of minutes the enemy will again return to its original place, which has returned to its normal state. This brings the necessary variety to the game and slightly compensates for the small number of maps – there are only nine of them, and you visit the same locations more often than you would like. But with destructibility and a large selection of heroes, the matches are still not similar to each other, so it doesn’t get boring.
Soon this broken wall will be restored
Temporary events also help – the last one was dedicated to Jeff and was a game according to the rules of Splatoon: all participants controlled this shark and painted the ground in the color of their team, while simultaneously shooting with each other. The mode turned out to be surprisingly fun (they even gave Jeff a free costume!), and it will be interesting to see how often the game is planned to be updated with new content, including temporary ones. So far, everything looks as if the developers have picked up speed and do not plan to stop – they are increasing the roster, adding events, and releasing season passes with a bunch of costumes (passes, by the way, can be completed even after the end of the season if you have their paid versions) . And monetization (yet) is not annoying – skins cost the same as everywhere else, and all new characters and maps will be free.
***
Obviously, the developers of Marvel Rivals didn’t come up with anything radically new. However, this game seems like it should have come out a long time ago – a team-based action game in which Spider-Man fights Venom while Squirrel Girl throws exploding nuts at them and Moon Knight throws darts at Loki’s doppelgängers. The Marvel license does not guarantee success (blessed with Marvel’s Avengers), and you won’t surprise anyone with hero shooters, but NetEase has proven that the history of the genre does not end with Blizzard’s hit. Personally, I lost interest in Overwatch after spending two thousand hours in it, and I have a desire to “settle” in Marvel Rivals for at least a few seasons – we’ll see what happens next.
Advantages:
- More than three dozen unique characters with completely different abilities;
- The destructibility of maps brings firefights to life;
- The unusual idea of complementary characters encourages you to switch between heroes to gain an advantage;
- Very fast search for matches and user-friendly interface;
- All future heroes and cards will be free – only “cosmetics” will be monetized.
Disadvantages:
- There are still some questions regarding the balance;
- There are few maps – you start seeing the same locations after just a few matches;
- In many ways, this is truly an Overwatch clone; there are almost no original ideas here.
Graphic arts
A comic book come to life – both the locations and the characters look great, and the animations perfectly convey their personalities.
Sound
There is only one complaint about the sound component – the sounds of headshots here are not as loud as in Overwatch. Otherwise, it’s hard to find fault with anything.
Single player game
Not foreseen.
Estimated time of completion
Until the same story as with Overwatch repeats itself, and you don’t want to switch to something.
Collective game
Already in the release version, a quick game is available (and it’s really fast – even searching takes less than a second), a competitive game, an arcade mode, and temporary events. And on a large shooting range you can try out all the heroes in different situations.
General impression
Excellent action – the idea has been on the surface for a long time, but it has only now seen the light of day. Marvel fans will rejoice, and fans of the genre can try something new and fun, especially if they are tired of Overwatch.
Rating: 8.0 / 10
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