would the game have been as popular if say they didnt have the marvel franchise and was generic superheroes? i mean they could have made similar archetypes to overwatch and marvel superheroes (capestuff) but with of course made up names
when i go play that game i see people excited to play spider-man, thor, captain america, the hulk, …etc. old comic books come to life in hero shooter format. its cool and yea they are baking it with that IP franchise hook. you have to give props to netease/china for that one.
also they went liberal on their art designs with the female heroes. i mean i was a kid and i remember the covers of comic books with psylocke on them and yea… lol… i wanted to read (hahem… READ … lol) i mean look at the pictures. not just psylocke i remember Rogue being a favorite of mine also.
netease/china knows what they are doing. hopefully it will push microsift/activision/blizzards button to compete or do the same… OR yea they will just make it the next heroes of the storm
Absolutely not.
Overwatch had Blizzard’s name behind it, but for the most part it had to rely on good gameplay to generate interest.
Rivals by default has interest in it because it’s Marvel. Even more so because Marvel hasn’t had success with any mainstream non-exclusive games for almost a decade. They had Spider-Man PS and Ultimate Marvel Alliance 3 be successful, but they were exclusive. Games like Marvel’s Avengers and Midnight Sons were hard flops.
thats true but i saw a lot of negativity with some of other marvel licensed games. the ip got abused i guess and some companies (whoever it was, not knowledgeable to know all the companies that use the marvel franchise) tried to ride on the coattails of that IP
i guess it depends on how netease/china moves forward. i know there is balance issues atm but really i think its all forshadowed by WOW IM THE HULK, IM CAPTAIN AMERICA, IM SPIDERMAN…giddy laughter/excitement by people
Mahvel wouldn’t even work without standing on Overwatch’s shoulders. It’s Chinese knock off to the extreme. The most important thing was that it needed to be fun and they delivered on that, at least. If the assignment was to be original, it’s a flop. Heck, the original ideas that ARE there are horrific such as seasonal buffs and team ups.
Every game has ‘‘coasted’’ off something. Be it previous media, mythology, etc.
Overwatch ‘‘coasted’’ on the Blizz’s past fame of making good games. It more than used fan artists and shippers for free publicity. It ‘‘coasted’’ on offering a shooter experience for everyone and not just AimLabs fanboys.
To be fair with Marvel’s IP it probably was good and bad marketing wise. It meant a lot of casuals would check it out but between the track record of Marvel games and NetEase being the dev my first thought was “Yeah, it’s gonna be another crappy cash grab”.
It helps that the game is actually pretty fun. Not peak Overwatch fun, but fun.
Also lest we forget that Marvel Avengers was a hyped up live service game from a proven developer that basically immediately flopped. The peak on Steam charts for that game is 28k.
So just getting to be the Hulk isn’t gonna make hundreds of thousands of people play it at any given time on just PC.
i am also wondering if “HERO SHOOTER” has anything to do with that. is this the first time the marvel franchise has been used in such a way… i think so
yea the game isnt as fluid/established as overwatch (in my opinion) but its marvel and they did get the gameplay feeling right a little. its new so there isnt a lot of maps atm or heroes but with the popularity of it now i bet that will get expanded upon.
netease/marvel rivals is gonna last for more than any other hero shooter has… ones that tried to compete with overwatch i mean. im still surprised paladins is around but there are a lot of hero shooters that just died and whimpered. also ones that died within a week because of reasons (concord heh)
yea i get the feeling that is what people are thinking (who cares)
still i know the reason is … IM CAPTAIN AMERICA, IM THOR, IM SPIDER-MAN… fantasies. overwatch had or still has that hero fantasy. reason why there are a lot of one-tricks and people who can play a FULL ROSTER of heroes but have their favorites and hatred of some of the other roster
it reminds me of that “I’M TRACER - NERF BASTION” song… not gonna post that but i wonder if marvel would get a cringe song like that sometime
In fact a lot of people are tired of the MCU and it has been quite a bit of a shock for people to learn that it is NOT a MCU game, even if it has some skins about it.
To my knowledge it’s the first hero shooter but then we’ve also seen those immediately flop too. The only good part of Concord was the Secret Level episode that just released.
For me compared to modern Overwatch it’s more that the game is just more fun to me for casual play. I was never into the super highly competitive part of Overwatch, and I consider it a mistake that they ever tried to balance the game towards it. I don’t even like role queue(though I acknowledge it is important for ranked play).
Plus to be fair we can also ask “Would Overwatch have been as popular if it didn’t have the hype of being the first truly new IP from Blizzard in 18 years?”
The answer to both that and the question in your OP is “probably not”. Marketing works, that’s why marketing budgets are often as big if not bigger than actual development budgets.
At the same time, bad games don’t typically have great staying power beyond the first week of release. People might come check it out because they can be Thor, but they’re not gonna keep playing it purely for that reason.
still i bet onlooking competitors (companies) are jealous they didnt think of the idea. netease/china is sitting on already established lore and world building ip. old blizzard (not this bought off one) had to make up all its lore and cinematics and they did a good job with something BRAND NEW. it is sad that all the old lore, art developers are no longer with us and are bought out by coorporate greedy suits… i wonder if this will be the fate of marvel rivals eventually?.. or maybe china is a different breed.
i heard of netease but was never really interested in any of their games… until now. just because its MARVEL i mean. also its a hero shooter similar to overwatch to a tee
People are always doing things based off something more popular. Disney did try to get MCU games running but none of them were good.
Regardless, its a good thing that Marvels is doing so good. Blizz needs the wake up call just like what happened with FFXIV. I just hope that Rivals takes a page out of FFXIV’s book and uses Overwatch as a cautionary tale and not a model to follow.
I mean, I’m sure tons of people thought of it the moment Overwatch took off but it was a matter of getting the license and funding to do it.
Then again the games industry do be weird sometimes. I’m kind of surprised we’ve had 2 good Spider-man games from Insomniac and we’re still sitting on using that formula for other superheroes(though they do have a Blade game in the works, and I hear there’s an Ironman one somewhere. I’d kill for a good Black Widow spy game).
Though when the live service trend went big, the game that Marvel tried to throw behind it was Marvel’s Avengers which flopped hard.
Yes. Maybe it would not be so popular at the beginning but the game is very fun and a good improvement to OW2.
Having Marvel in the title is good, but is not the reason the game succeds. They failed so hard with other games like Marvel Avengers or Marvel Midnight Suns. Having Marvel in the title did not save those games.