Marvel Rivals is a free-to-play hero-based FPS that has attracted absolute scads of players following its launch and earning favorable comparisons to Overwatch 2. This is in stark contrast to Concord, a buy-to-play hero-based FPS that attracted no players following its launch despite earning favorable comparisons to Overwatch 2. So why did one competitor do so well and another didn’t? NetEase’s Marvel Rivals director Thaddeus Sasser has theories, but he also makes it clear that it’s hard to predict:
“The truth is that I don’t think anybody can accurately predict this or the game industry would be radically different today. There’s a lot of games that come out that people are like ‘it’s going to do well’ then it flops… I think it’s really hard to tell ahead of time.”
As for Sasser’s theories, he points out that there’s a buy-in cost associated with switching from one live game to another and that Concord didn’t offer enough unique value to players. By contrast, Marvel Rivals has the faces of some of the most recognizable characters in the superhero space sitting front and center (although it certainly does not radically reinvent the game mechanics of the hero shooter genre). But it’s important to remember that in the game industry, just like in the movie industry, nobody knows anything.
