Marvel Rivals launched towards the very end of 2024 and kicked off 2025 as one of the most popular games of the year right off the top. It was already breaking records in December 2024, and kept that momentum going in January 2025 with over 644K concurrent players and $135 million earned in gross revenue.
To say that Marvel Rivals started off with a bang would be an understatement, and while it hasn't kept up the kinds of player concurrent numbers that see it go over half a million players on one platform alone, at least on Steam, it has consistently stayed near or above 100K concurrent players, and made multiple appearances in Newzoo's top ten games by monthly active users throughout the year.
But all of that, according to producer Danny Koo, was "just a warm-up." Speaking in an interview with Den of Geek, Koo said, "2025 was more of a warm-up period for us. Next year, we’re going to have bigger plans. We’re not going to slow down. We’ve already planned more than a year ahead and I can’t wait for our players to see it."
NetEase publishing and marketing lead, Yachen Bian, in the same interview added, "In the next year, we want to provide more game modes. It’s why we have prototypes in the game, like PvE and 18v18. We want to give the players more choices of different game modes beyond the basic gameplay because your fundamental experience might be very different. When you’re fighting against zombies, it’s quite different from fighting against other people."
It's difficult to imagine what even more success looks like for Marvel Rivals, considering it was already one of 2025's most successful new games on the market, as it seems to have definitively carved out a place for itself in the highly competitive free-to-play shooter genre.
"It's a lot of hard work and it always feels different and exciting," Koo continued. "This game is releasing new content every week. Even my own team comes in every day asking what's new today. Everyone's excited. They want to continue to make this happen. Everyone wants to make this the biggest game possible."
We'll see how NetEase continues to direct Marvel Rivals, and if it can sustain the engagement it enjoyed in the past year, and potentially even grow it further.
About the author: David has been writing about videogames, technology, and culture since 2020, with a focus on reporting daily news across multiple publications, including GameDaily.Biz, GameSkinny, and PlayStation Universe before joining Wccftech in 2025. David started contributing as Canada/US reporter for Wccftech's gaming section in 2025. Besides being up-to-date on the industry's movements, he loves interviewing developers, reviewing games, and writing intricate essays about the symbolism and layered meanings to be found in rich narratives as he's done for publications like GamesIndustry.Biz, LostInCult, and others. Outside of games he loves movies, music, theatre, his hometown, and his family, though not necessarily in that order.
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