Marvel Rivals Dev Promises a New Hero Every Month and a Half

NetEase Games is telling Marvel Rivals players that a new hero will launch every month and a half as additional seasons roll out.

The studio’s creative director, Guangyun Chen, clarified the team’s post-launch plans during an interview with Metro. He doesn’t mince words, promising to release a playable character every half-season. That equals out to at least one new hero every month and a half, or roughly every six weeks.

“Every season we’ll be rolling out fresh seasonal stories, new maps, and new heroes. We’ll actually be breaking down each season into two halves,” Chen said. “The length of one season is three months. And for each half of the season, we will introduce a new hero. We just eventually want to continue to enhance the experience, and, you know, keep everyone excited in our community.”

It’s a tall order that will leave fans with one question as every season winds down: who’s next? Marvel Rivals Season 1: Eternal Night Falls already kicked things off with a strong start by introducing both Mister Fantastic and the Invisible Woman for the first half, with The Thing and the Human Torch primed to launch with the second half in a few weeks. These are Marvel mainstays who have undeniably earned their place as legendary superhero characters, but keeping up that momentum over time will be quite the challenge.

Marvel Rivals already launched with a strong list of playable heroes that includes names like Wolverine, Magneto, Spider-Man, Jeff the Landshark, and Storm, but there are so many other faces to include. Blade is one character rumored to appear in Season 2, for example, with fans also hoping to see characters like Daredevil, Deadpool, and other X-Men at some point. It’s unclear how NetEase will expand upon the Marvel Rivals roster in the future, but with the success it’s seen so far, the team is showing no signs of slowing down.

Marvel Rivals Season 1 also introduced a laundry list of balance changes and general gameplay tweaks, with more promised to arrive in future updates. For other news on the studio’s hero shooter hit, you can check out how some players are using the Invisible Woman to ward off an alleged bot problem. You can also read up on the Hero Hot List, and why some players are using mods despite fears of being banned.

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

Be sure to give him a follow on Twitter @MikeCripe.