Is Marvel Rivals just a cheap Chinese clone of Overwatch? At least that’s what Mike Ybarra thinks – and he’s embarrassing himself quite unpleasantly.
Marvel Rivals was released a few days ago and was well received by many fans. The hero shooter is of course reminiscent of games like Overwatch, as there are many parallels. Former Blizzard boss Mike Ybarra apparently saw it that way too – but would have preferred to think about his words for a moment longer. Because now he has embarrassed himself with amusing accusations.
Marvel Rivals: The launch trailer for the shooter with Marvel superheroes on PS5 and Steam
More videos
Autoplay
What happened? On Platform X, former Blizzard boss Mike Ybarra reported on the new game Marvel Rivals. He criticized the similarity to Overwatch and wrote:
Looks like Overwatch Marvel Rivals is releasing tomorrow. Similar to Light of Motiram (a clear copy of Horizon Zero Dawn) from China. I mean, even the character names – Widowmaker in Overwatch versus Black Widow in Marvel Rivals lol. NetEase/TenCent – all the same.”
How did Ybarra embarrass himself? It didn’t take long for his tweet to have a “community touch”. If a particularly large number of users find a post misleading or incorrect, such a note can be added to provide more context and correct errors. The community added:
“Natasha Romanoff, aka Black Widow, is a popular Marvel heroine who made her comic book debut in 1964, more than 50 years before Overwatch and Widowmaker were created.”
What resonates with this is that if someone was based on the design or name, it would probably be Blizzard at Marvel and not the other way around.
Mike Ybarra has since deleted his tweet, but following the good old rule of “the internet never forgets,” plenty of screenshots have been taken of it and the community is having a good time.
It’s clear that Marvel Rivals and Overwatch definitely have some parallels – just as almost all hero shooters have a similar core that makes up the entire genre. It is questionable who took inspiration from whom when designing characters or the style of play.
Ultimately, Blizzard has a tradition of taking good game ideas from other companies and improving them further. When you, as a former Blizzard boss, complain that a game is a clone… it’s a bit strange: Marvel Rivals started extremely successfully – more than 400,000 players at the same time.