Marvel Rivals is the new hero shooter that pits teams of Marvel heroes and villains against each other, battling over objectives. If you ever wanted to see Black Widow fighting alongside Magneto against Captain America and Loki, your time has come.
Rivals follows in the gaming footsteps of Overwatch 2, which was inspired by Team Fortress 2 and others before it. If you’ve played either of those predecessors, you’ll probably ease into the game quickly — the objective-based gameplay and general roles will be familiar. The third-person perspective might take a while to get used to, and the destructible environments can add enough chaos to disorient even experienced gamers, but it shouldn’t take long to adjust and feel at ease in the fray.
If you don’t have hundreds or thousands of hours in PvP shooters, that’s OK. When I first started in Overwatch, I had no idea what was going on. But a few thousand hours later, I have a totally different grasp on the game. Marvel Rivals will probably feel overwhelming initially, but the key is to focus on one piece of the game at a time until it becomes second nature. Soon enough, you’ll be anticipating plays you didn’t even notice, clutching out wins for your team and feeling the full thrill of the game.
There’s a lot to get used to, but here’s a quick series of tips for getting started in Marvel Rivals.
First, find your heroes
The best way to settle into the game is to find a hero or two you really like and stick with them for a long while. It reduces some of the chaos by giving you more consistency from match to match. Once you get the hang of your character’s movement and abilities, that’s less information for you to have to digest. Instead, you can use the extra brain power to sift through things like, “What does that enemy voice line mean?” “Where do I go on this map?” and “How am I supposed to see through all of these particle effects?”
Maybe you’re coming into the game saying, “I want to play Spider-Man” because you really love Spidey, and the rest of the roster doesn’t particularly matter to you. Live your web-slinging dreams, my friend. But if you’re starting the game unsure of which hero you want to play, I strongly encourage trying out a little bit of each hero, even if just in the practice range, so you get a sense of how every character works. Find one or two heroes whose roles and abilities best match what you want to do. Check out my guide to Marvel Rivals heroes and roles for more in-depth advice.
Rivals is launching with 33 heroes, so you’ll have plenty of options to choose from.
Focus on your unique abilities
At any given time in Marvel Rivals, you’ll have a lot of information to consider: where your six opponents are, which abilities each of them has available, whether any teammates or enemies are going to use their ultimate abilities in this fight, where that fight is happening, whether that fight is effectively over or still up in the air and whether the destructible environment is going to respawn right in front of you.
Don’t worry about any of that just yet. As you start playing, spend your early games learning the ins and outs of your abilities. Figure out which ones are better to open with and which ones you need to save for fleeing bad situations. Experiment with using them in different sequences and situations: When does Loki’s Doppelganger work as a way to teleport aggressively, and when is it better to give yourself an escape button?
The results won’t be identical from one game to the next, but you’ll start to find patterns, which will inform how you should play to get the most value out of your hero — and how best to contribute to team wins.
The practice range is useful for getting the hang of a hero’s kit.
Practice the push and pull of the game
One of the defining features of hero shooters is the ebb and flow of the gameplay, which gives them a different feel than Call of Duty deathmatches. As your team gains advantages in map position, health or ultimate abilities, you can push more aggressively into the enemy team… at least until you run out of those resources, or the other side turns the tables. At that point, you’ll have a short window to pull back to safety, restock on those advantages and push again. Rinse and repeat until one team is wiped out.
Sometimes, the triggers to push or pull are obvious. Maybe your Doctor Strange just stunned the entire enemy team with his ultimate (push!) or maybe the enemy Scarlet Witch is attempting to blow up your team with her ult (pull). But there are smaller things that you’ll only learn through trial and error. Don’t use your Iron Man ult when the enemy Magneto likely has his ultimate available. Once you see Adam Warlock’s damage-thinning Soul Bond ability is over, that means it’s a lot harder for him to keep an ally alive through major damage — so go all-in!
Remember the objective
Rivals is an objective-based game, whether that objective is capturing a mission area, pushing a payload across the map or doing a little bit of both. Getting kills helps your team make progress on the goal, but it won’t win you the game outright. Beware the dreaded back cap (one player finishing an objective while the enemy team is distracted elsewhere). Once you have a handle on your abilities and the constant ebb and flow, keep a constant eye on the objective.
With this setup, Loki can damage and heal from safety but quickly teleport to the objective if the enemies threaten to capture it.
Accept that not every game is winnable and focus on what’s fun
Even after you’ve mastered your main, learned how to follow the tides of battle and maintained constant vigilance about the objective, you’re still going to lose some games. That’s OK. In any competitive game, you’re going to trade wins and losses.
Sometimes, you’ll have great games and lose because your Venom spends five minutes dying 1v6 on repeat. Other times, you won’t be able to hit the broad side of a Hulk, but you’ll still win because your team’s Magik player eviscerated the opposition without dying once. That’s all part of the experience.
Try to focus on whatever makes the game fun for you. For me, that’s learning and mastering new heroes — thankfully, this game is giving me almost three dozen at launch. For you, that might be playing with friends (highly recommended) or swinging around as Spidey all game, even if the enemy Namor makes it feel impossible to get kills. Whatever it is, focus on the fun thing, and remember that it’s ultimately just a video game featuring aliens, mutants, gods and one regular dude with a bow.
For more on Marvel Rivals, check out my hands-on with Cap and Bucky and my in-depth guide on finding your role and heroes.
