US-based Marvel Rivals development team hit with layoffs despite massive release

Marvel Rivals has been watching incredible numbers across all platforms since its release, however, everyone was hit with surprising news yesterday. Multiple lay-offs were reported in the Seattle-based development studio for Marvel Rivals despite being highly successful, leaving everyone confused about what happened.

Breaking the news on LinkedIn, Marvel Rivals game director, ‘Thaddeus Sasser’ informed everyone that the entire team has been laid off despite helping create a massively successful franchise. “This is such a weird industry… My stellar, talented team just helped deliver an incredibly successful new franchise in Marvel Rivals for NetEase Games....and were just laid off!” Sasser wrote.

Just two months ago, Marvel Rivals made an official announcement that the game reached 20 million players. It’s hard to think of a reason why NetEase decided to cut several jobs when the game was doing so well among its competitors.

More developers hit by layoffs come forward

The story does not end here as many other developers also came forward to confirm this was the case for a lot of people making the story believable. There is currently no official statement regarding these layoffs from NetEase which doesn’t send a great impression after they received so much praise for the game.

“Welp, just got laid off from my job working on Marvel Rivals with NetEase. Was an enormous pleasure to work with my American coworkers who join me in this sad culling. Just couldn't dodge that big boot I guess, no matter how big the success of the gig,” said Jack Burrows, level designer for the game.

Also Read:NetEase is ready to work on Nintendo Switch 2 port for Marvel Rivals

Game industry layoffs becoming a concerning factor

Up until Microsoft shuttered Tango Gameworks, the developers behind Hi-Fi Rush, people thought only bad game releases led to layoffs and studio closure. While Tango Gameworks was acquired by Krafton, the layoffs from the Marvel Rivals dev team act as another reminder of how unstable the game industry is becoming.