It’s exhausting to cease making Overwatch comparisons to Marvel Rivals, given how acquainted the latter’s upcoming Chinese language New 12 months occasion appears. These of us who’ve been enjoying Blizzard’s hero shooter for the previous eight years have seen this all earlier than.
The Spring Competition, which begins on Jan. 23, introduces a brand new limited-time mode that’s principally Rocket League with out the automobiles. It’s referred to as Conflict of Dancing Lions, and it takes place in a giant area with targets on both finish. Groups go a ball round and attempt to rating targets utilizing Black Widow, Iron Fist, and Star-Lord — in dancing lion skins, after all. For those who changed these heroes with Lúcio from Overwatch, you’d simply have Lúcioball, a mode that has existed in that sport since its first Summer time Video games occasion in 2016.
It additionally appears just like the Marvel Rivals heroes are getting dancing lion MVP animations identical to their Overwatch counterparts. Clearly, neither sport invented Chinese language New 12 months celebrations or the normal dance related to it, however the similarities between the occasions are exhausting to disregard.
Overwatch goes greater with its Lunar New 12 months celebration this yr partly as a result of it’s coming again to China on Feb. 19, by way of writer NetEase, no much less. In a submit final week on Xiaohongshu (also referred to as RedNote), sport director Aaron Keller introduced a bunch of returning cosmetics and an entire set of Chinese language mythology-themed skins coming in its subsequent season.
However till then, it’ll be Marvel Rivals’ flip to have fun. And even when the brand new mode performs nothing like Lúcioball, you may wager persons are going to level out how blatantly it’s borrowing from Overwatch. That doesn’t make it inherently unhealthy, but it surely does make you marvel how a lot of the sport goes to be aimed instantly at Overwatch followers sooner or later.
