Marvel Rivals Devs Like Introducing Unknown 'Curve Ball' Characters

While Marvel Rivals does have some of the most popular Marvel heroes like Iron Man and Captain America, there are also the more obscure characters from the comics like Magik and Jeff the Land Shark.

Though it would make sense for Marvel Rivals to just keep on bringing in familiar faces, the devs say that they purposefully bring in the more obscure characters to keep the roster interesting.

70% Hits, 30% Curve Balls

Talking to PC Gamer at GDC 2025, Marvel Rivals executive producer Danny Koo explains, "Roughly 70% [of the roster] is made up of your greatest hits, like well-known heroes: Iron Man, Cap, etc… And then we throw in some curve balls; you might not even know who they are, to make the roster more interesting."

Koo didn’t go into detail about who they might be thinking of as obscure characters for the roster, but leaks have suggested that Rivals is going to be introducing some non-MCU heroes like Hit-Monkey and the ridiculously named Paste-Pot Pete (or its more modern alias—Trapster).

Trust the Process

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Credit: NetEase Games | Fair use for promotional purposes

If anything, Koo explains that there is an extensive process that the team has to undergo whenever they start working on a new hero. "What we do is, whenever we have a character, we'll come up with a character background, who they are, and the comic references that appear in what they do, and we'll hand it over to the design team… Then they'll come up with some ideas, and we'll both agree on what their baseline is. When we feel good about [the hero], we go into production."

After they work out the character and all their bells and whistles, marketing then takes over to introduce the new character to players. Koo continues, "Then the marketing team is like, 'Okay, how do we present this to new players that might not know whose world this is? Do we need to explain it?' We have a comic historian come in."

So far, Marvel Rivals has been able to introduce obscure characters to players like Luna Snow and Squirrel Girl. While the MCU may be having a hard time bringing them to the big screen, MR has turned into the perfect avenue for players to fall in love with characters without even getting to know their whole backstory.

Who Else is Coming?

With Season 1 focusing mostly on the Fantastic Four, fans are now looking forward to the next season and which characters could be brought in then.

There have already been leaks for characters like Ultron and Blade, but a rumor suggests that the next season could be the dawn of Mutants and players would get to see characters like Emma Frost and Jean Grey enter the roster. There’s even said to be a map of the X-Mansion.

Until NetEase decides to make the official reveal, all fans can really do is wait.