NetEase’s dumping of the Marvel Rivals’ Seattle team continues to generate reactions across the game industry, mainly because of the game’s massive success. Gamefile’s Stephen Totilo today shared a message he received from NetEase rep clarifying the reason for the layoffs.
“We recently made the difficult decision to adjust Rival’s development team structure for organizational reasons and to optimize development efficiency for the game,” read the statement Totilo shared on X.
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“This resulted in a reduction of a design team based in Seattle that is part of a larger global design function in support of Marvel Rivals. We appreciate the hard work and dedication of those affected and will work and will be treating them confidentially and respectfully with recognition for their individual contributions.
“We want to reassure fanbase that the core development team for Marvel Rivals, which continues to be led by Lead Producers Weicong Wu and Game Creative Director Guangyun Chen in Guangzhou, China, remains fully committed to delivering an exceptional experience.
“We are investing more, not less, into the evolution and growth of this game. We’re excited to deliver new super hero characters, maps, features, and content to ensure an engaging live service experience for our worldwide player base.”
After posts from devs affected by the NetEase layoffs started showing up on social media, two theories quickly followed. The first claimed that NetEase was pulling out of North America while the second claimed they simply used American devs to gain access to the American market.
In a comment under Totilo’s post, an X user with the handle @TheZapken reminded us that, “NetEase did the same to the entire Visions of Mana team before the game even officially release”.
Twitch streamer @NatsuJutsu said the decision was likely made because the Seattle team was expensive and NetEase was eager to maximize profit.
“Clearly, whatever NetEase says really doesn’t matter; they just don’t want to pay them since the Americans probably had the highest salary on that dev team. They would rather cut them off and reap the profits.”
Our best guess is that NetEase’s statement would not fly. Rather, most gamers will stick to one of the narratives highlighted above. But will this affect the success of Marvel Rivals down the line? Only time will tell.
