The players of the new superhero shooter Marvel Rivals are convinced that something is wrong with their matches – yet the game has so many players.
How many players does Marvel Rivals have? Marvel Rivals is currently very popular. Already in December, about 2 weeks after release, the superhero shooter announced on X that the game had 20 million players.
Especially on Steam, where we can see the current player numbers through databases like SteamDB, the game is very successful. With the start of Season 1 on January 10, the player numbers increased again, reaching up to 644,000 concurrent active users.
Marvel Rivals is also available on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S and in the Epic Games Store.
Not all “players” are human
What is this theory about? Part of the Marvel Rivals community believes that they are not only playing against real people in the hero shooter. Some players are convinced that in the unranked quick play mode, matches against bots occur.
According to a Reddit post, a player claimed that after 2 consecutive losses, there is a chance to play against 6 bots in the next match while their own team consists of up to 4 players.
The Reddit user spent a week testing and arrived at the following findings:
- Bots only exist in quick play, not in competitive
- After 2 consecutive losses, the chance of entering a bot lobby is very high
- A bot lobby consists of 4 human teammates, 2 bot teammates, and 6 bot opponents
- There are penalties for leaving bot lobbies
- All bots have account level 1
- All bot profiles have “restricted access” (as opposed to “limited access” for human profiles)
The post received a lot of support on Reddit, garnering over 3,200 upvotes and 2,500 comments.
Player cleverly exploits bot lobbies
What does the community say about this? Most players comment that it’s very easy to tell when you are playing against bots. Some are bothered by the fact that there is still no in-game notification indicating that it is now a bot match.
The fundamental criticism, however, is: The gameplay of Marvel Rivals is designed to play against other players. You do not want to play against bots.
However, one player has found a clever way to exploit the bot lobbies without completely wasting their time: He completes hero achievements that cannot be finished in regular AI matches and must be completed in “quick play” or “competitive.” These include achievements that require hitting 4 opponents with a specific ability, for example.
If you are still undecided about which heroes to play in Marvel Rivals, you can take a look at our tier list. We have examined the heroes, their strengths and weaknesses, as well as the current meta of Marvel Rivals and subsequently assigned each hero to a tier: Marvel Rivals: Tier List for Season 1 – All Heroes Ranked
