Oliver Mitchell

Resurrecting the Past: Marvel Rivals Brings Back Controversial Overwatch Mechanic with Adam Warlock's Ultimate

Marvel Rivals is providing an alternative for those who play Mercy and feel sidelined by recent Overwatch updates, as it reintroduces one of her most controversial abilities in a new format.

This game is bringing back and tweaking a skill from Overwatch that had been highly debated and ultimately removed by Blizzard. For early Overwatch players, Mercy’s former ultimate ability is a memorable one. It allowed her to instantly bring back any number of teammates within her range to full health. The sight of an enemy Mercy dashing across the map after your team’s multi-murder, only to undo all your efforts, was a truly disheartening moment. The phrase "Heroes Never Die" struck fear into the hearts of her opponents. Although players enjoyed using this powerful ability, Blizzard eventually replaced it with a much less impactful version.

Marvel Rivals, however, seems unbothered by any potential backlash from rebuilding a meta around resurrection. The new hero shooter’s Adam Warlock has a similar ultimate ability. In the current closed beta, his ultimate, known as Karmic Revival, creates a glowing golden circle that not only revives teammates but also brings back any who fall within the next ten seconds, albeit with partial health. It's a mass resurrection and a temporary respawn point combined into one powerful move.

A video clip showcases Adam Warlock's Karmic Revival acting as both a mass resurrection and an auto-revive checkpoint within a two-minute YouTube video. This bears similarities to Mercy’s old ultimate, which transformed team battles into prolonged endurance tests. Every match had at least two Mercys, turning combat into a waiting game centered on the timing of Mercy’s ultimate: who could eliminate Mercy first or save their ultimates until she had used hers? This period in Overwatch's history represented a time when the game was more of a wacky, fun experience rather than a finely tuned competitive shooter. It remains to be seen where Marvel Rivals will fall in this spectrum upon its release later this year.