It’s a bad time to be a cheater in Marvel Rivals, as NetEase has just cracked down on pesky exploiters with a massive ban wave, with the company threatening to take stronger action against those caught playing unfairly in the future. Marvel Rivals’ competitive integrity has been a concern in the community this season, as its anti-cheat is allegedly fairly easy to bypass, leading to potential hacking throughout the game.
NetEase Games launched Season 8 of Marvel Rivals on May 15, 2026, bringing with it Devil Dinosaur and Cyclops as new playable heroes, along with brand-new cosmetics and a new battle pass. While Marvel Rivals has had a strong playerbase since its 2024 debut, the game’s anti-cheat has been a source of controversy since its release due to its kernel-level access to a user’s PC. Season 8, in particular, has seen heightened scrutiny over the game’s security. Notable Twitch streamer Jay3OW recently alleged that Marvel Rivals’ anti-cheat feature could apparently be “deleted” without many consequences thereafter. So far, these claims have not been verified, but it seems like NetEase is now taking major steps to address cheating in Marvel Rivals regardless.
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Despite Marvel Rivals being dominated by Overwatch lately, Blizzard’s latest fumble could be just what NetEase needs to get back in the fight.
NetEase Issues a Ban Wave For Marvel Rivals, Threatening Severe Penalties for Repeat Offenders
NetEase has issued a large wave of bans in Marvel Rivals, publicly listing 504 players who were found exploiting the game using cheats, assist programs, or client tampering. The studio’s official blog post states that all of these players have been permabanned from Marvel Rivals following an investigation into cheating in the game, and further states that any repeat offenders could be subject to account bans, IP bans, or even whole-device bans. The team states, “Maintaining a fair and honorable arena is our primary directive. We continuously combat cheats, scripts, and illicit tech through multi-layered anti-cheat monitoring, abnormal behavior detection, historical data reviews, and manual verification.” The Marvel Rivals team signs off the blog post by squashing rumors that fraudulent players have been “deleting” the game’s anti-cheat, stating that these claims are “completely false” and that NetEase’s in-house anti-cheat cannot be disabled independently of the game.
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A quick look at this wave of bans for Marvel Rivals tells an interesting story. Most of the players who were recently banned never even reached Bronze or Silver, the two lowest rankings in Marvel Rivals PvP. Whether or not these accounts were created to avoid bans on their main accounts is unknown, but it would certainly be somewhat funny for these cheaters to get banned for using exploits without ever actually reaching the highest highs in the game. Only a handful of players banned in this wave were among the ranks of One Above All or Grandmaster.
Fans online have been celebrating this spree of bans, but feel like NetEase Games could do a little more to make Marvel Rivals a better experience. The community still wants harsher penalties for players who are overtly toxic over text or voice chat, and are still frustrated with smurfs and throwers who aren’t getting the same ban treatment as cheaters, while still making Marvel Rivals a worse experience overall. How NetEase plans to handle these lesser offenses in the future remains to be seen. Marvel Rivals’ next-best competitor, Overwatch, has similarly struggled with those issues for a decade now.
Rearrange the covers into the correct US release order.
Rearrange the covers into the correct US release order.
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Season 8 of Marvel Rivals still has a lot in store for fans of the hero-shooter. The next few weeks will see a brand-new map called Alchemx Headquarters, along with new skins for Black Cat, Wolverine, Iron Man, and Mantis, ahead of the Season 8.5 roadmap launching later this summer. With the recent wave of bans and reassurance about the game’s security, hopefully, Season 8 of Marvel Rivals can be a smooth and fun experience for the community overall.
- Released
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December 6, 2024
- ESRB
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T For Teen // Violence
- Developer(s)
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NetEase Games
- Publisher(s)
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NetEase Games
