The summer player base celebration is happening at Marvel Rivals, and the major event is certainly the much-awaited Landshark! The Jeff Summer Party kicks off on the 18th of July and continues until the 31st, with the exclusive TikTok filter giving players a chance to click some photos with the monster-favorite character. By posting their videos with the hashtag #JeffSummerParty, participants can stand a chance to win one out of 10 Marvel Rivals keychains, with the winners contacted through TikTok DMs.
The official announcement talked about good times in the sun, but the responses shed light into a very different story: angry players venting their frustration about the state of the game. Matchmaking woes and complaints about character balancing surfaced for the players who basically said: “Fix it, and then we’ll party this summer.”
The number one complaint, for the most part? Matchmaking. The system was bashed in more than one reply, with one player more or less stating: “Fix the fing matchmaking you sons of b” (translated from Portuguese.) Others chimed in with “What about fixing your garbage matchmaking?” and “The matches in this game are so far from balanced that you either have fun or feel like crap.”
Almost on an equal rung was cross-progression issues, with many requests flowing for account linking across platforms, one saying, “Please add cross progression already my Xbox bricked and can’t use any of my stuff on PlayStation it’s such a massive L.” The hashtag #LetUsLinkAccountsMR appeared in several replies.
There also was an abundance of character-specific issues; “Nerf Black Panther,” they said; one person complained about Iron Man’s “hip thrust bug”, and “DELETE BOT GAMES!!!” appeared in capital letters four times from an increasingly frustrated voice. Deadpool was even mentioned with the suggestion that for April Fools, any character selected would immediately default to Merc with a Mouth.
Meanwhile, the cult of Jeff was thriving; one declared him “the cutest Landshark” while another jokingly requested, “Give Jeff a Bikini fit next?” The character clearly has a fanbase, even though opinions on the game are anything but unanimous.
With the event going on, the Marvel Rivals player base keeps rising. The TikTok contest seems to be a sincere attempt at truly engaging the community outside of just gameplay, even though many replies suggest that the players would rather spend time patching existing issues than creating more filters for social media.
With the deadline for the contest being July 31, the two-week-long wrap-up could well be the very period during which developers should be co-working on some of the huge issues facing the community. Sure, keychains are great, but balanced matches, working progression, and bug-free gameplay are what really lie on top of every player’s wishlist.
Having the summer heats set, the Marvel Rivals finds itself at crossroads- is it going to provide entertainment for these seasonal events or give these gameplay changes that people have been vocally demanding? At least, while Jeff basks in his hour or two of glory, the other half would rather see some characters get knocked down a peg.
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