Overwatch 2 fights back — closing the gap with Marvel Rivals

NetEase Games' Marvel Rivals and Blizzard Entertainment's Overwatch 2 are continuing to trade blows, with the latter recently gaining ground but unable to overtake the former.

That's according to the latest insights from analytics firm Newzoo, which outlined the most-played games across different platforms in the U.S, U.K, and several other countries for the month of February 2025.

Per Newzoo, Marvel Rivals slipped a bit, falling two spots to the sixth most-played game overall. Meanwhile, Overwatch 2 gained in players, rising three ranks to the 17th most-played game across platforms, but still notably behind Marvel Rivals.

That's backed up by data from Circana executive director Mat Piscatella, who noted that Marvel Rivals took the first-place, fifth place, and seventh place spots for the most-played games on Steam, PlayStation, and Xbox respectively for the month of February.

This shake-up comes as Blizzard Entertainment recently announced a cavalcade of updates for Overwatch 2, including a new Nordic hero named Freja, a new Perk system, and wild mode called Stadium.

Perks have already rolled out in Overwatch 2, while Freja and the Stadium mode are slated to arrive as part of Season 16 later in the year.

Marvel Rivals first launched back in December 2024 to an explosive start, recently crossing 40 million players as the developers added the remaining members of the Fantastic Four to the playable roster.

Healthy competition is great

As someone that's enjoyed playing both games, it's good to see some healthy competition between the two. Having another game with a large overlap in its audience means both teams should be pushed to make their offering more attractive.

I'm extremely curious to see if this trend continues and Overwatch 2 gains even more ground in the coming months, or if we'll instead see things stabilize for a bit.

Marvel Rivals and Overwatch 2 are currently free-to-play on Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, and PlayStation 5. Overwatch 2 is also available on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Nintendo Switch.