Marvel Rivals is adding its first PvE experience and it is leaning right into spooky season. Zombie Mode lands on October 23, 2025, and pulls from the upcoming Marvel Zombies series to turn the hero shooter into a survival fight against the undead. The pitch is simple. The city is on fire, the infected keep coming, and your squad has to hold the line as long as possible.
This is not a lore throwaway. The mode pairs Marvel Games and Marvel Animation, with Brad Winderbaum and Danny Koo introducing the update in an overview video. That tie to the Disney Plus show gives the event a clear identity and a reason to return. Marvel Rivals has been a PvP first title, so a full co op mode is a big swing that can bring in lapsed players and new teammates who prefer cooperative chaos over competitive play.
You can queue up as Thor, Blade, Magik, Jeff the Land Shark, or the Punisher. Each hero gets a twist built for crowd control and boss pressure. Thor stays in an Awakened state. Magik goes full Darkchylde. Blade ricochets moon blades through packs. Punisher drops an automated turret to lock down lanes. Jeff turns Hide and Seek into a damage aura that chips away at nearby enemies while you weave in and out of danger. It is a loadout built for mowing through waves and setting up big clutch saves.
Boss fights keep the runs from feeling like a one note horde shooter. Zombie Namor shows up as a brute force check on positioning and burst damage. The Queen of the Dead, a zombified Scarlet Witch, brings area denial and panic moments that can crack even clean runs. Expect long stretches of crowd control, then sudden priority targets that punish sloppy ult usage.
The map choice feeds the mood. Empire of Eternal Night Midtown wraps the action in a dark city that reads well for silhouettes and telegraphs. Clarity matters when 40 plus bodies are on screen and you are juggling cooldowns while tracking team health. Survivability and ult timing are going to matter more than mechanical flexing here, which is exactly what a good PvE lane should demand in a hero shooter.
A few design calls stand out for replay value. Endless waves make every session a high score chase. Five heroes with bespoke modifiers invite experimentation and team comps built around buff synergies. Boss rotations prevent trivial meta solves. If the update layers in time limited rewards or cosmetics tied to milestones, you can expect queue times to spike through Halloween week.
Timing and access are friendly. The mode launches October 23 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and S, and PC through Steam and the Epic Games Store. If your group has been waiting for a reason to squad back up, this is it. Co op play is the best on ramp for friends who bounced off PvP, and a Marvel Zombies theme is as broad an invitation as it gets.
One note to watch after launch is difficulty tuning. Endless modes live or die on the curve from power fantasy to pressure. If early waves melt too fast or bosses hit like brick walls, runs stall out. If NetEase nails the pacing and sprinkles in smart modifiers over time, Zombie Mode could become a seasonal staple rather than a one weekend tourist stop.
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