Marvel Rivals officially confirms first new characters: The Fantastic Four are coming soon

Marvel Rivals Fantastic Four teaser art
(Image credit: NetEase Games)

Confirming the first of many Marvel Rivals characters to come, developer NetEase Games announced that the Fantastic Four are headed to the hero shooter soon.

"Get ready to welcome Marvel’s First family in Marvel Rivals," a fresh tweet reads, teasing the hero art pictured above. "Trailer on January 6th at 8:00 AM PST / 16:00 UTC. Be there."

Season 0 of Marvel Rivals will end soon and was "inspired by Doctor Doom and his never-ending quest to unravel the mysteries of time," making the Fantastic Four natural frontrunners for the next chapter.

With this new trailer coming Monday, we won't have to wait very long for additional details. For the time being, this teaser image has ignited hopes that the titular fantastic heroes may be joined by their robot sidekick HERBIE, who's smiling comfortably in the middle of the scene. Leaks suggest this is just set dressing, though HERBIE could end up being, say, part of an ability for one of the Fantastic Four members.

Given the popularity of Jeff the Land Shark, I wouldn't be surprised to see NetEase release another cute little Marvel Rivals mascot in some way. Jeff even won over Marvel TV, streaming, and animation head Brad Winderbaum, who said the little shark's debut in the MCU proper is downright inevitable. "You know it's coming!" Winderbaum said. "I can't say when, I can't say where. But we're all Jeff fans around here. Man is he fun to play!"

Marvel Rivals joined Manor Lords, Palworld, and Helldivers 2 as one of Steam's best-selling and most-played new releases of 2024 despite launching at the end of the year.

Austin Wood

Austin freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree, and he's been with GamesRadar+ since 2019. They've yet to realize that his position as a senior writer is just a cover up for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a focus on news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.