Marvel Rivals follow in CoD, Overwatch, and Fortnite’s footsteps with new PvE mode

Darragh Harbinson, Senior Editor

Last Updated: 17/10/2025

Marvel Rivals has unveiled a new spooky Zombies mode, which will see players face off against hordes of the undead.

Marvel Rivals Zombies is Marvel Rivals’ first official PvE mode, and comes in conjunction with the Marvel Zombies TV show.

The zombies will be unleashed on October 23.

Marvel Rivals Zombies mode: What to expect

Marvel Games Executive Producer, Danny Koo introduced the mode, stating that players could play as Thor, Blade, Magik, Jeff, and the Punisher in the mode.

However, the developer noted that the heroes have special abilities for the mode, so players can enjoy slashing (or munching) through waves of enemies.

Koo added that Zombie Namor and ‘The Queen of the Dead’ are bosses for the PvE event, a special edition of Wanda.

The mode is four-player co-op, and available on all platforms from October 23.

Marvel Rivals follows CoD, Overwatch, and Fortnite in its PvE mode

Zombie modes have been a staple of gaming ever since the Zombies mode in Call of Duty: World at War.

The 2008 CoD game kicked off a trend of horde modes being added to several games, with Treyarch’s subsequent Black Ops series refining the Zombies mode.

In 2016, Overwatch released its special Halloween event – Junkenstein’s Revenge.

The mode saw four-player co-op, with the team facing off against successive waves of robot zombies, called ‘Zomnics.’

The PvE mode was Overwatch’s first official PvE event. Sound familiar?

Certainly, the comparisons between Marvel Rivals and Overwatch run deep, but to be fair, Marvel Rivals’ implementation looks quite different.

For example, in Overwatch’s implementation, you could only play as four select heroes, and in Marvel Rivals’ you can play as five!

To be less flippant, it seems Marvel Rivals’ Zombies is less about defending a point and more offensive and focused on having fun with characters’ abilities.

After all, Marvel Rivals is all about fighting other heroes, so now players will get to see what it’s like to handle a superhero against a regular old undead.

Additionally, as Fortnite celebrates its Fortnitemares 2025 event, it’s hard to remember back to its 2017 release, but Fortnite actually started as a PvE zombie-horde experience.

The game was originally a four-player co-op, with the team facing off against successive waves of Zombies coming from the storm.

The mode was later entitled “Fortnite: Save the World” as Fortnite’s Battle Royale quickly surpassed the mode in notoriety and cultural cachet.

Darragh Harbinson, Senior Editor

Darragh Harbinson is an esports writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK, Esports Insider, UKCSGO, Dexerto, and Rush B Media.

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