Marvel Rivals, the free-to-play hero shooter developed by NetEase, has rapidly gained popularity, surpassing 20 million players just weeks after its launch. The game continues to draw in over 250,000 daily active players on Steam. However, this success hasn’t prevented NetEase from implementing layoffs within its US development team that contributed to the game’s achievements.

In a recent LinkedIn post, Marvel Rivals’ game director Thaddeus Sasser announced the unfortunate news about job cuts at the Seattle studio operated by NetEase. “This industry is quite perplexing,” he wrote. “My exceptionally talented team has just launched an incredibly successful new franchise with Marvel Rivals for NetEase Games… and we find ourselves laid off!”

While Sasser did not disclose the exact number of layoffs, Eurogamer has reached out to the company for more details. However, level designers Jack Burrows and Garry McGee acknowledged their job losses in separate posts on social media.

“Well, I just got laid off from my role on Marvel Rivals with NetEase,” Burrows wrote. “It was a tremendous experience working alongside my American colleagues who are also facing this unfortunate situation. It seems that no matter the success, we couldn’t escape the downsizing.”

McGee echoed these sentiments, stating, “My team recently played a pivotal role in developing and launching Marvel Rivals, which exceeded all our expectations. Unfortunately, my team was also let go. These are indeed strange times in the industry.”

Despite the surprising nature of NetEase’s layoffs in light of Marvel Rivals’ success, this decision follows a trend of job reductions within several of its western studios. For example, in November, former BioWare executive Mac Walters announced a “pause” on activities at his NetEase-backed project, Worlds Untold. Furthermore, Jar of Sparks, a studio established by Halo Infinite‘s head designer Jerry Hook in 2022, suspended its work on its first game in January, resulting in layoffs while seeking a new publishing partner.

This week also witnessed undisclosed layoffs at Liquid Swords, a Swedish studio formed in 2020 by Christofer Sundberg from Avalanche Studios, which also received funding from NetEase.

The latest layoffs mark a challenging period for the gaming industry, which has seen over 25,000 employees lose their jobs since the beginning of 2023. Just a couple of months into 2025, another 900 layoffs have already been documented, impacting personnel at companies including Unity, Hi-Rez Studios, Sumo Digital, Ubisoft, Splash Damage, and Midnight Society.