Marvel Snap shows no signs of slowing down, with the popular free-to-play card game reportedly earning over US $30 million from 14 million downloads since the game’s launch. To kick off 2023, the team at studio Second Dinner, comprised of veteran developers of Hearthstone and Blizzard Entertainment, have announced a new patch for January that makes a few key changes.
One of the most important new features isn’t one that affects gameplay, but is just as important: Artist Credits. The artwork on the cards of Marvel Snap comes from a variety of different artists, with the ability to collect variant artwork – alternative versions of cards that feature iconic Marvel comic book covers, different versions of characters, or dramatically different art styles – being a key feature.
Initially, there was no way to find out the name of the artist responsible for the artwork on a card through the game. A small change was eventually introduced that began titling some of the more prevalent style sets with artist names (like ‘Dan Hipp Variant’ or ‘Rian Gonzales Variant’), but this new feature will ensure each and every card features an artist attribution.
Read: The best decks in Marvel Snap, according to creator Ben Brode
A number of major card balance changes are also being introduced in this Marvel Snap patch, with the most significant being for Galactus (who destroys the rest of the battlefield when revealed) and Leader (who clones every card played by your opponent). Both cards have had their power level reduced, with Ben Brode of Second Dinner flagging that more changes for these cards are on the way.
Other cards that have suffered a power drop are Aero, who disrupts the battlefield by moving the opponent’s cards, as well as Nova, who boosts the power of other cards when destroyed. Both of these cards see very frequent use in the game.
The January 2023 Marvel Snap patch will be rolling out on 10 January 2023. Full patch notes follow, courtesy of the game’s official website.
Marvel Snap Patch Notes – January 10, 2023
Patch Highlights
- NEW FEATURE: Artist Credits! You can now tap the Variant Label above the cards in your collection to see information about who the illustrators are!
General Updates
- The collection view automatically filters to your favorite variants when editing a deck.
- When cards trigger each other in a loop that lasts too long, the game will now “fast forward” to the end of the loop. We’re looking at you, Wong-Onslaught-Mystique-Ironheart!
- Orka’s issue has been fixed, and the card is now in Series 4.
- Russian language support
- For new players who want to jump right in, we’re releasing a one-time purchase, ‘Pro Bundle’ with 12,500 Credits and enough boosters to upgrade 8 cards from Common to Infinity.
- Reserves now reward different amounts of Collectors Tokens once you collect all Series 3 Cards. The individual amounts vary from 200-600 instead of only 400. However, the token earning rate remains the same.
Audio
- New Location Sounds:
- Asgard
- Daily Bugle
- New Card Sounds:
- Aero
- Polaris
Art & Visual Effects
- New Visual Effects for Aero and Polaris
Balance Updates
CARD UPDATES
- Aero 5/8 -> 5/7
Developer Comment: Aero’s effect can be a very powerful disruption and control tool. While previously, we buffed Aero up to her current statline, players have since learned to utilize her to great effect, so we think it’s appropriate to reduce her Power a bit.
- Galactus 6/3 -> 6/2
Developer Comment: Even at the highest ranks of play, Galactus and decks using him are demonstrating concerningly high cube-gain and win rates. Not all of these decks overtly herald his approach, and the range of cards that can complement him has proven wide and difficult for some decks to counter. We’re taking one Power away from Galactus now and evaluating whether or not we should make more meaningful changes to his design in the future.
- Leader 6/4 -> 6/3
Developer Comment: Leader’s effect is proving to be very frustrating to many players and polarizing in its ability to lock down games and discourage playing some other 6-Cost cards. We are taking a bit of power away from him for now and exploring further changes to the card in the future.
- Nova 1/2 -> 1/1
Developer Comment: Nova’s effect makes him much stronger than an average 1-Cost card, so we don’t think it’s appropriate that he has the stats of an average 1-Cost card.
- Drax 4/4 On Reveal: If your opponent played a card here this turn, +4 Power. -> 4/5 On Reveal: If your opponent played a card here this turn, +3 Power.
- Groot 3/3 On Reveal: If your opponent played a card here this turn, +3 Power. -> 3/4 On Reveal: If your opponent played a card here this turn, +2 Power.
Developer Comment: We believe the Guardians’ effects create fun moments, but they can feel too sink or swim. We’re giving Drax and Groot a small buff to their baselines to make them less risky to play and hopefully open them up as more viable contenders in the 3 and 4-Cost slots.
- Hazmat 2/1 -> 2/2
Developer Comment: While we are aware of the Hazmat combo decks that may feel strong, Hazmat is actually doing fairly poorly overall. We’re giving the decks she enables a small buff with this update.
- Black Cat 3/6 -> 3/7
Developer Comment: Black Cat sees virtually no play, so we’re giving her an extra Power to make running her more worthwhile.
- Nakia 3/1 -> 3/2
Developer Comment: We think Nakia’s effect is a fun mechanic to play with, but she’s currently seeing very little success. We’re hoping a small buff will make her a more appealing option.
LOCATION UPDATES
- Oscorp Tower will no longer swap card sides if Professor X is there
- Raft and Vibranium Mines text-only updates
- Warrior Falls will appear less often
Bug Fixes
- Localization improvements for some Titles.
- Fixed an issue that would cause players to get kicked out of games when Black Panther activated many times in a turn.
- Fixed an issue that caused some card buffs to not be added if there were multiple doubling effects active at the same time.
- Attilan activating no longer causes games to get stuck.
- Fixed an issue that causes shop timers to break if you change device time.
- Power values larger than 2 digits no longer display stretched.
- Fixed an issue with certain locations stalling the game, such as Warrior Falls and Gamma Lab.
- Deadpool now displays Power correctly if he’s destroyed while temporarily buffed.
- Updated Carousel for Season Pass to say “Season Pass” instead of “Battle Pass.”
- Fixed an issue that caused certain cards to display with stretched textures if upgrading to Uncommon at the end of a match.
- Updating Time Stone to grant Energy even if it’s destroyed.
- Isle of Silence Visual Effects are no longer split.
- The Title page scroll now goes in the correct direction.
- Fixed an issue in the Rewards Claim tutorial that could result in a player getting stuck.
- Re-positioned the Sort/Filter buttons on iOS.
- Tapping location 2 after Attilan activates no longer displays a random card instead of the location preview.
- Removed the navigation bar from showing on certain screens where it should not.
- The Fast Upgrade section should no longer disappear from the shop.
- Buy buttons no longer disappear if you’ve purchased a variant in the shop, and the shop refreshes.
- Season Pass spotlight card “Variant” text no longer overlaps with the card itself.
- End Turn button should no longer show 1/6 then 0/6 then 1/6 again at the start of a match.
- Fixed an issue that would cause players to sometimes get stuck ~25% into the loading bar.
Known Issues List
- Some devices show cards overlapping with artist info when in focus view.
- The shop UI scrolls back up after purchasing an item (Variant, Fast Upgrade, Gold, Token Shop item).
- There is a Fullscreen button in Settings on some devices that should not be present.
- Boosters in the Season Pass UI can display the incorrect color
- Some audio in FTUEs does not sync with the speech bubbles.
- Medusa’s card does not show parallaxing VFX during the FTUE upgrade flow.
- Season Pass headers overlap with the notch on devices with notches
- Switching back to the Collection page from other tabs doesn’t focus the deck selector on the current deck.
- Emote/Emoji windows are too far down from the player/opponent avatars on iOS.
- Card backs can duplicate when scrolling through the list.
- Season Cache rewards are missing text.
- An extra ! can be displayed on incomplete decks.
- Artist info can clip outside the plate UI
- Flickering/white boxes can appear when changing language on Android.
- Cards and locations that add cards to your hand or the opponent (eg: Black Widow, Lechuguilla) can show cards going to the wrong player.
- Ebony Maw’s VFX don’t move if the card moves.
- Kingpin’s VFX may play in the incorrect location.
- Isle of Silence VFX go red even for cards that don’t have ongoing abilities.
- Jessica Jones’ VFX are hard to see.
- Rockslide/Okoye can cause turn ends to take too long.
- Iceman can cause cards to cost more than 6 if they are temporarily lower cost before Iceman changes their cost.
- Cards can overlap when Lockjaw replaces them.
- Lockjaw can bring back cards that were previously destroyed.
- Lockjaw doesn’t always interact with Leader properly.
- Vault doesn’t let Multiple Man back in if he moves from the location on turn 6.
- Arnim Zola’s copied cards can be added to locations locked by Professor X.
- Switching into TVA on turn 4 or away from Limbo on turn 6 causes the wrong text for “Next Turn” cubes won/lost.
- Widow’s Bite doesn’t prevent Attilan from drawing cards.
- Some UI elements (eg: Ranked reward number, Deck name) can go missing temporarily when switching between languages.
- Several text elements are too small in Thai.
- PC – Pressing Escape while in the Token Shop UI can unpin cards.
- PC – Adjusting window size can cause the carousel to be misaligned.
