William Bao, currently a concept artist at id Software, has spoken very badly Of Marvel Rivals and his experience with NetEasewhich apparently turned out to be a period of unpaid work under the guise of graphics testing.
“I remember working on this title with NetEase during the pandemic: they never paid for the work I did and it's one of the most uninspired projects I've ever had the misfortune of dealing with,” Bao wrote following the announcement of Marvel Rivals.
“Most of the feedback given during the concept phase was like 'look at this thing from this other thing and copy it'. At one point the reference image I was given was literally concept art taken from ArtStation and popular at the time.”
A warning for young talents
“I would like to give some advice to all the young artists in this industry: never take free tests. If you are good enough, you deserve to be paid for your effort, while any work done during these 'free tests' will end up being the property of the companies and could be used in the final project.”
As for the non-payment, Bao explained that he began to get suspicious at the beginning of the third week, “because they kept telling me that it was just a stylistic test for the game but the requests became more and more specific.”
“No test lasts that long, and I can only imagine how much free labor they got from these sessions.”