Marvel Rivals Season 2.5 release date, Ultron abilities, and more

In case you're somehow running out of characters to learn and events to tick off, the Marvel Rivals Season 2.5 mid-season update adds even more to play around with. This update includes the rest of the content revealed in the announcement for the second season, but also a few additional surprises.

The first half of Marvel Rivals Season 2 brought Vanguard Emma Frost to the team, the beautiful Krakoa map, heaps of costumes, and tons of tweaks to various systems. While the mid-season update isn't quite so chunky, it's still worth marking on your calendar. Below, you'll find out everything there is to know about Marvel Rivals Season 2.5 right now.

Marvel Rivals Season 2.5 release date and time

Marvel Rivals Season 2.5 is expected to launch on Friday, May 30, 2025. Starting at 2 am PDT / 5 am EDT / 10 am BST / 11 am CEST, the servers should go offline for around two to three hours before the update is in our hands.

Season 2.5 will hang around for about six weeks until Season 3 comes along and messes up the meta once again. In fact, from Season 3 onwards, the update cadence is speeding up, with each season lasting just two months. This means we'll get a new hero every single month from now on, alongside new maps, events, and costumes.

Marvel Rivals Ultron release date and abilities

The one and only Ultron finally arrives with the mid-season update. Despite his…prickly nature, Ultron is actually a Strategist, meaning it's his job to keep the team alive with healing and other supportive buffs.

While Ultron's abilities are yet to be officially revealed, his kit has leaked in its entirety:

• Encephalo-Ray (primary attack): Unleash a burning energy beam.
• Rage of Ultron (ultimate): Summon drones to fire Encephalo-Rays, damaging enemies or healing allies.
• Imperative: Patch (ability): Command a giant drone to follow an ally, constantly healing allies in its radius, with additional healing for the designated ally.
• Imperative: Firewall (ability): Summon drones to grant bonus health to allies within range, centred on himself and the ally marked with Imperative: Patch.
• Algorithm Correction (passive): Hold jump to fall slowly.
• Dynamic Flight (movement ability): Fly quickly in the direction of movement and then enter a free-flight mode.

Almighty Ultron isn't the only new addition in the mid-season update, as we'll also get Arakko, a brand-new convoy map. Of course, we'll also get tons more events and costumes, too.

Marvel Rivals Season 2.5 patch notes and balance changes

With the Season 2 meta finally settling into a rhythm after the arrival of Emma Frost, NetEase has revealed some heroes expected to see changes in the mid-season patch:

• Groot and Captain America are set to have reductions in the survivability department
• Spider-Man's Amazing Combo damage range will be slightly reduced
• Doctor Strange's ultimate cost will be reduced
• Winter Soldier's Tainted Voltage ability and team-up ability will be slightly buffed
• Black Widow, Mister Fantastic, Scarlet Witch, Peni Parker, Jeff the Land Shark, and Rocket Raccoon are also expected to see changes

Since these balance changes are coming alongside the addition of a new hero, the tweaks are somewhat minimal. Expect further balancing after the meta has settled once more after Ultron joins the roster.

Outside of character balance, NetEase has also confirmed a slight change off the back of Season 2's competitive point tweaks. Following this update, competitive point gains and losses were more heavily weighted on match performance, rather than the outcome.

This resulted in a handful of Duelists gaining a disproportionate number of points (and losing less) compared to the rest of the roster, especially Vanguards and Strategists. In Season 2.5, the competitive point system will be further optimised to avoid these kinds of situations.