If there's a contender for the biggest news over the weekend, it would undoubtedly be TikTok's temporary ban in the United States. This action followed a congressional act labeling it as a "foreign adversary controlled application," and the ban took effect on Sunday. However, President-elect Donald Trump quickly pledged to restore the service, and ByteDance promptly brought TikTok back online. Yet, not all of ByteDance's applications have enjoyed such a swift return.
A prime example is Marvel Snap, the popular comic-themed card battler. As reported over the weekend, Marvel Snap, along with other releases from ByteDance subsidiaries like Moonton's Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, was abruptly halted in the U.S. with a message stating it had been banned. ByteDance's message was clear: accept all their offerings or get none at all.
The real surprise? Developer Second Dinner was seemingly not informed about this move and has been managing the fallout on Twitter for the past 24 hours. Despite this, they've promised to restore Marvel Snap to service quickly. However, this situation raises some troubling questions.
Catch!You don't need a degree in political science to see that TikTok's brief outage and its pointed message singling out Trump as its potential savior was a calculated move by ByteDance to generate buzz. It appears to have worked, allowing them to dramatically return to availability in the U.S.
However, this political maneuver also affected other gaming releases, leaving some ByteDance developers in a lurch. Second Dinner has had to offer lucrative free rewards to compensate players for the downtime, hoping to have Marvel Snap back online by the time of publishing.
While it's unlikely that Second Dinner will end their lucrative partnership with ByteDance, this incident may have shaken their confidence. The message seems clear: mobile gaming is less of a priority than ByteDance's algorithm-driven social media enterprise.
Game overThis isn't the first time ByteDance has indicated that gaming takes a backseat to their social media business. In 2023, their gaming division underwent massive layoffs, canceling many projects before they could be released.
Since then, Marvel Snap seemed to signal a shift towards partnerships rather than in-house development. However, this significant breach of trust could make other developers and publishers wary of getting entangled in ByteDance's next political controversy.
Disney, too, might be feeling the impact, especially with the recent release of NetEase's Marvel Rivals, which boosted mobile gaming through a crossover collaboration earlier this month. ByteDance may have outmaneuvered politicians, but players, developers, and IP holders are likely to be less forgiving.
They think it’s all over…Rumors suggest that ByteDance might just be the beginning. Tencent, NetEase, and other Chinese gaming companies could be next in line. The FTC has already targeted MiHoYo over loot boxes, and even this high-profile dispute and its anticlimactic resolution may not deter the next politician with a vendetta against gaming.
What might happen next? The sudden removal of Marvel Snap caught many off guard, especially older players who were indifferent to TikTok. ByteDance's gamble paid off, setting a worrying precedent. How will people react when their favorite pastime becomes a pawn in geopolitical games? The saying about bread and circuses might just backfire on everyone involved.
