Marvel Snap has also been banned along with TikTok

Summary

  • Marvel Snap has been pulled from US mobile app stores.

  • Although developed by California-based Second Dinner, the popular mobile game is published by Nuverse, a subsidiary of TikTok owner ByteDance.

  • TikTok and Marvel Snap were pulled from mobile app stores due to a new law that went into effect on January 19. Second Dinner suggested its game be relaunched in the US ASAP.

Marvel Snap has been banned in the United States. The hit game was pulled from mobile app stores due to the same legislation that imposed a statewide ban on TikTok.

On January 19, a law called the Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act – dubbed HR7521 – went into effect. This piece of legislation prohibits the distribution and maintenance of applications offered by companies originating from countries that Washington considers adversary, particularly China. With President-elect Trump scheduled to be inaugurated a day later, on Jan. 20, the Biden administration said it would leave enforcement of HR7521 to his successor. Nonetheless, after the Supreme Court upheld this de facto TikTok ban, the popular social media platform owned by China-based ByteDance was removed from Google and Apple's app stores in the late evening hours ET on January 18.

Family

TikTok no longer works in the US

The millions of individuals who use TikTok in the US no longer have access to the hugely popular app.

Around the same time, hit the mobile CCG Marvel Snap was also downloaded from both the Google Play Store and the iOS App Store in the US. Although developed by Irvine, California-based Second Dinner, Marvel Snap is published by Nuverse, a subsidiary of ByteDance. This connection is what caused it to fall under HR7521, resulting in its removal from state-side app stores. Second Dinner acknowledged the ban in a social media post, but characterized it as a temporary setback. “We are actively working to get the game up as soon as possible and will update you when we have more to share,” a company spokesperson wrote on Twitter.

The Second Dinner and the Nuverse were blinded by the Marvel Snap Ban

A similar message, reviewed by Game Rant, was posted on the game's official Discord server. There, a Second Dinner representative wrote that the ban was a “surprise” to both the developer and Nuverse, suggesting that Marvel SnapThe removal from US mobile app stores was a decision that came from Google and Apple, or directly from ByteDance. This would explain why neither Second Dinner nor Nuverse said anything about the possibility of the game being banned in the days before it was removed.

We are actively working to get the game up as soon as possible and will update you when we have more to share.

Marvel Snap players are not happy with the game's US ban

While the ban may have blindsided both the game's developers and publishers, Marvel Snap players are not happy with this turn of events, with many of them already voicing their displeasure on Discord and social media. Some fans are already pushing Second Dinner to refund all the money they spent on the game, claiming they never would have done it if they had known Marvel Snap would become unplayable just two years after its release in late 2022.

Since Second Dinner seems to believe that this removal will be short-lived, it is unlikely to focus on offering mass refunds to customers from the government in the immediate future. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew recently thanked President-elect Trump for being willing to work on solutions to keep the social media app in the US, signaling that the incoming administration can “save TikTok,” something the 47th president promised to do on the promotional track in mid-2024. In the meantime, it appears that US players can still download Marvel Snap via Steam starting in the early morning hours ET on January 19th.

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