I will admit it, I got into the Marvel vs. Capcom game pretty late in my youth. After being into comics, specifically the X-Men, for a short while I discovered a Game Informer article on Marvel vs Capcom 2, revealing to me that it featured an unreasonably large selection of my favorite mutants (seriously? Marrow??) and immediately set out to track it down. Much to my chagrin, it was only available on the Dreamcast at the time and my 13 year-old heart was crushed when I had to settle for the Ps1 version of the original Marvel vs Capcom. That said, I proceeded to spend so much time beating the holy hell out of random Capcom characters I couldn’t recognize with Venom and War Machine that I broke the damn disk. Sadly, I never did own a copy of MvC2, though I have played plenty of it in its arcade form, which is why I was insanely excited when the “ten years in the making” third installment was announced. Now that I’ve logged a fair amount of hours with the game, click below for my “informed” (read: biased) impressions!
I’ll be pretty forward: I play video games for sheer entertainment, not a challenge. If I want a challenge, I’ll try cooking some more. No, I game to have a good time, usually with friends. If a game is exceedingly challenging with intricate and complex mechanics and tasks, I get turned off very quickly. Which is probably why fighting games appeal to me as much as they do. The concept is very simple: hit the guy that isn’t you until they fall down and, if you’re daring enough, try to make it look good. Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter and my childhood favorite Primal Rage all hold fond places in my heart…but none as high as the Marvel vs Capcom franchise, which is why a distinct feeling of dread came over me as entered the main menu for the first time: what if it sucked? What if I couldn’t pull off any visual badassery? There are a lot fewer characters than last time…what if I don’t click with any? All of these thoughts ran through my head and all of them were for not. Simply put: this game is freakishly fun.
Its easy enough to pick up too: you pick your three man (or woman) squad and get to the brawling. The great thing though, is that the difficulty levels are highly individualized. On very hard, not only are your enemies stronger, faster and more enduring of punishment, but the more powerful signature moves are harder to churn out (read: I died a lot.) However, on very easy, enemies go down quicker and its a lot easier to stumble into some visually impressive attacks by button mashing. The four difficulty levels in between are all well placed, making this game accessible to any level of player ability.
Remember those “impressive visuals” I alluded to earlier? The production team really went the extra mile with the level of detail seen here. While still remaining faithful to the original games (the environments are strictly 2D), the level of depth and finesse applied to each and every 3D modeled character and background is immense. They also managed to strike a good balance between realistic graphics and more cartoony cell shading that really makes the characters pop as they bounce, hurdle and fly across the screen.
Speaking of characters, while the selection is not as wide and far reaching as MvC2, there is plenty of variety here. As much as there is a diverse range of characters here from both universes represented here(MODOK, Viewtiful Joe, Taskmaster and Amaterasu, just to name a few oddities), the important part is that each character feels genuinely unique. You can’t attack the same way with Dormammu as you do with Arthur, and each character really requires its own level understanding in order to master. For all of you worried about the inclusion of Wolverine AND X-23 (and Hulk and She-Hulk for that matter), fear not: they are are four very different characters when you step into the fray with them.
Continued belowMuch like the detail given to the graphical engine, the attention to detail given to each and every character is immense. Speaking for the Marvel characters as a long time Marvel fan, noticeable things like the detail of Thor’s costume all the way down to easily missed things like the way Deadpool walks are all keyed very closely to the character’s portrayal in the comics and, as a fan, made me very happy (especially one of Taskmaster’s specials, drawn right from one of my favorites not included in the game…who’s name rhymes dock-cry.)Plus, don’t forget to scroll through the alternate costume selection (done on the 360 by selecting your characters with the X, Y or Right Bumper as opposed to the A-Button) as you’ll find some pleasant surprises in there rather than the usual swapped out color model.
Honestly, the only element I find slightly lacking is the story itself. With long time Marvel writer Frank Tieri on board, I knew the story would be told adequately and respectfully. I was surprised to find, however, that there was not much story to be had. Maybe I was just spoiled by the fine tuned, interwoven story mode of Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe from 2008, but I was expecting a little more backstory of why this conflict came to be in the first place included in the game itself (as opposed to the original, albeit short, comic included with the special edition of the game). Sure we get brief bits of narrative in the individual character endings, but I wasn’t expecting Galactus (the final boss of this particular yarn) to just pop up and wanna kick my ass in the 7th. A little more narrative build up to that battle would have been nice. Does it detract from what we get though? Certainly not.
Overall, this game is a big winner in my book. It has the playability desired by any level of gamer (like me, who just wants to beat stuff up and look cool doing it), it is graphically and mechanically sound and its just plain fun. I do think arcade mode could have been beefed up a little more, and I can’t wait for the inevitable DLC characters beyond those that have been announced, but as a strictly brawling title in 2011 it accomplishes everything it needs to do with flying colors.
One note though: I highly recommend springing for the Special Edition. For only ten dollars more (!) you get a much nicer package, the original comic explaining the backstory of the conflict (kinda), a one month subscription to Marvel Digital Comics and, most importantly, instant download of the two first DLC characters (Jill Valentine and Shuma Gorath, both available on March 15th.) Plus, as I found out coincidentally, if you buy the Special Edition from Target this week, you also get a free Marvel Universe action figure of your choice (I picked the Winter Soldier since this guy knows badass when he sees it.) Overall, a noticeably beefed up package for an absurdly low price.
When all is said and done, fans of comics and quality fighting games have a lot to love here. So what’re you waiting for? Get out there and start button mashing!
Final Verdict: 9.0 – Buy
