Review

Marvel Heroes: Review In Progress Part 2

It’s been over a month since Marvel Heroes launched and I can say That Gazillion Entertainment has been hard at work with patches and updates. Last month I talked about their rough start in part 1 of my review. A decent amount of time has passed since then; now I can give a clearer picture of Marvel Heroes’ quality, diving deeper into what makes or breaks this title!

Like I said before the game is certainly fun to play. However, after having played the game for an extended period (about 100 hours) it doesn’t have the lasting power as I once thought it did. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot of content to experience. Just that some of that content can be a little repetitive. The endgame (the part you usually play after you’ve finished the main story or finish leveling in most games) starts pretty early; the level cap is sixty and you get to the endgame missions around twenty six or so. The main story arc just isn’t that long compared to other games in the genre. This wouldn’t be a problem if the endgame portion offered a diverse group of raids and/or missions.

The endgame is split into three sections: Green Terminals (easy), Red Terminals (Hard), And Group Challenges. The Green and Red Terminals are copy and paste dungeons. They’re exactly the same with the exception of the higher difficulty in Red Terminals. The Group Challenges are a little more varied as they require a large party or parties to complete. While they offer more than the other terminals, they are few in number. The Endgame missions are also split up by zones. You can think of them as tiers. Tier one is in the Avenger’s Tower. This is where you go to start your endgame. Tier two is in Xavier’s Mansion, offering tougher challenges for those at the appropriate levels. And then there’s the toughest tier, tier three, located in the Shield Helicarrier. Again, besides the level of difficulty they aren’t any different from one another; the nine missions of the Green and Red Terminals found in the Avenger’s Tower are the same found at Xavier’s Mansion and Shield Helicarrier.

The repetitive mission structure really hurts the endgame. I mean, it’s supposed to offer enough of an incentive to keep playing until newer content arrives. Or at least be something awesome to look forward to once you’ve leveled up your character. That’s not exactly the case here. One positive thing I can say is that the community managers over at Gazillion Entertainment read the forums and listen to what the fans have to say. This results in a lot of updates that actually take fan feedback into consideration. One of the major complaints I had in the first part of this review was the price. Marvel Heroes’ microtransactions where insanely expensive with some heroes costing as much as twenty bucks! In the last patch though, Gazillion dropped the cost of each character by a significant amount. The most expensive heroes (Deadpool, Spiderman, etc.) went from $20 to $14.50 while the cheaper heroes went from $6 to $4.50. This hold true for their extra costumes as well. Another big adjustment made it easier to earn heroes. A new, rare item drop called Eternity Splinters can be used to buy new heroes, additional levels in you ultimate power and more. What makes them great is the fact that they can drop from any enemy or boss in the game (as opposed to dropping from a rare boss or as endgame loot). So now without relying completely on luck or cash you can earn the hero you want!

Another good loot update had to do with adding another tier of rarity in items. Called Cosmic Items, these drops add more incentive to keep playing. The way Gazillion has been going with these updates, the game is sure to improve more and more down the line. One thing that doesn’t need improvement is the visuals. Marvel Heroes runs at 60FPS as most games on PC should, so the movement is very fluent. A lot of work went into every detail of the hundred plus costumes available in the game; zooming in close is a treat as it shows how great everything looks including a character’s idle animations. The color palette is very vibrant which makes the onscreen action really pop. The same thing goes for the comic book-esk cutscenes. They work well and that’s not just because the game is based on the Marvel universe.

The game is somewhat decent when it comes to the audio department. The voice acting is well done; the heroes’ quotes during in certain situations are great. No one sounds out of place. That said, things can get a little murky in public areas as there’s so much going on. Repetitive phrases fill the air before being combined with random explosions. Think about hearing a multitude of car crashes…it doesn’t sound like a war is going on. With multiple instances of the same character giving the same battle cries, it just sounds like a mess. So much so that sometimes I just play with the sound off.

With the way Gazillion is handling the updates I can see this game getting better over time. But as of right now it’s not the best game in the genre. With the endgame starting as early as it does they need to offer more variety in the missions. The customization/loot hunting is there but that’s not enough to keep everyone going for the long term!