Marvel’s Avengers
When it’s good, it’s great, but when it’s bad...
The Marvel’s Avengers marketing campaign and its multi-weekend beta buried the lede, guys. At the core of this loot-based, cosmetic-heavy, live-service game is a fantastic, roughly 12-hour campaign full of pathos, personality, and yes, a lot of punching. If you’re surprised by that, you’re not alone – I was shocked to complete the now all-too-familiar opening scene and dive into a captivating campaign centered around the perfect protagonist. So shocked, I didn’t want it to end.
If Marvel’s Avengers is an Iron Man suit, Kamala Khan is its arc reactor, propelling the story forward and providing necessary emotional torque. She should have been featured in the marketing materials far more than she was, because she really is *the*
Avenger in this game. Her story and the simultaneous story of the Avengers we know and love overcoming failure and crippling self-doubt in order to reassemble is a rock-solid one (and I dare say better than one or two of the Avengers films).
But it’s what comes after the campaign that causes Marvel’s Avengers to stretch at the seams until it bursts. There’s simply just too much – too much insignificant gear and confusing numbers, too many rinse-and-repeat multiplayer missions that are full of too much punching and kicking enveloped in too many pulsing, over-saturated colors. Each side mission is like a souped-up Honda street racer that went overboard with extras – neon lights, glowing gauges, explosions, reflective metal, and pithy catchphrases slapping against your ears like a surplus of bumper stickers on a rear window.
With Marvel’s Avengers, there’s a tight, emotionally resonant campaign… and then there’s everything else. Like Kamala Khan struggling with her new Inhuman identity after exposure to Terrigen mist, this game can’t figure out what the hell it is.
★★★☆☆
A snappy, fun campaign full of great VO ends too soon, and the game-as-service that comes after is paper thin. Alyssa Mercante