Marvel’s Guardians Of The Galaxy
Something good? Something bad? Bit of both?
Roughly three seconds of footage is enough to suggest that Eidos Montreal might just be the perfect choice to deliver the latest chapter in the interstellar adventures of Marvel’s most lovable oddballs.
As Star-Lord slides on his knees, firing twin blasters into the flanks of a quadrupedal alien to the power-pop strains of Bonnie Tyler’s Holding Out For A Hero, it seems the team behind Deus Ex: Human Revolution has adapted brilliantly to a very different brand of science fiction. The colourful action, the irreverent tone, the vintage needle drops? This is the Guardians we know and love.
Well, sort of. An inescapable problem with any Marvel game is the ubiquity of the MCU – we all now have a shared picture in our minds of how these characters look. True, the lack of likenesses is less of a problem when one of your heroes is a walking tree and another a scratty raccoon (besides, whoever’s voicing Rocket sounds fairly close to Bradley Cooper), which means this suffers less than Crystal Dynamics’ Avengers game from that off-brand uncanniness. Yet there’s no avoiding the fact that Star-Lord looks oddly like Man United left-back Luke Shaw, but with an ostentatious ’80s ’do and a voice like a Californian surf dude.
BE QUILL OR BE DEAD
Strange, too, that in a story about a group of misfits, you’ll only ever play as their self-appointed leader. Even so, they’re more than “just a bunch of jackasses standing in a circle” while you do all the hard work in combat. Fights owe a clear debt to Marvel’s Avengers, but with a more dynamic flavour, as you get to command the other Guardians directly: each comes with four moves that can be combined in a variety of thrilling ways. Rocket can climb into the harness he’s affixed to Groot to become a furry turret; in return, Groot can hogtie enemies for his tiny friend to blow up. Launch an uppercut as Star-Lord, meanwhile, and Drax can land a drop-kick while your opponent is still airborne. There’s a special meter, too, which prompts Star-Lord to raise his Walkman to the sky and blast out an ’80s classic (in this case Joan Jett’s Bad Reputation), letting you launch a flurry of attacks without worrying about cooldowns.
Eidos Montreal has got the films’ sense of fun down pat, then, but the Guardians wouldn’t be a dysfunctional family without a little, well, dysfunction. So, as the de facto decision-maker, you get the casting vote in arguments, and while this may be a Pratt-free zone you can still indulge your inner a-hole – ask Drax to throw Rocket over a chasm to activate a retractable bridge, and you’ll get a ‘Rocket will remember that’-style notification. Avengersstyle action meets Telltale-style choices with Kiss and Blondie on the soundtrack? Marvellous.