My copy of Marvel vs Capcom is, tragically, still in its cellophane wrapper. Fistbeard McTavish, however, has gotten his bearded hands (or his fisted beard) all over his copy, and has deemed us fit to read his review.
Take it away Senor McTavish.
Marvel vs Capcom 3
I’m not very good at fighting games, let’s just get that out of the way first. I know my way around them, I can pull off Hadoukens, Aerial juggles, 12 hit combos in Tekken, but I’m hardly what you would call a “serious” fighting game player. If I go online, I usually get my ass handed to me fairly quickly. I guess I’m what you would call a “casual” fighting game player.
So, I went out and grabbed myself a copy of Marvel VS Capcom 3 purely by chance, when I found my local game store was naughty and was selling it early. How does it stack up?
Loved
Controls/Gameplay – I really enjoy them, and there seems to be a huge amount of depth hidden inside what initially seems like a very simplistic button masher. Instead of the usual Light, Heavy, Strong kicks and punches, you instead use the directions and only 3 buttons for light, medium and heavy attacks. Punches and kicks are determined automatically. (Holding down and doing a heavy attack does a low sweep kick, while forward and heavy is a lunging punch). It feels weird at first, especially coming off the previous entries in the series, but for such a fast paced crazy game, 3 main buttons for attacks works a lot better.
Then you have a Special attack button, which has multiple uses. Pressing it does a launcher attack, which you can follow up with an aerial combo, and combining it with a direction in the middle of an aerial beatdown performs a mid-combo character switch. The first time you get all 3 of your team members into one aerial combo followed up by chaining 3 of their supers together is a sight to behold.
Fan Service – I genuinely laughed when one of Hagaar’s attacks was using an Iron pipe to smack you over the head, then have it rotate / fly out of his hands like in Final Fight. That, and Deadpool’s ultra combo where he smacks you with the Super Combo meter, before chanting “That was a hyyyyper cooooo-oombo!”
It’s the little touches like that, from Deadpool’s fourth wall breaking humour, to the Iron Spider costume for Spiderman, to Dante having controls that mimic Devil May Cry which really makes this seem like a nod to all fans of comics and fighting games.
Easy for newbies – I have a few friends who hardly ever touch fighting games, so the fact this has a “simple” setting for controls means that if you want to sit around on the couch and just trash talk each other, it won’t just be one sided because your friend can’t pull off a Hadoken. I know it’s not an option for “serious” fighting game players, but as a way of getting those who have little patience or skill for fighting games to have some fun, it’s brilliant, and excellent for a group of friends.
Hated
Blinded by the light – I know this one comes down to personal preference, but it gets to the point sometimes where you don’t know what the hell is happening because there are just explosions and flashing colours everywhere on your screen. I know that this is supposed to be a hyper colourful anime / comic crossover with screen filling energy attacks, but my eyes felt worn out after an hour of gameplay. Which is a shame, because when you can see the action it looks amazing, but good luck making sense of what’s happening on your screen when you call in all 3 characters for a simultaneous super attack.
Other than that, there’s only so much words can do for a fighting game. I suggest renting it out, or checking out some YouTube videos of how it looks in motion. Overall, I liked it, and found it to be well worth the wait. It’s not as complex as Street Fighter IV, but it’s much more fun.
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