Developer: Square Enix
Publisher: Square Enix
Platform: PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Google Stadia, PC
Tested on: PS4
Marvel’s Avengers – Preview
If one of the biggest running movie franchises starts a closed (by the time of writing open) beta for its upcoming game, who are we to say no? Obviously the new Marvel’s Avengers game had to be checked out. The Avengers is such a big phenomenon with a large fan base, that it must feel like a big responsibility to please the fans. Luckily, the project got picked up by publisher Square Enix, who are real veterans in making sure games get on the market the right way. But also by Crystal Dynamics, who are mainly known for the Legacy of Kain series, and the Tomb Raider games. So the Avengers are in the right hands, right?
The beta feels a lot like a carefully orchestrated demo. First, you start by playing a few minutes with each character which showcases their abilities and personal touches. This happens on A-Day, the day where the Avengers got put in a bad light as they seem to be responsible for superhero powers getting spread everywhere. Bad and good people alike get affected and chaos ensues. After that, the game transitions into a story where the Hulk/Bruce and Miss Marvel get together to break into a lab of A.I.M Industries. These events all follow the comic books/movies pretty closely. After these first two hours max, the game introduces a system with a global map where you get to follow campaign levels to start playing with friends, strangers, or your requested available NPCs.
This sounds alright as a concept. Playing with non-NPCs is the most fun, but the areas you get dropped in involve quite a bit of walking and free-roaming where there really shouldn’t be any call for such activities. The game often tries to make you a hoarder, pointing out the collectible chests with useable gear around every corner. It’s the first thing that lacks the explosive behavior that’s being pumped into your brain by the movies. It makes the game feel sluggish actually, and the controls are even worse. Especially as the bulky Hulk who you get to play as early on, the camera feels like your enemy and everything you should be able to jump on does not seem to want to cooperate. It’s the combination with the environment that conflicts most with the movement though. We learned that playing as Iron Man in a training simulation with minimal obstacles feels a lot better already.
Even the combat system lacks a bit as it quickly turns into hack and slash work. A few enemies require a different approach, but generally, your characters just have to mindlessly melee attack opponents to get ahead. It’s a flawed design choice that they gave each character melee attacks, a ranged attack, and such generic capabilities that actually kills a lot of what makes all of the Avengers unique. That all characters have their own three unique capabilities doesn’t change much as they quickly feel like “room-cleaners with cooldowns”, all about equally useful to quickly get rid of multiple enemies.
The voice-acting is alright, though the original actors were clearly way too expensive to hire which might be a stab in the ear of some fans. The music is generally alright, and graphically, the atmosphere is kind of there, though the clunky controls and poor interaction with the environment largely destroy this. It feels a bit like Marvel’s Avengers is made to be played by all age groups. This doesn’t mean that there are no challenging bits included in the game, but the Avengers just feel so flat and uninspired by a lack of a target audience combined with poor design and polish that honestly, there’s not much hope for this game to turn into anything more than mediocre right now.
The fact that A.I.M industries uses a lot of robots that you need to fight and that there’s little “human” world-building going on, only enforces these issues. The excitement that is Marvel and that is the Avengers is quickly taken away by the overall tutorial-like empty feel during the entire gameplay. Where is the connection to the franchise besides copying some story? And where is the challenge or unique selling point that makes the Avengers live up to their name? The game feels like a mashed-up mix of genres and mediocre games, stretched out with collectible upgrades that do not add anything to the gameplay.
Conclusion
Marvel’s Avengers has little positive stuff right now. This is mainly due to the poor controls and the disconnected feel the game has, compared to other things from the Marvel universe. It doesn’t feel like playing with superheroes, but it feels like generic characters who need to do generic things to achieve generic goals. Maybe for the most die-hard fans, it could still be worth something, but Marvel’s Avengers is by no means actually fun to play right now.
Marvel's Avengers - Preview,
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