Marvel vs Capcom Infinite Review

Marvel vs Capcom Infinite Review

Robert Lewis Knuckles III

“Back to its Roots”

One of the biggest crossover games returns on the new generation consoles with Marvel vs Capcom Infinite. It’s been six years since Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 was released and it's had its great moments but lately its been slowly losing the hype so does Marvel vs Capcom Infinite bring the fun and excitement back to the world? Well we’re about to find out.

Marvel vs Capcom Infinite brings together characters from the Marvel and Capcom universe for insane tag team action. This is the fourth installment in the Marvel vs Capcom series but instead of calling it Marvel vs Capcom 4 Capcom called it Infinite to promote the upcoming Marvel movie Avengers Infinity War that’s coming out in May 2018.

The gameplay in Marvel vs Capcom Infinite has Capcom going back to its roots. Instead of 3 on 3 tag team battles it's now 2 on 2 battles. Now I would prefer 3 on 3 but with the new features it fits so much better. The button layout has changed and went back to Marvel vs Capcom 2 layout with Light Punch, Hard Punch, Light Kick and Hard Kick. Which I’m very happy with. I was never a fan of the attack buttons in Marvel 3. One of the biggest features with Infinite is that there are no more assist and you also have the ability to tag in your partner anytime you want. Capcom want players to be more involved in their fights meaning that Marvel vs Capcom 2 and 3 featured and during the battles players would call on their assist to help them battle at times players would have their assist do all the work and in Infinite players won’t be able to hide behind their assist. The ability to tag in your teammate anytime you want without using meter is a very unique feature. It makes players be creative with their combos and it's a little bit more safe to tag in your parner. For example Ryu can his Shinku-Hadoken and if the opponent blocks the tag in his partner so he can safely get out and try to perform a cross up overhead but be careful when using the tag in feature because happy birthdays still exist. Happy Birthdays are when both teammates are caught in a combo.

One feature that was missing in Marvel 3 was the ability to break a combo because almost every character dies in one combo from the start of the combo. Infinite features the counter switch. When you are getting hit and if you have at least 2 bars of super meter you can perform the counter switch that brings your partner to break the combo but be careful you can get caught in that same combo that your partner is getting hit or your opponent's partner can come in with the active to try to stop you from the breaking the combo.

The gem system from Marvel Super Heroes return in Infinite but they are used a bit differently. When players select their characters they can pick one out of the six stones; Power, Mind, Space, Time, Reality and my favorite Soul. Each having their own ability. The Infinity surge can be used at anytime without their gem meter having to be filled. The Soul Stone Infinity Surge can drain their opponents health and the Space Infinity Surge can draw their opponents closer. Now when the players gem meter reaches the halfway point they can use the Infinity Storm where turns into the color of their stone for a huge ability. The Soul Stone Infinity revives their fallen teammate and the player can control both characters very similar to Marvel vs Capcom’s crossover ability. The Infinity Storm are kind of like a comeback mechanic but it's no where close to X-Factor.

Now what has made Marvel vs Capcom Infinite so unique was the roster and I have to say right away that this is a weak roster. The roster is only 30 characters which is very small compared to the last Marvel games but the biggest issue that fans will notice and that there’s no X-Men. The X-Men characters started this series with X-Men children of The Atom. Wolverine has been in every Marvel game made by Capcom and to see Wolverine, Storm and Magneto not in this game is very weird. On the Capcom side fan favorite X from Megaman X makes his fighting game debut. People were upset that Mega Man wasn’t in Marvel vs Capcom 3 and to see X make his debut is awesome to see. We also see the demon Jedah from the Darkstalkers series make his way into 3D. X and Jedah are the only new characters on the Capcom side and everyone else are returning characters from Ultimate.  The Marvel side consist of characters from the Marvel Cinematic Universe so of course you’ll see Captain America, Iron-Man and Rocket Raccoon. They are joined by new characters Gamora from Guardians of the Galaxy. She’s one of my main characters to use and she’s a lot of fun. The evil robot Ultron makes his fighting game debut and he plays a major part of the story.

A feature that many fans wanted in Marvel 3 was a story and we finally get that in Infinite. Ultron from the Marvel Universe and Sigma from the Megaman X series have joined together using the Space and Reality Stone and become Ultron Sigma bringing both universes together to destroy biological life. This brings the heroes from both universes together to stop Ultron Sigma. Now a lot of the fights in story mode have the players fight against robots that don’t have a lot of health so you really don’t many epic fights. The cutscenes in the story are really nothing to talk about. I mean you see some chemistry between some characters but everything else are just oh my goodness. The presentation is just bad. Characters like Dante and Morrigan look really bad and some characters don’t have necks which look very awkward. Story feels like there wasn’t any heart towards it and it also felt like the story went fast as well meaning that the heroes already knew each other. There wasn’t any scene that showed them introducing them to each other. Once you finish story mode you won’t play it again.

Online returns in Marvel Infinite and surprisingly it's pretty good. Most of the time when Capcom release their fighting games there's always early bugs with the online mode. You have the ranked match, casual match, online lobbies and the new beginner league where new players play against other new characters similar to their rank so they won’t have to face anyone at a very high rank.

In the end Marvel vs Capcom Infinite is a fun game. I really love the gameplay with the ability to tag in your partner anytime you want and it really have the study the chemistry between your team you have to find out when is it a good time to tag in your partner to extend the combo. I really had to study every combo opportunity. It makes it kind of difficult but that's what you want in a fighting game but if you’re a new player don’t worry Capcom has a made simple mode for new players to perform a combo by pressing one button but if you really want to have the full experience with the game that off simple mode and you’ll perform longer damaging combos. I honestly think that Marvel Infinite might be the least cheapest game of the versus series. Players can’t hide behind their assist are forced to fight.

Now with all that said about the gameplay I feel as though Capcom took a step back. The roster is very small with majority of it being returning characters and a few new characters. Not having any X-Men characters is huge loss. You can’t have a Marvel game without the mutants. Story mode is okay it really isn’t much to talk about. Online is good but a big thing that Capcom failed to do is have a couple of offline modes. Marvel was criticized heavily barely having any modes offline. In Infinite you only have Story, Arcade mode which has no character endings and you have Mission Mode that has players play the tutorial and complete combos for their favorite character. There are people that don’t like playing online and want to play offline but they don’t many options. It just seems like Capcom hasn’t learned from their past mistakes which is why I give this game a 7.5 out of 10.

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel vs Capcom 2 New Age of Heroes

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel vs Capcom 2 New Age of Heroes

Robert Lewis Knuckles III

“Take you for a Ride”

This time Capcom took us for a major ride with Marvel vs. Capcom 2. Marvel vs Capcom 2 was released in arcades in 2000 and a number of systems. It was released for the Dreamcast and later released on Playstation 2, Xbox and later ported to the Xbox 360 and PS3.

Capcom went really went huge with this game. The character roster is huge featuring 56 characters. It brings back everyone from all the versus game including X-Men Children of The Atom. Spinal, Silver Samurai, Psylocke, Sentinel and more return and have new moves. Now majority of characters from the Marvel side are reused character sprites. The only new character sprites from the Marvel side are Cable from the X-Men who has tons of weapons and Marrow another character from the X-Men. Now for some odd reason Capcom added another Wolverine that has bone claws. I never understood that.

Now the Capcom side I would say is a lot more interesting than the Capcom side due to the fact that there are more new character sprites. It was really cool to see Jill from the Resident Evil series turn into a 2D fighter. She has the ability to call out zombies, dogs, crows and even has a hyper combo to call out the Tyrant. It was also cool seeing Hayato from the 3D fighting game Plasma sword and turn into 2D fighter was really cool to see. Capcom also made two original characters for this game Ruby Heart who’s a treasure hunter and plays as one of the leading characters alongside Cable. Amingo a Mexican Cactus is another new Capcom original character who’s a lot of fun to use. Street Fighter favorite Guile makes his versus series game debut and he plays completely different from his Street Fighter gameplay and he’s actually one of my favorite characters to use in this game.

What really surprised with Marvel vs Capcom 2 is the fact that it's three on three tag team battles. Also when players pick a character they can choose their assist type. It can be a projectile, anti-air, expansion type or more. Players have to choose wisely though because some assist work a lot better than others. Just like in Marvel Super Heroes vs Street Fighter characters can come in for an assist whether it's to surprise the opponent or set up their opponent for combo opportunities. Now players do have to be careful when calling their partner for an assist because they can get caught in a combo and there’s a new feature called snapback an attack that when it hits it forcibly bring in your opponent's partner and it completely gets rid of the red health and your character won’t be able to regain their health back  and it can sometimes kill them.

The gameplay in Marvel vs Capcom 2 is a six button layout like the previous games but two of those buttons are the assist and the rest of the buttons are light punch, hard punch, light kick and hard kick. The gameplay is also a lot faster than the previous games and making it more crazy are the assist. They come in super fast and a lot of players like to use it for protection.

The super meter upgraded as well in this game is the super meter. Players can build their meter up to five gauges. There’s the new feature called the delayed Hyper Combo. A player can perform a Hyper Combo and can bring in their next partner to perform their hyper combo and can later bring in their last partner to perform their Hyper Combo. This of course can only be used if you have at least three gauges of Super Meter. The player can also use variable combinations that brings in the entire team to perform their Hyper Combo all at the same time and it's probably one of the coolest things to see especially when finishing off your opponent.

The boss in Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is named Abyss. He has three forms each are annoying but are less annoying than the last bosses.

In the end Marvel vs Capcom 2 is arguably my favorite fighting game ever. I love the huge roster now people can make the argument that the two Wolverines and Iron Man and War Machine were kind of pointless but during that those times we were happy and surprised to see 56 characters. The three on three battles were crazy hectic and the soundtrack is pretty good. It has a smooth jazz theme to it that surprisingly fits. This game is a lot of fun and I definitely prefer this game to anyone that loves fighting games. One of the only grips I have are the God  characters; Magneto, Storm, Cable, Sentinel and others. They are extremely cheap and annoying but that doesn’t stop me from loving this game. Many people arguably say that this is the best fighting game ever during that time and it's hard to disagree.

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel vs Capcom 3 Fate of Two Worlds/Ultimate

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel vs Capcom 3 Fate of Two Worlds/Ultimate

Robert Lewis Knuckles III

“Big Return”

This might’ve been a huge surprise from Capcom at E3 2010 when they announced Marvel vs Capcom 3 coming out in Feb. 2011. It's been a decade since the last Marvel vs Capcom game and honestly I didn’t think we would get another one but looking back at the return of Street Fighter IV and success of Marvel vs. Capcom 2 on the Xbox 360 and the PS3 I shouldn’t be surprised that Marvel vs Capcom 3 was coming.

Marvel vs Capcom 3 enters the 3D world but still plays like a 2D fighting game. Now the roster in this game is very different and what I mean by is that there aren’t many classic Capcom characters. You still have your favorites Ryu, Chun-Li and Morrigan. They are joined by new characters Chris and Wesker from the Resident Evil series, Dante and Trish from the Devil May Cry and a couple of more characters.

Now the Marvel side has classic characters such as Wolverine, Captain America, Spider-Man and others are joined by new characters the merc with a mouth Deadpool, Hulk’s cousin She-Hulk makes her fighting game debut and more new characters join the fight.

You do have many returning characters but a lot of them don’t play the same as their 2D counterpart which shouldn’t be a surprised because this a brand new game. Ryu can shoot his Shinku Hadoken upwards or when performing in the air can shoot it downward. Captain America's shield throws like a boomerang and hit the opponent from both sides. Now the roster got a mix reaction. The roster is a total of 38 characters including the DLC characters. Many people believed that this roster is small because Marvel vs Capcom 2 featured a total of 56 characters. Not only is the roster small but they are missing a very important character and that's the blue bomber Megaman. I mean it's cool to have Zero but you can't have a Capcom game without the blue mascot.

Marvel vs Capcom 3 still features the same three on three tag battles and has almost every feature from Marvel vs Capcom 2. The button layout is different  in this game. Instead of a punch and kick button they have light attack, medium attack, hard attack and special button (which is basically an air launcher). This button layout was used before in Capcom’s other vs title Tatsunoko vs Capcom This kind of made combos easier especially for new players. Another new feature was the air exchange when players put their opponent in an air combo they can tag in their partner to continue the combo. This can be used three times but your opponent can counter the combo if they guess the same direction pad button you press so be careful.

The biggest new feature that had mixed reviews is X-Factor. X-Factor was a comeback mechanic that gave your character increased power, speed and increases your health. There are three levels of X-Factor depending on the amount of active members on your team. The more teammates you lose the longer X-Factor last. Now I wasn’t the biggest fan of X-Factor and I understand that Capcom wanted a feature to help give players a chance but this makes comebacks way beyond easy. Like level three X-Factor Wesker…

Marvel vs Capcom 3 added online and it's pretty rough. Online was especially rough during the first few days it was released. Online lobbies didn’t have spectator mode so you had to watch game cards battle it out instead.

In the end Marvel vs Capcom 3 is an okay game. It had a lot of hype from the trailers and gameplay but it just failed to deliver. I mean sure the numbers of sales were great due to the fact that we're getting another Marvel vs Capcom game. The arcade endings were bad and they had nothing to do with the trailer. Online was rough, the roster wasn’t the best and gameplay felt really easy, really broken and a lot characters can die in one combo especially during X-Factor.

Later that same year in 2011 Capcom released the updated game Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3. This new game added 12 new characters to the roster with all returning being patched. Some turned out better while some turned out worse. Ultimate added Spectator mode which should’ve been in the last game. Other than that Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 should’ve been the game that Capcom should’ve released first. Its honestly the same game with new characters. X-Factor was patched to become weaker but it's still a cheap comeback mechanic. If you play this game beware of Dark Phoenix…….

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel vs Capcom Clash of Super Heroes

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel vs Capcom Clash of Super Heroes

Robert Lewis Knuckles

“Ultimate Dream Matchup”

Now this is a versus game that people had to predict was coming. For the past couple of verses games we saw the crossover of Marvel and Capcom characters but we never had the official title of a Marvel vs Capcom game and we finally get that with Marvel vs. Capcom Clash of Super Heroes. Marvel vs Capcom was released on Jan. 23 1998 for arcades, the Dreamcast and Playstation. I think you know what I think about the Playstation version of this game.

Marvel vs Capcom is the dream crossover that obviously features characters from the Marvel and Capcom universe. Now the roster size is smaller than the previous games but added a lot new character sprites. Street Fighter characters Ryu, Chun-Li and Zangief return. Ryu has a new move where he can obtain Akumas and Ken’s moveset. Morrigan from the Darkstalkers series makes her Marvel vs Capcom debut. We also see legendary Capcom characters making their fighting game debut such as the blue bomber Megaman,  ninja assassin Strider Hiryu, Jin Saotome from Cyberbots and Mr. Capcom himself Captain Commando. Already this Capcom side is amazing and it's great to see these characters in a fighting game.

The Marvel side has a lot of returning characters. Spider-Man, Captain America, Wolverine, Hulk and Gambit from X-Men vs Street Fighter returns. Iron Man’s best friend War Machine makes his fighting game debut and he plays a bit similar to Iron Man. Spider-Man’s arch nemesis Venom makes his fighting game debut and he’s a blast to play. This roster is very diverse and it caught a lot of attention from the intro to the character select screen and by the way the character select music is amazing.

The secret characters return in this game and just like the last game they are character palette swamps. The original secret character is Mega Man's sister the house keeping robot Roll and she’s quite honestly not the best character but it's still pretty cool to see her.

The gameplay is the same tag team battles. The assist is removed with the Special Partner system. After players select their characters they randomly choose a special character from the Marvel or Capcom universe. On the Marvel side most are from X-Men like Psylocke and Magneto. The Capcom side has legendary characters such as Arthur from Ghost and Ghouls. These special partners are used like assist but are limited. The best ones are Colossus and Psylocke because they can rush the opponent leaving them opening for a big combo opportunity.

A cool new feature is the Variable Cross. This new feature has the players use their super gauge to bring in their partner and control both characters at the same time and has unlimited amount of Hyper Combos until the gauge runs out. Now the computer never does it but if you play against another human player you’ll see 2 on 2 madness and that's what Marvel vs Capcom is all about.

The boss in this game is Onslaught from the X-Men comics. He’s basically the anger conscious of both Magneto and Charles Xavier. Onslaught is an annoying boss as well. He has two forms and both of them are equally annoying.

Marvel vs Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes is a fantastic game. The roster, the gameplay and the must is awesome. Even the stages are awesome. You have stages from the Avengers base to the Daily Bugle to Dr. Wily’s base you see the best from both worlds. Some might even say that this game is their favorite Marvel vs Capcom game and there’s nothing wrong with that. I mean sure there are some broken things that lead to infinite combos but overall it's still a fun game. If you ever have the chance give this game a shot.

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter

Robert Lewis Knuckles III

“Darkhorse”

Here we go with another Marvel vs. Capcom History with probably the darkhorse of the entire vs series and that's Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter. Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter was released in arcades in 1997 and later ported to the Sega Saturn in 1998 and ported to the Playstation in 1999. The playstation version once again doesn’t feature the tag team system.

This crossover game features characters from the Marvel side and the Street Fighter side. Wolverine and Cyclops are the only X-Men characters that return in this game. Spider-Man, Hulk, Captain America, Shuma-Gorath and Blackheart return from Marvel Super Heroes with new Hyper Combos. Omega Red from X-Men Children of the Atom makes a return as well with a new air Hyper Combo. Most Street Fighter characters return from the last versus game except for Charlie and Cammy. Sakura (one of my favorite Street Fighter Characters) and Dan make their versus debut and they play differently. Now Dan is pretty much the comic relief in the Street Fighter series but man I really think Capcom made Dan a bad character in this game on purpose. His one Hyper Combo the Shinku Gadoken is a very small multi hit projectile. Granted Dan can still do some nice damage combos but that one hyper combo really scratches my head. Sakura plays a bit differently from her Alpha counterpart. Her quarter circle forward punch is her multi hitting dragon punch. Her quarter circle back punch button is her projectile attack that shot diagonally up and if done in the air to shots down like Akuma. I’m not sure why Capcom changed Sakura’s moveset but I was still able to adjust. So when you really look at it there wasn’t really any new character sprites in this game.

Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter features a couple secret characters. Most of the secret characters are palette swamps of characters.There is an armored Spider-Man that has some armor and jumps lower than the original Spider-Man.

The gameplay in Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter is the same as the previous game. Players choose two characters for crazy tag team battles. One new feature is the Variable Assist. The player is able to call upon their partner for an attack. Some attacks can set up certain combos. Other than that not much has changed. The same stages return from the last game but different highlighted colors.

Apocalypse returns as a boss but this time he’s not the final boss. The Final Boss is new character Cyber Akuma. Basically an Akuma with robot parts made by Apocalypse and almost everyone in the fighting game community can agree that Cyber Akuma is one of the hardest bosses in fighting game history. He’s super fast and his special moves come out fast and he’s really cheap. I really hate Cyber Akuma.

In the end Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter is a fun game but at the same time it's kind of a weird title. For me Marvel against Street Fighter seems like an unfair matchup for the Street Fighter side. The announcer for this game is definitely the most hypest one ever. When you finish your opponent with a Hyper Combo he screams the name of the move. One of the coolest thing ever. This game might be the least played from the versus series but overall it's still a fun game.

Marvel vs Capcom History: X-Men vs Street Fighter

Marvel vs Capcom History: X-Men vs Street Fighter

Robert Lewis Knuckles III

“An Unexpected Crossover”

Back with another Marvel vs Capcom History this time we talk about a crossover game that we never thought would happen and that's Capcom’s X-Men vs. Street Fighter. X-Men vs Street Fighter is a 2D fighting game that features Marvel’s own X-Men and Capcom’s own Street Fighter. It was released for the arcades in 1996. It was also ported to the Sega Saturn in 1997 and ported to the playstation in 1998 but I would strongly suggest you stay away from that version.

With the success of both X-Men Children of The Atom and Marvel Super Heroes Capcom decided to raise the bar higher by putting two universes together. During that time in the 90’s the X-Men tv show was doing extremely well and the Street Fighter series was super popular. The X-Men side featured most characters from Children of the Atom such as Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Magneto and Juggernaut all with some new moves. They are joined by new X-Men characters Rogue, Gambit and Sabertooth. The X-Men characters play like how you would imagine for example Rogue has the ability to drain her opponent's power and gain one of their moves so you can see Rouge performing a Hadoken for a short time.

The Street Fighter side has their Alpha sprites with Ryu, Ken, Chun-Li, Cammy Charlie, Zangief, Dhalsim, M. Bison and Akuma. All of their special moves are updated for example Ryu’s Hadoken is a huge and the Shinku Hadoken shoots like a Kamehameha wave.

The gameplay in X-Men vs. Street Fighter shares features from the past Marvel games such as super jump and air combos and it runs a bit faster but the biggest feature is the tag team feature. (This feature is gone in the PlayStation version.) Players can choose two characters for insane tag team battles. The objective is to finish off your opponents two characters. Players can tag in their partner anyone they want. A really cool feature is the Variable Combination that has both player’s characters performing their Hyper Combo. I mean seeing Ryu can Cyclops performing their Hyper Combo doesn’t get any cooler than that.

The boss in X-Men vs Street Fighter is the first mutant Apocalypse. He’s actually not really a hard boss but what makes the game really interesting is that the character that defeats Apocalypse plays that character and fights their teammate for the final fight and get their ending.

X-Men vs. Street Fighter was the start of something very special for the future of crossover games. You could only dream of seeing Ryu fighting Wolverine or Magneto teaming up with M. Bison. Back in those games arcade games were very popular. They were full of people and back then you didn’t need to be great at fighting games people just really enjoyed seeing X-Men and Street Fighter together in one game. They even had toys and a comic to help promote this game.

Now a days X-Men vs Street Fighter might be seen at some arcades but mostly people download this arcade game as an emulator or rom. I would love to see this game remastered but with the current issue with Fox and not letting people use their characters I doubt we’ll see that happen.

Marvel History: Marvel Super Heroes

Marvel vs Capcom History: Marvel Super Heroes

Robert Lewis Knuckles

“Power of The Infinity Stones”

Back with another Marvel History game and this time it’s another arcade classic Marvel Super Heroes.

Following the success of X-Men Children of the Atom Capcom stepped their game up by releasing Marvel Super Heroes for the arcades, PS1 and Sega Saturn

Marvel Super Heroes was released for arcades in 1995 and released for the Saturn and PS1 in 1997. It’s a 2D fighting game that shares similar aspects from X-Men Children of the Atom. Players can choose between 10 characters. Six heroes and four villains. New characters such as Spider-Man, Avengers: Captain America, Hulk, Iron-Man, Mephisto's son BlackHeart and Shuma Gorath the one eyed demon make their fighting game debut. Wolverine and Psylocke return. Magneto and Juggernaut return as well and are a bit more balanced than their Children of The Atom form. Big time villains Dr. Doom from the Fantastic Four and every Marvel hero worst nightmare Thanos make their fighting game debut as well and they can be unlocked.

The story follows the Infinity Gauntlet in the Marvel Universe. Heroes are battling the villains for control of the Infinity Gems that Thanos plans to use to rule the universe.

The gameplay is the same as X-Men Children of The Atom but in Marvel Super Heroes it introduces air combos and players can recover from the ground a lot quicker. A new gameplay mechanic is the ability to use the infinity gems. Just like in the comics players can use the six gems. There’s the Power gem that increases the character's strength, Space gem gives the player super armor, Time gem increases the character's movement, Reality gem gives players element attacks such as ice and lighting, Soul gem increases the player's health and Mind gem increases the player's super meter.

Another interesting concept of the infinity gems is that certain characters get a unique ability for example when Spider-Man uses the power gem he creates a doppelganger on the other side of his opponent and granting him double damage and when Magneto and Juggernaut  uses the space gem they are immune to attacks.

Marvel Super Heroes is a fun fighting game that features Marvel’s favorites. The infinity gems are a lot of fun to use. You might be able to download this game for the Xbox 360 and PS3 as part of the Marvel vs Capcom Origins pack. If you are a Marvel fan pick this game up!