DoctorFinger
09-24-2009, 09:22 AM
Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 Review
Title: Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 http://www.colonyofgamers.com/cogforums/showthread.php?p=371226
Platform: Xbox 360 (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Xbox-360/dp/B001UWGBC8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-1-spell). Also available on: PlayStation 3 (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Playstation-3/dp/B001UW9ZW6/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-2-spell), Wii (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Nintendo-Wii/dp/B001UWA0I4/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-3-spell), DS (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Xbox-360/dp/B001UWGBC8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-1-spell), PS2 (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Nintendo-Wii/dp/B001UWA0I4/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-3-spell) & PSP (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Playstation-3/dp/B001UW9ZW6/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-2-spell).
Developer: Vicarious Visions (http://www.vvisions.com/)
Publisher: Activision (http://www.activision.com/)
ESRB Rating: T (Teen)
MSRP: $59.95 (360/PS3); $49.95 (PS2, Wii); $39.95 (PSP; DS)
Editor: Michael 'DoctorFinger' Chauvet
Favorite Team" Thor, Hulk, Songbird, Gambit
What's Hot: Madcap 4 player co-op action. A surprisingly faithful recreation of the popular "Civil War" storyline. Mixing and matching to create your perfect team.
What's Not: Inferior voice acting. The RPG elements are greatly dumbed down compared to the original. An almost uniformly dark and muddy color palette. Dull boss battles. You end up fighting the camera more than any enemy in the game. We live in a world of sequels. Walk into a game store and you can bet that at least half the product on the shelves has a number after its name. Sometimes those sequels improve on the original, other times they can't live up to the legend. Where does Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 fall on that scale? Sad to say, but somewhere in the middle.
Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is at its base an action flavored RPG. You select a team of 4 prominent Marvel characters (although there are a few rather glaring omissions as well as some pleasant surprises) to tackle various missions. Weak attack, strong attack, grapple and jump/fly are mapped to the face buttons while the shoulder buttons let you block, heal and trigger your character's special moves and Fusion attacks. At any time you can switch to any of the four characters under your control. And you will switch, because your team will be set upon by wave after wave of enemies, robots, thugs and super-villains.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3607/3417237073_6625aea424.jpg
A fantastic Fusion
As for the story, the developers centered it around one of the most popular (and controversial) storylines from the last few years at Marvel: 2006's Civil War. The first act of the game sets the scene. People are scared because super powered individuals seem to be everywhere and out of control. After a disaster involving a group of neophyte heroes, the US government passes the Superhuman Registration Act, which requires anyone with powers to register with the government. This forces you to choose which side you - and the team you have at the moment - are on: Captain America and the anti-registration rebels, or Iron Man and the pro-registration forces. Whichever side you choose will decide which missions you take and which characters you unlock. To get the whole experience in the game you really do have to play though it twice (or at least preserve a save from the end of act 1). The latter part of the game diverges more from the established story, but in a mostly logical and interesting way.
But what, you ask, about the gameplay itself? This is where the game's first (of many) stumbles occurs. MUA2 is nominally an RPG, but one of the key elements of an RPG - choice - seems to be absent. Your characters have a variety of different abilities and enhancements you can pump up with points earned from leveling up and defeating enemies. You can choose which abilities you bump up, but it's not really much of a choice. Each of four different special abilities are mapped to one of the face buttons, but the original had 8 powers for each character, and you selected which you used, and on which button. No such choice is available to you here. Enhancements - such as faster healing or more elemental damage - increase in cost so much from level to level that you really won't be able to greatly favor one over another. Most egregiously, while the game appears to give you the option of whether or not to manage the advancement of your heroes, this is another illusion. There is an 'Autolevel' option, but the game will reset it to 'on' every. Single. Time. Yes, you can subtract points from the various powers and buffs, but if I set Autolevel to 'off' on a given character, I want it to stay off until I change it.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3330/3417237683_998a193289.jpg
Iron Man and Songbird team up for a Fusion attack
While the RPG elements aren't up to snuff, the gameplay itself, while repetitive, can be fun. Trying to come up with the best or most interesting team is entertaining. Each character has a series of Heroic Tasks which, upon completion, grant buffs or a new costume (one more gripe: only one alternate costume per character? Lame. The original gave each character 3 alts.) Attempting to complete each of the challenges leads you to use a wider variety of characters than you may normally. Each character also has a Fusion attack. These attacks, available only after your team has accumulated enough Star Power, combine the powers of you and a teammate to produce a devastating attack. Some of the combinations are pretty damn cool like The Invisible Woman creates a force sphere around The Thing, who then goes all Super Monkey Ball on the enemies. Gambit can charge up a huge rock with kinetic energy, which the Hulk will then smash onto a foe. And of course Wolverine has the Fastball Special executable with any of the super-strong teammates. Fusions come in three flavors: clearing, targeted and guided. Each has their strengths and weaknesses, but all are fun to use. The Fusion system is clearly one of the bright spots of the game. However one (more) area where the game lags is enemy variety. Each act has about 4-5 different enemies for you to fight and even those differences are mostly cosmetic. Variations in attacks, strategy or vulnerabilities are few and far between. Enemy AI is more or less non existent. Boss battles, with a couple exceptions, come down to all four members of the team pounding on someone until they earn enough star power to execute a Fusion attacks. I was almost (almost!) hoping for a quick time event to break the monotony.
As I said previously, after the first act you're given the choice of which side to take in the Registration Act conflict. Some characters - Iron Man, Mr. Fantastic and Songbird on the pro side, Captain America, Luke Cage & Iron Fist on the anti side - are locked into one faction or the other. After that point the missions you take vary. The pro reg side defends a prisoner convoy, while the rebels try to attack it and spring their comrades. As you complete these missions new characters are unlocked, although you still have to beat the game twice to get everyone. There's also a series of Challenges to complete in the simulation room. Some of these are fun, but the ones which diverge from the game's basic formula unfortunately don't work very well. This is not a game in which I want to do stealth or escort missions. The experience improves quite a bit in co-op play, in no small part because your AI teammates are complete morons. When playing with others many of the game's problems smooth out nicely, and there's no noticeable slowdown when compared to offline play.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2645/3899525041_93b23a3f98.jpg
The team absolutely no one is pining for: Iceman, Venom & Iron Fist
The presentation of the game is inconsistent. The voice acting ranges from competent to awful. The characters themselves are very nicely animated and detailed, but environments all too often tended towards the dark and muddy side of the color palette. The action can get really frenetic with lots of enemies and effects going on, and when things get heavy the framerate drops a bit. And then there's *sigh* the camera. At times, for no apparent reason, you simply cannot control the camera. Which means at times you'll sit there twiddling your thumbs because the last enemy you need to kill is stuck somewhere you can't see them. Other times the camera gets stuck behind a crate, or a truck or a wall and you simply can't see anything. I know that camera control is tough to implement in a game like this, but you really spend way too much time fighting the camera.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3641/3417238017_487a2a5c60.jpg
Everybody is kung-fu fighting
In the end MUA2 is greatly diminished by a few poor choices by the design team. You have so little control over the make up of each character - even only when compared to the original MUA - that the whole game just feels stripped down. It can be fun, especially in co-op, but the problems persist even then.
Score: 3 out of 5 CoGs
http://www.colonyofgamers.com/images/CoG3.png
Michael says, "Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 could have - and maybe should have - been great. But ultimately it's doomed by it's decisions, or rather the lack of decisions. While you're given one major choice when you decide whether to join the pro- or anti-registration forces, the game seems bound and determined to take any and all other choices about character development and progression out of your hands. Which is pretty much the last thing you want in an RPG. This diminishes a game which can get a bit monotonous at times.
Title: Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 http://www.colonyofgamers.com/cogforums/showthread.php?p=371226
Platform: Xbox 360 (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Xbox-360/dp/B001UWGBC8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-1-spell). Also available on: PlayStation 3 (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Playstation-3/dp/B001UW9ZW6/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-2-spell), Wii (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Nintendo-Wii/dp/B001UWA0I4/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-3-spell), DS (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Xbox-360/dp/B001UWGBC8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-1-spell), PS2 (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Nintendo-Wii/dp/B001UWA0I4/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-3-spell) & PSP (http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Ultimate-Alliance-2-Playstation-3/dp/B001UW9ZW6/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1253806040&sr=8-2-spell).
Developer: Vicarious Visions (http://www.vvisions.com/)
Publisher: Activision (http://www.activision.com/)
ESRB Rating: T (Teen)
MSRP: $59.95 (360/PS3); $49.95 (PS2, Wii); $39.95 (PSP; DS)
Editor: Michael 'DoctorFinger' Chauvet
Favorite Team" Thor, Hulk, Songbird, Gambit
What's Hot: Madcap 4 player co-op action. A surprisingly faithful recreation of the popular "Civil War" storyline. Mixing and matching to create your perfect team.
What's Not: Inferior voice acting. The RPG elements are greatly dumbed down compared to the original. An almost uniformly dark and muddy color palette. Dull boss battles. You end up fighting the camera more than any enemy in the game. We live in a world of sequels. Walk into a game store and you can bet that at least half the product on the shelves has a number after its name. Sometimes those sequels improve on the original, other times they can't live up to the legend. Where does Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 fall on that scale? Sad to say, but somewhere in the middle.
Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is at its base an action flavored RPG. You select a team of 4 prominent Marvel characters (although there are a few rather glaring omissions as well as some pleasant surprises) to tackle various missions. Weak attack, strong attack, grapple and jump/fly are mapped to the face buttons while the shoulder buttons let you block, heal and trigger your character's special moves and Fusion attacks. At any time you can switch to any of the four characters under your control. And you will switch, because your team will be set upon by wave after wave of enemies, robots, thugs and super-villains.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3607/3417237073_6625aea424.jpg
A fantastic Fusion
As for the story, the developers centered it around one of the most popular (and controversial) storylines from the last few years at Marvel: 2006's Civil War. The first act of the game sets the scene. People are scared because super powered individuals seem to be everywhere and out of control. After a disaster involving a group of neophyte heroes, the US government passes the Superhuman Registration Act, which requires anyone with powers to register with the government. This forces you to choose which side you - and the team you have at the moment - are on: Captain America and the anti-registration rebels, or Iron Man and the pro-registration forces. Whichever side you choose will decide which missions you take and which characters you unlock. To get the whole experience in the game you really do have to play though it twice (or at least preserve a save from the end of act 1). The latter part of the game diverges more from the established story, but in a mostly logical and interesting way.
But what, you ask, about the gameplay itself? This is where the game's first (of many) stumbles occurs. MUA2 is nominally an RPG, but one of the key elements of an RPG - choice - seems to be absent. Your characters have a variety of different abilities and enhancements you can pump up with points earned from leveling up and defeating enemies. You can choose which abilities you bump up, but it's not really much of a choice. Each of four different special abilities are mapped to one of the face buttons, but the original had 8 powers for each character, and you selected which you used, and on which button. No such choice is available to you here. Enhancements - such as faster healing or more elemental damage - increase in cost so much from level to level that you really won't be able to greatly favor one over another. Most egregiously, while the game appears to give you the option of whether or not to manage the advancement of your heroes, this is another illusion. There is an 'Autolevel' option, but the game will reset it to 'on' every. Single. Time. Yes, you can subtract points from the various powers and buffs, but if I set Autolevel to 'off' on a given character, I want it to stay off until I change it.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3330/3417237683_998a193289.jpg
Iron Man and Songbird team up for a Fusion attack
While the RPG elements aren't up to snuff, the gameplay itself, while repetitive, can be fun. Trying to come up with the best or most interesting team is entertaining. Each character has a series of Heroic Tasks which, upon completion, grant buffs or a new costume (one more gripe: only one alternate costume per character? Lame. The original gave each character 3 alts.) Attempting to complete each of the challenges leads you to use a wider variety of characters than you may normally. Each character also has a Fusion attack. These attacks, available only after your team has accumulated enough Star Power, combine the powers of you and a teammate to produce a devastating attack. Some of the combinations are pretty damn cool like The Invisible Woman creates a force sphere around The Thing, who then goes all Super Monkey Ball on the enemies. Gambit can charge up a huge rock with kinetic energy, which the Hulk will then smash onto a foe. And of course Wolverine has the Fastball Special executable with any of the super-strong teammates. Fusions come in three flavors: clearing, targeted and guided. Each has their strengths and weaknesses, but all are fun to use. The Fusion system is clearly one of the bright spots of the game. However one (more) area where the game lags is enemy variety. Each act has about 4-5 different enemies for you to fight and even those differences are mostly cosmetic. Variations in attacks, strategy or vulnerabilities are few and far between. Enemy AI is more or less non existent. Boss battles, with a couple exceptions, come down to all four members of the team pounding on someone until they earn enough star power to execute a Fusion attacks. I was almost (almost!) hoping for a quick time event to break the monotony.
As I said previously, after the first act you're given the choice of which side to take in the Registration Act conflict. Some characters - Iron Man, Mr. Fantastic and Songbird on the pro side, Captain America, Luke Cage & Iron Fist on the anti side - are locked into one faction or the other. After that point the missions you take vary. The pro reg side defends a prisoner convoy, while the rebels try to attack it and spring their comrades. As you complete these missions new characters are unlocked, although you still have to beat the game twice to get everyone. There's also a series of Challenges to complete in the simulation room. Some of these are fun, but the ones which diverge from the game's basic formula unfortunately don't work very well. This is not a game in which I want to do stealth or escort missions. The experience improves quite a bit in co-op play, in no small part because your AI teammates are complete morons. When playing with others many of the game's problems smooth out nicely, and there's no noticeable slowdown when compared to offline play.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2645/3899525041_93b23a3f98.jpg
The team absolutely no one is pining for: Iceman, Venom & Iron Fist
The presentation of the game is inconsistent. The voice acting ranges from competent to awful. The characters themselves are very nicely animated and detailed, but environments all too often tended towards the dark and muddy side of the color palette. The action can get really frenetic with lots of enemies and effects going on, and when things get heavy the framerate drops a bit. And then there's *sigh* the camera. At times, for no apparent reason, you simply cannot control the camera. Which means at times you'll sit there twiddling your thumbs because the last enemy you need to kill is stuck somewhere you can't see them. Other times the camera gets stuck behind a crate, or a truck or a wall and you simply can't see anything. I know that camera control is tough to implement in a game like this, but you really spend way too much time fighting the camera.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3641/3417238017_487a2a5c60.jpg
Everybody is kung-fu fighting
In the end MUA2 is greatly diminished by a few poor choices by the design team. You have so little control over the make up of each character - even only when compared to the original MUA - that the whole game just feels stripped down. It can be fun, especially in co-op, but the problems persist even then.
Score: 3 out of 5 CoGs
http://www.colonyofgamers.com/images/CoG3.png
Michael says, "Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 could have - and maybe should have - been great. But ultimately it's doomed by it's decisions, or rather the lack of decisions. While you're given one major choice when you decide whether to join the pro- or anti-registration forces, the game seems bound and determined to take any and all other choices about character development and progression out of your hands. Which is pretty much the last thing you want in an RPG. This diminishes a game which can get a bit monotonous at times.