Taken in moderation, there’s nothing wrong with a little sequelitis. When a movie or game is stimulating and unique enough, it’s just cause for the provider to “follow up” with a marginally-improved version of the original hit. There does come a point where such baby-step evolution loses its effect, however… and as other critics have been quick to point out in the past, we’ve already seen this approach multiple times before with X-Men Legends 2 and then Marvel: Ultimate Alliance.
At the same time, I have to admit, I think that over the years the once-mighty appeal of the beat-‘em-up genre has begun to fade. Sure, these games, in all their glorious repetition, were rich in the midst of the warm arcade environment while twiddling joysticks and cramming Chuck E. Cheese pizza into your mouth in between levels, but here at home, they sort of leave something to be desired. Even those products which do it best (products like the Marvel Ultimate Alliance series, in fact)—with their fancy RPG-style character growth matrices, deep storylines, and plethora of unlockable features—still consistently rest squarely in the shadows of the bigger-budget, more innovative offerings. And if MUA2 is any indication, we may have hit a bit of a brick wall with regard to improvement to the design.
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But surely you long for digression, and so let’s ignore for a moment the fact that we’ve all done this before and focus on the details. Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is prettier than its predecessor; that much is obvious from the outset. What’s also pretty evident is the fact that it adopts a much darker, harder-edge mood that disposes with the previously-playful homage to all things Marvel and instead attempts to portray its premise as something more serious and believable.
Whether or not you consider that a positive move is a purely subjective matter, but a direct consequence of this shift in style is that in order to squeeze full mileage out of MUA2, you’d better be at least partially acquainted with what’s up in the modern universe of Marvel. (In case you aren’t, the game does a decent job of quickly introducing the situation; it’s just not the same as being an established, up-to-date Marvel fan and then picking up this game.)
Specifically, MUA2 takes place in a world of political and terroristic turmoil, afflicted by recent collateral damage and innocent deaths at the hands of superheroes. In the wake of such events, the U.S. government passes the Superhuman Registration Act, which forces all humans with superhuman qualities to register as living weapons of mass destruction. The decision creates a division between supporters and opponents of the move, a volatile social phenomenon which carries forward directly into MUA2’s design. The game lifts this foundational premise from the 2006-2007 series of Marvel comic strips entitled Civil War.
Superhuman story, substandard gameplay
For purposes of clarification, let’s first address this heading. Substandard is not the most accurate term if you happen to be comparing intra-genre; Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2, is, in fact, among the best of the bunch when it comes to streamlined, mindless brawling. But having said that, even with all of the scattered refinements, this is one formula which hasn’t seen a great deal of qualitative improvement in recent years. MUA2 provides the most impacting example of this yet, featuring essentially the same design as its predecessor, with the usual layer of fine-tuning and just a few truly noteworthy mechanical additions/alterations, which we’ll get to in a moment.
That means you will still be guiding a team of four heroes of your choosing, traversing a couple dozen linear levels, tossing trash cans, cars, and missiles all over the place, and smashing through droves of enemies on your way to the next boss. If you’re lucky, you’ll be doing it in the company of three friends (or online, relatively lag-free), too, under which conditions the game is, of course, exponentially more appealing. Yes, you get a few different attacks—varying depending on the character—along with some special moves. Yes, you will collect experience (ability points) throughout your missions and upgrade your heroes. And yes, you can still jump, grab, and dodge, just as you could before. Trophies, dossiers, costumes ad naseum. It’s a brawler of the most sophisticated variety, seasoned by its developer’s longstanding experience.
Returning to the noteworthy additions referenced earlier, the first of those few is Fusion Powers. These are two-person team-based attacks which are performed by holding R1 and pressing a face button corresponding to the teammate with whom you wish to perform the attack. For instance, Character A blasts lasers into Character B, who then disperses them hazardously amongst the surrounding mob of attackers, or Character A picks up and throws Character B in a particular direction. Depending on the selected combination, the results will vary. Some attacks are targeted and must be aimed, while others knock out an entire radius of enemies. It’s a fun addition and definitely worth the trouble, though in the end, it really does just come down to one more combat variation. The cosmetic factor doesn’t last, either, as many of the attacks almost boil down to mere palette swaps of other similar ones. Still, it’s hard to blame the developers when they’re dealing with right around (mathematically) 600 different attacks, and at least you are rewarded occasionally with health tokens if you wisely implement these techniques so that there is some incentive to leverage them beyond visual splendor and speedy victory.
The gameplay has undergone other refinements as well, such as a much greater attention paid to the interactive environments and which characters can interact with what. For instance, there are a number of items Wolverine is not strong enough to handle—cars and whatnot—that the Incredible Hulk has absolutely no problem lifting (often one-armed). It’s common sense stuff, but this, at least, really spices up the gameplay.
Additionally, you also get new team-wide “boosts”, which are collected throughout the game and assigned (up to three at once) to the team to layer blanket effects across your group (increased damage, health boost, and the like). These are cool, but it’s hard to see how they live up to the previous game’s items system (which is sorely missing in the sequel if you ask me). In addition to that, the “health tokens” you read about in the last paragraph can be carried (up to two at once) and used to revive defeated allies or restore health to those still alive.
Finally, there’s a startling story branch during the first half of the game, mandated by the Civil War theme, which requires you to choose between two factions: pro-registration or anti-registration. Depending on which path you take, your character choices will be limited accordingly, and the storyline and levels are altered. It isn’t a massive difference; just a couple of new bosses here and there and some unique gameplay… though it does provide at least some rational excuse to play through the game a second time and max out your squad. Later in the game, these restrictions are lifted, making way for all selectable heroes and reuniting the full squad of (eventually) twenty-four—plus Juggernaut, downloadable—so the branching doesn’t apply to the entire story beyond this point, either.
Most other changes to the Legends/Ultimate Alliance blueprint are negligible—stuff like dialogue choices which provoke different answers (and can earn you benefits and trophies) and some patchy improvements here and there. Also, the game is pretty heavy on industrial/bleak environments this time around. While they certainly look nice, a good number of MUA2’s areas are too often dark and dreary, drab and disenchanting. It’s worth mentioning, however, that later in the game this feeling subsides, with some attractive indoor architecture, forest environments with waterfalls decorating the background, and other more inspiring locales.
Son of a glitch
At first I was wondering whether or not the problem had something to do with the console on which we played the game, but after a bit of research (and moving my entire review plans to a friend’s console), it’s become clear that the game also has an issue with freezing. Specifically during high-action events such as boss battles, it’ll occasionally lock up and require a restart. These problems are frustrating and uncomfortably common; we experienced two such situations throughout our time with the game. Other users report seeing stability issues as well, so it’s not just us and our sorry PS3(s). Hopefully a corrective patch will be issued.
While I’m on the subject, the load times are pretty horrendous this time around as well. It takes several seconds to do just about anything that requires the change of a character or its costume, and don’t even get me started on retrying missions. It’s an awful lot of waiting in a gaming world where extensive load times are now expected to be just about universally vanquished.
The costumes are disappointing in MUA2 anyway. Apart from the fact that the stock outfits are brimming with totally uncool reality-check seams and zippers, there’s only around one unlockable costume for each character this time, and the beneficial status effects with which Ultimate Alliance’s were imbued have been dropped. It’s a fairly serious blow to what originally was a pretty cool incentive to continue playing.
And finally, while the team-based combat is par for the course, it’s arguably not even as engaging as that of the previous game, mostly thanks to the previously-mentioned simplification of the team/character modifiers system and, well, a glaring lack of sensation when you hit someone. At least when you’re working your way through a dozen hours of gameplay in one of these titles, you typically can correlate your endless fits of button mashing with mashing in the faces of the scum you’re battling. In MUA2, it’s practically impossible to hear what’s happening, nevermind trying to see the action taking place anyhow (as the camera angles are frequently irksome and awkward—even my 52” LCD couldn’t make it comfortable for four players).
Adding to that, in a number of ways, the overall presentation is simply lacking. While the textures are sharp and the visuals are impressive, everything just feels like it was halfheartedly constructed. The costumes are lacking, the voice acting is completely hit or miss, and the cut scenes can’t even match the visual quality of the real-time gameplay (it’s like switching back and forth between DVD and Blu-ray on the fly)—worse yet, they can’t be skipped, as the game loads during them. Some players will take issue with the story and character selection as well, though that’s more of a subjective matter. All of this on top of the occasional lock-ups and the overlong load times makes the game feel rushed, even if it wasn’t.
While a lot of these problems may seem nitpicky, the honest truth is that Ultimate Alliance 2 should be showing improvement and evolution, not regression. In some ways it has, but in others, it’s fallen behind. It’s already problematic that the formula is so darn repetitive; you’d at least expect that something could be done to help enliven it and reinforce the need for yet another session of the same old. All things considered, the net movement seems to be backward, not forward.
Fortunately, taken as directed (meaning, with friends or online buddies), Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is still entertaining, if not a bit stale and wearing. It’s hardly an evolution overall, but then again, if you’re simply hurting for more MUA and you don’t mind the usual senseless repetition, that’s precisely what you will find.