Marvel Heroes Review (PC)

It’s Marvel! It’s an MMO! It’s free to play! Gazillion Entertainment has delivered what many Marvel fans have requested. Ever wanted to be Hawkeye (You know, that one who was under Loki’s control for 75% of The Avengers movie)? No? How about Halle Ber- I mean Storm, of the X-Men? Yes? Ok, read on. If you answered no, get out your credit card, then read on.

Free to play!

Marvel Heroes is a free to play (to an extent) MMO with game play a la Diablo 2. After a hands-on with the beta version, I was pretty sold on the full version’s release. To my slight disappointment however, you only start with a choice of five heroes: Daredevil, Storm, Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch, and The Thing.  If you wish to choose any of the other playable characters, these have to be purchased in the form of micro-transactions.

Not free to play!

Should you desire any of the other 19 playable Marvel Heroes, then this is where the free-to-play ends. Real monies are used to purchase in-game credits to purchase not only characters, but also a wealth of costumes for those characters. To put a positive spin on things, the game needs support to exist, right? Of course the answer is yes, but Marvel Heroes can hit your wallet hard. 1000 credits is roundabout £10, with the price of characters/costumes varying. With the recent price drop, they’re under 1000 credits in many cases, but the premium characters such as Iron Man will cost more. This is potentially very off-putting for some, unless your preferred character happens to be one of the originally playable five. Should you happen to be an nth degree collector (as some comic fans are), you will be spending potentially hundreds of pounds for scarcely different Marvel Heroes experiences.

Attack enemies and… attack more enemies!

Whichever character you do choose, each character has two forms of attack – regular or special – assigned to the left and right mouse button respectively. Special attacks are limited to a chargeable health bar, while health itself is administered by the designated keystroke. The characters are comparable to their current comic counterparts, and attacks are based on their abilities and super powers, such as Daredevil using regular punches and kicks, and his secondary attack a more acrobatic kick.

Attacking is often full frontal, combining left-click movement through the surroundings into the character’s regular attack. It’s all very simple, allowing you to get on with the missions, collecting the important items and EXP as you go. If anything however, it’s this simplicity that is its downfall.

The missions are generally the same throughout, although the description may differ. ‘Switch off the power’ and ‘Locate command tower’ amount to the same thing; wading through baddies and bosses. I’ll admit, I’m not typically an MMO player, so maybe this is what I should expect from such a game, but it just isn’t exciting in any way. In truth, it’s rather mindless, dumb and gets boring very quickly. It’s just Ultimate Alliance all over again, which was also very, very dull.

Whilst the missions are not convincing, Marvel Heroes does obtain little redemption in its target fan base. Unlike DC Universe online, you get to be the Marvel hero, which has to be the biggest attraction of all. I was there back in 1997 when Quake was modelled with the X-Men. I was disappointed that I was killing them, not portraying them in anyway. DC Universe allowed you to fight alongside the Justice League, but you never got to play as one of them.

Ultimately, playing as one of Marvel’s many heroes is Marvel Heroes’ only redeeming feature, and even that could cost you an arm and a leg. The premise is great; Diablo-style Marvel game, hours of missions and unlockable features for fans of both MMOs and Marvel. The result is mediocre at best; bland backdrops, mindless combat, one dimensional missions, and overly expensive content. Avoid not only the game, but also your credit card, should you wish to play it.

Marvel Heroes is free to play on Windows.