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Review: Marvel Superheroes |
First of all let me start up by saying that I was a big time Marvel Super Heroes fanatic when the game arrive at the arcade about two years ago. For one, I was presented with gorgeous 2D animated graphics from the 2D gods and of course, my favorite slew of heroes. On top of that, Capcom picked up one of the most enjoyable storylines to ever be conceived out of the Marvel Universe — the Infinity Gauntlet.
So what may follow is a review of a hard core player (no pun intended) who has been waiting for one of his all time favorite game for too long.
After more than two years in production for the Sony Playstation, Marvel Super Heroes has had high anticipations for the machine that supposedly could not compete with the Sega Saturn in the 2D fighting game field. Critics from all over the gaming world have predicted that the Playstation version of the game would have excessive slow down and an unbearable frames of animation missing. And while some of these predictions may be true, the final product brought back those arcade moments that I enjoyed two years ago. Allow me to explain.
Graphically Marvel Super Heroes is nearly arcade perfect. The characters take up about the same amount of space on screen as the characters on the arcade did (give or take a few pixels.) Animation wise the game is a masterpiece. All the characters have been brought back with their trademark moves, taunts, ground to air combos, exaggerated jumps and all that juicy stuff. Admittedly Marvel Super Heroes does have its drawbacks as far as frames of animations go. As much as I hate to admit it, the game feels like something is missing and even though I can not really point out exactly what it is, the way the combos look a bit different hint towards missing frames. There are of course the awe-inspiring Infinity moves. Some backgrounds seem to have suffered since their arcade appearance but still look strikingly arcade perfect. For example: Dr. Doom’s scrolling scenery has less colors and less detail in the playstation version.
As far as the music is concerned, Marvel Super Heroes scores big on my chart. The trademark “spider sense tingling” from Spiderman or the “superior tech” remark by Iron Man are all here — no tin can voices this time. You will also get your huge assortments of gem sound effects and grunts all at great arcade quality. Memorable music can also be found here!
Yeah I know that’s all nice and pretty, but does it play like the arcade? Well, my answer would have to be yes. You see, even though there seems to be a difference on the combo system (as far as the timing is concerned), you will be executing the 7+ air combos in no time. All of the supers are done at a snap of a finger and the comfortable, but no skill demanding punch X3 and kick X3 buttons help those starting rookies out. The combo timing could therefore be blamed on the slowdown sometimes present.
Just in case you did not know, Marvel Super Heroes features some of the most impressive looking combos in a video game (sorry KI). You get air to ground, ground to air, jump in, dash in, throw combos, ground to air to ground, just to name a few of the possibilities. The gameplay is really massive and best of all addicting. Of course, you also have the super jumps which greatly add to this game’s super hero appeal.
Then it comes the real important question. Is the game as slow as a 76 year old grandma driving a sports car on the expressway? It pains me to say this, but Marvel Super Heroes does have some major slowdown in certain levels. Magneto, BlackHeart and Dr Doom’s levels offering most of the chaos. I noticed that really big characters did not really have a big effect on slowing down the game; the multi scrolling levels did. So could Capcom have made the levels less dynamic and made the game faster for our sake? Perhaps. Please note, that the game plays at an arcade pace about 93% of the time!
So when it comes right down to it is Marvel Super Heroes worth buying? If you are a big fan of the game like I was (and still am) you should probably rent it before you purchase. The reason being the slowdown. And telling you from experience the slow down bothered me very little after a few hours of play (I guess playing until 4 am in the morning could have its effects eh?) Im enjoying Marvel Super Heroes an awful lot on my Sony Playstation, so when in doubt… rent it. Bring it on Capcom!
- HardCore
