11 Years Later: A Marvel vs. Capcom 3 Review

11 years. Not 11 years of development, but 11 long years nonetheless, for a sequel to one of the most groundbreaking 2D fighting game in the history of fighting games.

The first thing I should say is, “the game has changed”. Yeah, that’s the understatement of the year, but in MvC3′s case, it fits pretty well. Aside from returning characters and special moves from the previous installment, this game is very, very different. It’s bigger, with bigger specials, bigger lasers, bigger bosses, bigger boo- ok, let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. It’s definitely flashier. But there are enough new changes to the fighting engine that even veteran Marvel players will feel out of place.

In two lines: I like 2 better. But 3 is no slouch.

The Graphics

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 introduces a new 3D graphics engine that manages to pull off a faux 2D cel-shaded look. It’s impressive. The whole game plays out like a gigantic comic book – hell, the character selection screen puts your team on the cover, complete with a little barcode in the corner. The presentation, everywhere, is superb.

And while I was a huge fan of the former 2D pixelated sprites, the move to 3D had to be done. Otherwise we’d have been left with Marvel vs. Capcom 2.5 Hyper Fighting Edition.

The Sound

I don’t remember much of the sound effects in MvC2, just mainly some choice quotes and grunts. In MvC3, I’ve noticed a few things: the sound of Tron Bonne’s mech crunching the ground as it lands, the “Tony!” that Captain America says when switching to Iron Man. There’s a lot of little sound details like that in the game, and I love it.

The music is some kind of psychedelic techno-synth elevator music, and nothing to write home about. None of the songs in the game are as iconic as “I wanna take you for a ride” (which, incidentally, shows up in remix form at the character select screen) or as catchy as the jazzy stage themes (Carnival stage) in MvC2.

The Gameplay

The meat and potatoes.

Capcom has attempted to accomodate new players to the genre with a couple of changes. For example, there’s a “Simple” control style, which allows specials and supers to be executed with only one button. It’s worthless, to say the least, unless you’re putting the controller in the hands of a three-year-old kid.

More importantly, the entire button scheme has been simplified.

Gone are the days of punches and kicks, light attacks doubling as medium attacks, and inconsistent launchers (moves that pop characters up in the air). Now there’s only Light, Medium, and Heavy attacks, and a dedicated launcher button.

In actual play, this means that combos are now a little more inconsistent (or the optimistic way of looking at it, have more possibilities) per character than before. You can chain the same attack in your combos as long as you follow the Light -> Heavy progression.

The mechanics of the combo system still feel a little odd. I find myself having trouble executing the same combos – maybe it’s me, maybe it’s my crappy arcade stick. The timing window seems shorter than before. Then again, MvC2 was more like the Wild Wild West of the series, where, as long as you swing and there’s something there to get hit, you’ll hit.

MvC2 was also a very buggy game. The bugs have now been squashed. Lengthy startup animations have been added for some, ahem, well-abused moves. Sentinel now moves like a Sentinel, instead of being gigantic yet ridiculously agile. There is no more Cable. (but he could come back as DLC – personally, I wouldn’t mind)

Funny thing is, while Capcom has tried to balance out the game by cracking down on specific characters, they’ve simultaneously managed to relax the restrictions on everyone. You can cancel practically anything into a super. 100% damage combos, once a rarity in the world of Marvel vs. Capcom, are now a serious threat.

Replay Value and Extras

It’s a fighting game. Replay value is provided by playing versus matches on- or offline. Pretty striaghtforward.

Other than the standard Arcade, Training, and Versus modes, MvC3 provides a “mission mode”. It’s basically an extension of training and has you attempting combos of increasing difficulty for each character (10 missions per character). It’s a nice introduction but not what I’d call exactly fun, especially for the later levels. It’s practice.

Spending time in the various modes earns you Player Points. I wish this were more fleshed out, kind of like how MvC2 had an extensive shop system (okay, unlocking characters was a pain). Instead, special items like new characters, sound tests, movies, and artwork are automatically unlocked as you progress. Unfortunately, you don’t have any control on what you get.

Character-specific extra stuff like endings and bios are unlocked after you finish the game with that character.

There are three other neat features included in the game. One is the ability to select either original Japanese or English voices for each character. Nifty.

The other is the addition of the License Card, showing basic statistics like wins/losses but also a nice meter of your fighting style, your most best/most used characters,

Finally, you can set up a “reserve unit” – basically your three favorite teams – so that you don’t have to go selecting your characters individually.

Conclusion

Does it even matter? If you’re a MvC fan, you’re going to buy it. No question. Newbies to the series should be warned – if you aren’t serious about playing, you would probably be happier with Guilty Gear or Blazblue.