Marvel vs. Capcom 3: First Impressions.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 has been the long awaited sequel many didn’t see coming due in part that a lot of the licenses for characters are split between different publishers so to see the game announced last year with the inclusion of Spider-Man, Hulk, Iron-Man etc was a refreshing surprise.

Now I never played the previous games though I had an interest in playing Marvel vs. Capcom 2 when it was released on Xbox Live Arcade, I was on the fence about it after hearing mixed things about it and the high entry level of skill to play the game so I wasn’t sure if I would get much out of it. Then hearing about Marvel vs. Capcom 3 I thought I might as well jump in to the new game like many others.

On a first impression the game is not that hard to a new user,  picking up skills as you play the game is a process, like struggling to pull off air combos but after a bit of practice they become second nature it is this kind of thing that I am enjoying about it the more time you put into it the more you get out of it.

The roster is pretty good and anyone that has been following the game will already know about it, both sides are fleshed out with iconic characters and some lesser know ones for each brand. I will say being a fan of the Marvel characters while the roster is good it feels a little bare bones and some character choices just don’t do anything for me personally I would of like to of seen some characters like Cyclops or even Gambit but there is always hope these might make it in as dlc later down the line.

For anyone picking this game purely for the single player experience they might be disappointed because other than arcade there really isn’t anything else to keep you playing, there is mission mode which is essentially combo challenges with each character having ten challenges to complete but for the casual user or even a mid skilled player some of these will be tough to beat.
The arcade mode is pretty good and offers a good challenge with Galactus as a boss battle which is alright but it feels a little basic compared to other end bosses in fighting games. Each character has a comic book style ending which suit’s the style of the game but it would have been nice to of seen short cinematic pieces done in a similar way to the opening sequence.

Online is where the majority of players will get the most play hours out of Marvel vs. Capcom 3, there are Ranked and Players matches with leaderboards for ranked as you would expect. I’ve encountered a lot of problems online at the moment mainly with ranked matches with the inability to connect to matches frequent connection loss when joining games and some serious lag in matches. Now this is a widespread problem that Capcom is aware of but it is a huge issue that needs fixing soon as currently its kind of busted.
When the online actually works it works well matches are fun when matched with similar players of your skill level but matches against high level opponents just aren’t and with that ranked can become frustrating at times with some players using cheap tactics.
Player matches is the place I find the most enjoyable like I spent 40 minutes playing one guy online match after match, we were similar levels so each match felt it could go either way. So for new users I would say get a friend or two or stick to player matches for a bit before heading into ranked.

As a whole I like the game but its not perfect it kind of feels like it is missing something I just can’t help but feel that the game is a bit bare bones and while the core gameplay is good I’m just not sure on the longevity of the game.