User Review : Marvel: Ultimate Alliance

Hero or Villan???

Story
With the sinister Dr. Doom and the Masters of Evil on the verge of seizing unimaginable power-power that could destroy the fabric oh know universe-Colonel Nick Fury brings together an unprecedented force of the greatest Super Heroes in the world. You must for you and your Ultimate Alliance are mankind’s last hope.

The numbers game
Throughout the game you will eventually come across a whopping total of 140 Marvel Characters.

Do I look fat in this suit?
Running at a cool 1080p this game is a feast for your eyes. With stunning detail you’ll often find yourself trying to zoom in to really applaud the detail but unfortunately there is no zoom button in this game.

Who ever was in the effects team for this game all deserve a dozen beer as the effects are simply amazing. In fact if the game had a poor effects team behind it could have been one dull looking game really as the game relies on decent effects. Take for example the third level I think it is were your completely submerged under water, many painstakingly hours must have been put into this and there been no shortcuts taken here that’s for sure.
But the thing that all sets it of for me is the lighting. If you thought games like Splinter Cell had good lighting, effects well then this game gives a new meaning to good. The lighting is absolutely astonishing.

Other things to mention is the camera is about as easy to navigate as playing a game of poker with a blind person, and because the levels all have one theme running through the duration of the level its pretty easy to get lost so the inclusion of the radar will be of some relief to those of us who find our self’s lost many a time.

One downside about all this is that one thong has to suffer and considering the PS3 only being on the market for half a year threes going to be some development problems and this certainly is the case here.
It does have its minor frame rate issues at times. It seems to occur when there’s many enemies on the screen or when you pick the fire guy from fantastic four and use his fire powers. But amongst all the pro’s this will take a back set when your playing, trust me you merely notice it, I only noticed it as I had to study the game in depth for the purposes of this review.

Bang, Whack, Wallop, Crash!
In most RPG’s the sound doesn’t play that much of a roll in the overall experience that much, I mean throw in a couple of orchestra hits, and a gibberish voice over and your home and hosed. Well this game doesn’t really break that golden rule and follows much of what I just said, but does expand on a few things without making to much noise (no pun intended)

It seems as if Activision has broken the trend with its voice overs and thank god as there is a fair amount of chatter in game. Instead of an over payed gibberish voice actor they have actually got some talent into there sound booths. When I say talent I actually mean it, the voice over acting is done to a pretty high standard here so no complaints here.

There’s also enough crash, band, swoop, wallop, whip's, to keep the comic geeks happy here as I’m sure most of the fighting effect sounds have been based upon these iconic sounds.

Orchestra lengths are all to common in RPG’s but this time Activision have put on a bit of a twist, with the orchestra theme still in abundance but played and composed to suit the level that your in. For example the first level your on a heavily metal dominated helicarrier, which is about to hit earth sooner rather then later. So to match this the music can be acomped to the heavy metal genre. Another example of this is the water level that I reffered to before, in this case the music is very slow, soothing and relaxing. All in all its not to bad of a concept and I’m sure to all RPG fans this will be music to there ears. (again no pun intended)

Super ma…er… No spider man to the rescue
Now don’t get me wrong but I’m not a big fan of RPG’s so me reviewing the game play of this may be a bit suspect but here goes…

Characters play a huge role in a game like this and they definitely don’t let down here, with a vast array of characters at hand to help you save the earth. Activision and Marvel have covered all floors when it comes to choice. You have the fan favs like Wolverine, Spidey, and Captain America, then you have characters that I have honestly never heard of like Spiderwoman and moon night. All come with there strengths and weakness’s but you will have a team of at least 3 that stay in your team of 4 throughout most of the game. This is due to some characters drawing to short straw when it comes to powers that they process. As unfortunate as it is, it really does show us who the real stars of the show are which is neither a good thing or a bad thing.

Now that we have covered the goodies, lets move on to the badies. The regular level enemies are nothing special and by that I mean not proving much of a challenge and no AI what so ever. Many villains that you see on TV also make an appearance and prove to be the real challenge of the game. Although some prove to be more epic then others. For example one boss you can just hack and slash and move away from his powerful attacks and you can dispose of him quite easily. This is in star contrast to a boss battle which requires you to defeat a dragon that has just been pea fried.

Yes everything up until now sounds pretty promising doesn’t it but we all know that a game has to have game play for it to be considered decent and unfortunately this is were the game most lacks. It does what you would expect but does nothing more therefore making it a rather average experience, The overwhelming felling of the game is “been here done this” Ounce you’ve completed the first couple of levels, you will start to feel the all to common drag of repetitiveness. Whack bang crack smash, whack bang crack smash, boss battle, Whack bang crack smash and that’s it really. It does how ever prossies some depth with side quest’s and little side missions to up the longtivity of the title. These side missions consist of comic book missions that are found throughout the whole game. Ounce unlocked you can play as that particular hero through one of there goldest moments, nothing in terms of game play changes here though. This is a great segway to my next point. The game is very unforgiving, if you forget or miss one of these collectables throughout a level there’s no way to go back to a past level to find them again unless your willing to restart your save.

Linear would be the one word to describe the levels, and although they change in terms of appearance drastically throughout the game. Eg you can be pwning enemies in a castle and before you know it you will be pwning enemies in a circus but overall and on close examination all levels play out the same.

In terms of game play mechanics, there’s nothing to write home about really, but there is one thing that I will say and that is the use of the SIXAXIS motion sensing. Ultimate Alliance is one of a few games to actually use the motion senescing to some type of effect. Its mainly used in boss battles which require fast reactions so thank god that the motion sensing is very responsive and for the first time in a title I don’t feel as if its just used as a gimmick.

Damm it
To every gamers despite Activision didn’t take up the task to base Invisible woman’s likeness on the hottest superhero of all time…Jessica Alba, maybe next time lads.

Captain worldwide
This title does support online play but that’s not a problem, the problem for me is that lack of people that play online. The idea of having 4 human controlled players playing through the main game would be enough to purchase the game itself. But up till this very moment of time I have never played this game online.

However if you a captain popular you wont need to worry about online speech as you and 3 mates can all play through the main game by yourselves. This proves to be much more funner then doing the job single handily, it also makes it less frustrating as in single player your team mates have no AI and in a civil attempt to hide these shortcomings Activision put in a command system that is so under baked they would have been better off cutting it all together.

Dooms back?
In case of a sequel heres a few things that Activision could re cap on to make for a better experience:
-Fix the frame rate issues
-Have mini games in the story mode to break it up a bit.
-Have a help feature when it comes to upgrading characters as all the options seem a bit overwhelming for a RPG novice.
-Give the player a little more freedom in levels
-Give all characters a real brain and not one the size of a peanut.