Marvel vs. Capcom 2

"Multiplayer - come on in, Single player - stay away"

The problem with deliciously over the top beat ‘em ups revolve around one longstanding concept. Unlike more, and I use this word loosely, realistic franchises such as Tekken or Street Fighter, most modern 2D fighting games rely on a massive stock of similar characters instead of a dozen or so unique characters. Generally, this would be seen as a major flaw in a beat ‘em up intending to take itself seriously, however in a world where 50+ hit combos are the norm and characters vary from tiny yellow headed robots too massive green skinned muscular abominations, exceptions can be made.

Marvel V Capcom 2 (MVC2 hereafter) has an incredible roster of 50+ characters. The variety is staggering. There are many familiar faces from the worlds of Marvel and Capcom plus the odd few you probably won’t recognise without being a hardcore fan of the comics/games. You start off with 25 characters. The other 25+ and other things such as new levels are unlocked through the point system. This is where my first main gripe comes in.

Every mode of play in MVC2 earns you points. The amount varies on which mode and the time you are playing for. For example, completing Arcade Mode on the medium difficulty setting will earn you about 2300 points. Playing Versus mode with a friend for about 20 minutes gets you about 80. And here comes the most exploitable fact of the whole game, which significantly reduces the challenge. Its possible to earn 600 points per hour (10 a minute) just by leaving the game in training mode and doing nothing. Characters generally cost anywhere between 1000 and 3500 points. It fluctuates incredibly for the same character though. One time you might enter the menu screen and Akuma is available or 2000 points. Next time you’re at that menu it could have raised to 3200. To be fair, it really isn’t a large fault when the focus of the game is not collecting characters.

The style of combat is very heavily set towards combos. Air combos are encouraged, ground combos are required, Hyper Combos are essential. Each team (teams consist of 3 fully selectable characters, its 3v3 you see) has a Hyper Combo bar. It fills up as you attack and are attacked. At 0, you can’t do any hyper combos. At 1 you can do 1. Here is where the simplicity ends. At 2 you can either do two single ones with an individual character or do a tag team consisting of 2 characters. At 3 you can either do 3 individual combos or a 3 way tag team. 3 is the most in a tag team move, and it goes so on and so forth. Hyper Combos can HURT. They also rack up the hits, 102 being my personal best. Although its nothing to boast about as all that is required to get a large amount of hits in a Hyper Combo is pressing the two triggers on the XBox controller at the same time while having 3 characters who have large hitting individual Hyper Combos.

Ah, there’s another important point. If your planning on seriously playing MVC2, do yourself a favour. Buy yourself a S-Controller. Their smaller size makes the game far more fun. In fact, buy one anyway because they really are a huge improvement on the original XBox controller.

Graphically, the game is superb. The characters are well animated and they look like they are supposed to look. There really are no flaws that can be pointed out by all but a graphical connoisseur. It is however just a 2D beat ‘em up, so while It has no flaws it has no real remarkable traits. The only outstanding thing is unleashing a massive 3 person 50+ hit combo and watching the screen flash with all manner of bizarre colours. Sound wise, the speech samples are nothing short of great. They all sound like you would except them too. The customary “As much as bill gates” (at least that’s what it sounds like) is clear when you perform Ryu’s whirlwind kick, there are all manner of Hadokens, Beserker Claws, Web Balls, Optic Blasts and Ice Beams flying about. Again nothing special but nothing below scratch.

While there are better multiplayer XBox games out there, in terms of 2D beat ‘em ups there hasn’t been something this truly fun since Street Fighter Alpha 3. There are a large amount of characters, standard graphics and sound and really no major flaws. However the single player is extra weak. Buy only if multiplayer gaming on your XBox is standard. And even then, only as a filler between multiplayer sessions of Halo.

Pros:
+ Intensely fun in multiplayer.
+ Large roster of characters.
+ A good 2D beat em up on XBox.

Cons:
- Single player is lacking.
- Needs the controller S.
- Pathetic unlock system.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 02/22/03, Updated 02/22/03