Six Exciting Additions To Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2

With recent announcements about who will make up the roster of the highly anticipated Marvel [...]

With recent announcements about who will make up the roster of the highly anticipated Marvel Ultimate Alliance sequel, MUA 2: Fusion, gamers everywhere are drooling for its fall 2009 release. Included are the standard characters from the first game, all of the Fantastic Four, Daredevil, Spider-Man, and of course, Captain America and Iron Man. These last two characters will form the crux of the storyline for this game, as it picks up after the concluding events of the first game.

I'll avoid spoiling the ending of the first MUA if you haven't played it yet, but you HAVE to play it!

Ok, back to where we were. MUA 2: Fusion will focus on the Civil War storyline from Marvel, and with that comes the addition of several characters that were not in the original game. After looking over the list of characters, and I have to add here that it's not clear yet if some of these new characters will be playable or will simply appear in the game in some form, six stand out as having the potential to make a huge impact on the direction of the game, a direction of your choosing, as you will assign where character's go, either to Iron Man's pro-hero registration side or Cap's anti-registration side.

Hulk - The Hulk was clearly not present during the Civil War, that whole "I've been exiled to another planet by a small group of powerful men" thing keeping him away. Now here he is in MUA 2, and since there's no clear frame of reference for him, as he's essentially fought every Marvel hero and villain at some point it seems, the ramifications of his placement on either team could be exciting and, needless to say, smash-worthy. His powers will obviously be toned down a bit for parity, but the storyline potential would be unlike any that could be imagined by readers of the mini-series.

She-Hulk - On the other hand, we have Bruce Banner's gamma-powered cousin, She-Hulk. During the events of Civil War, this green powerhouse was in a difficult spot. While Jennifer Walters, her attorney at law alter ego, worked with heroes on both sides of the Superhero Registration Act, She-Hulk herself was a registered hero. Unlike Hulk, it's not been confirmed as to whether or not she is a playable character; she could certainly add strength to either side. Consider if she fought with or against her cousin and the possible combo moves they could perform if they were on the same team!

Iron Fist - Danny Rand adds a technically precise fighting style to the playable characters in this game, definitely valuable in a melee attack. He briefly posed as Daredevil while Matt Murdock tried to distance himself from his alter ego, and quickly joined Captain America's rebel forces against the pro-registration movement. His addition to the game could add an extra dimension to the anti-registration dynamic, but it would be quite a turn to see how he would affect Tony Stark's team as a member. Either way, it's quite nice to see him in a playable role, after appearing sporadically in other Marvel video games.

Green Goblin - Wow. What else can be said about the addition about this archenemy of Spider-Man turned high-ranking government agent Norman Osborn? His rise to power began in the pages of Civil War and fully blossomed in Thunderbolts. It's interesting that he's been added to the game, and although he was (and still is) on the side of the government, the freedom to place him on either team proves intriguing. One big bonus of having him in this game will be seeing what cool gadgets, tricks and special moves he'll have, as Gobby has always had an array of tricky weapons at this disposal.

Bishop - The X-Men, more or less, didn't get very involved in the events of Civil War, but Bishop did add a mutant presence to the events, serving as a guard for the Negative Zone prison. Bishop's presence in this game, even though he hasn't been revealed as playable yet, shows an inclination to set up some possible conflicts with fellow mutants, especially Storm, who he battled in Civil War and who is a playable character. His powers of absorption would be a pretty cool special power in the game, and having him switch sides to Captain America for game play would add a turn to the mutant influence in the story.

Venom - Another addition from the villain universe, this time coming from the angle of a "hero". Pairing him up on the same side as Spider-Man might produce some killer super-powered combos, and even pairing them on opposing teams could set up a battle of wits, with some aspects of their powers certain to be similar to one another. This version of Venom is a little more savage than the Eddie Brock version, and his strength would add some definite heavyweight potential to either side of the conflict. Pairing him up with Green Goblin, and possibly creating a Thunderbolts playable team, would be a VERY fun aspect of this game not seen since the Brotherhood team of X-Men Legends II.

Hopefully word of which characters will be made playable will be released soon, but before then, let the speculation commence! Who would you team up together? Why? What would a team of a united Fantastic Four look like in the game play versus what happened in the series? Regardless of the answer, expectations for this game are high and the possibilities almost endless.

0comments