Despite a rocky release, and a rather mixed reception by long time fans, Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite has so far managed to release upward of 900,000 copies. While short of their initial 2 million goal, both Marvel and Capcom seem adamant to make it a success.
On December 5th Capcom wrapped up MvC:I’s first DLC season. The Season includes 2 new Capcom characters, 4 new Marvel characters and a premium costume for each of the now-36 playable characters on the roster.
Is the content worth its hefty $60/£50 total price tag? Well, let’s take a look!
If you haven’t yet read my review for the base game, be sure to check that out too!
Characters:
The first three characters; Capcom’s Sigma and Monster Hunter, as well as Marvel’s Black Panther released back on October 17th.
Black Panther:
Black Panther is a fairly typical rush-down kind of fighter. His moveset is somewhat reminiscent of X-23 from Marvel vs. Capcom 3, though he also has elements of Wolverine and Sabretooth from Marvel vs. Capcom 2. He also has wall-grabbing abilities which helps him stand out a little more from other rush-down fighters.
Black Panther’s only real flaw lies in his nature as a character, and how he has translated from the comic books to the fighting game. While he’s completely true to form he’s perhaps the most pedestrian newcomer overall.
Sigma:
The second DLC character is Megaman X’s Sigma, who serves as the game’s primary co-antagonist in the form of Ultron-Sigma.
Sigma boasts a significant amount of power, and is one of the largest characters in the game. The bulk of his moves revolves around his big-ass energy sword, which double as long-lasting traps. I appreciate the attention to detail that has gone into Sigma, many of his moves are lifted directly from the boss battles of the X series.
In spite of this, it’s hard to overlook that Sigma had such a prevalent role in the game’s story mode. Releasing a
character so integral to the plot as additional paid DLC is a hard pill to swallow.
Monster Hunter:
Monster Hunter is something of an oddity. She has one of the most creative move sets in MvC history that in part, results from her status an almost an MvC original.
She has a ton of different weapons in her arsenal, ranging from big-ass bows, spears, daggers and big-ass bone swords. Her special moves range from lightning fast, to slow as molasses. Some of which can be charged, and offer shield protection.
Though small, my favourite thing about Monster Hunter is her jab taunt. It does a tiny amount of damage. I love little things like that. Like Sigma and Black Panther, Monster Hunter has a somewhat prolific role in the game’s story.
Winter Soldier:
Lots of guns!
I have to admit that while I’m a big fan of Bucky, I was worried about his inclusion. The Bionic Arm gimmick was already well covered with Spencer, and we had umpteen other gun users. In spite of that, it’s his use of his arm that defines him as a character, which is thankfully different from Spencer. This includes an awesome special that sees him use his arm as a shield. It can absorb practically any attack without taking damage.
He also has a unique team-up level 3 Hyper Combo with Captain America. He’s fastly becoming one of my favourite characters!
Winter Soldier has A LOT of Chris in him, but he’s still an asset to the game! “JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!”.
Venom:
While some characters like Thanos and Rocket Raccoon saw pretty big changes in their moves and play style fromprevious MvC games, Venom remains faithful to his MvC1 and MvC2 characterisation. But not so much so that he has nothing new to offer. He has several new moves, including a new hyper and special moves, which update him enough to feel competitive (from the perspective of play) when compared to the rest of the cast.
He looks utterly fantastic in Marvel Infinite’s realistic aesthetic style, though his voice misses the mark. Venom is without a doubt the highlight of this Season, even if Capcom were negligent enough to not include a blue palette based on his sprite design from MvC1 and MvC2!!!
Black Widow:
The long standing joke amongst Marvel vs. Capcom fans was that Jill stole Black Widow’s moveset in MvC3. It turns out, the joke wasn’t too far off, at least in terms of her function, particularly pertaining to her normals. Even though Black Widow’s normals are pretty typical, her specials are where you start to see some shine.
She has some interesting tech, which includes time-delayed explosions, a grappling-hook and the use of her stun-baton.
She has a little more to offer than Black Panther, but there’s something that seems off about her character model.
Costumes:
The bulk of costumes added to Marvel Infinite are interesting to say the least. They’ve done a good job creating original skins, instead of recycling more content from Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, likely in response to the tremendous backlash from fans. The general aesthetic value on most costumes is on point, though cases like Zero and X don’t really look different enough to justify their cost as a premium skin.
Some of the highlights include classic costumes for Miss Marvel and Gamora, as well as Frank West cosplaying as Proto-Man (a reference to Dead Rising 2: Off The Record).
Some characters like Chris Redfield have costumes that the characters have worn in previous games, some characters like Spencer, Nemesis and Strider Hiryu have costumes based on other characters in their respective franchises. Though some characters, like Thanos just look like a giant toe protruding out of white garbs.
The costumes are a good value if you buy the bundle, as that way they’ll cost you around $1 each. Individual prices are pretty intense.
Conclusion:
Truthfully, this DLC is genuinely done to a high standard. Everything arguably look better than the bulk of characters that made the default game.
As a result of both the character choices, and costume choices being almost entirely new (with the welcome exception of Venom), they’ve helped define Infinite, helped give it a reason to exist. Consequently, the game is already significantly more interesting and enjoyable than it was during its initial launch.
In terms of value, it depends on your perspective. On the one hand, you have 6 unique, fun and memorable characters that are nothing but a boon to the overall game. On the other, at least 4 of these characters, and arguably all 6 feel like they were purposely omitted in order to gouge the customer. Aside from that the content exceeds its somewhat hefty pricetag. At least if you buy in bulk.
I’m hopeful that we’ll see a 4 Capcom/2 Marvel split for the next DLC, but overall I’m excited for the future!
What do you think of the Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite DLC? What are your hopes for the future? Be sure to let us know in the comments!
Well done.
Good article. I agree that MVCI already looks more interesting than it did at launch. My favorite characters so far are Venom and Sigma. Some of the characters should’ve been included in the base package but I’ll still give credit where it’s due.
My only critique with this article is that you repeatedly used “big ass”. I don’t mind swearing at all but it felt repetitive and unnecessary.
Here’s hoping that MVCI will have a bright future and that Viewtiful Joe and Amaterasu are included at some point! I will NOT stop clamoring for them until they’re in! Okami is being re-released on modern systems after all! C’mon Capcom, don’t you want money??
Oh yeah, and include Wolverine too, please.
Marvel Infinite: At least it’s not Battlefront 4.
Yeah, I also would have liked Venom’s blue palette as availaible color scheme atleast but putting aside the lack of it, as well as that bad voice, I’m glad with how Venom turned out in MvCI.
I haven’t played the game yet, but seen many gameplays through Youtube videos. So sorry for not experiencing the game yet…
While the first three character were already existed in the cutscenes of the story mode, it’s glad to see them become playable for the first time. Black Panther is more like a replacement of X-Men’s claw fighting mutants like Wolverine, while Monster Hunter brings out many weapons as references, and it’s good to see her having a voice since most avatars are silent. I really don’t know much about Sigma’s gameplay style, but it’s really good to see him finally joining the fight alongside the heroes of Mega Man X series, despite not having much of a role in the cutscenes other than being Ultron Sigma.
For the new trios, Winter Soldier’s gameplay is quite interesting. Not just he looks like another Chris Redfield, but he have a secret Lv. 3 Hyper Combo having Captain America joining the rumble. This reminded me of Rival School’s mechanic, which calling your partner to perform a Team-up Techniques. It would be interesting if Capcom made a patch to have certain fighters perform a same mechanic like Winter Soldier. X and Zero would be the best combination, Ryu and Chun-Li should work as they’re both friends, maybe Spider Man and Venom despite being rivals…possibilities are there. And speaking of Venom, it’s good to see him again in full 3D. But the voice was kinda off…it sounded like Green Goblin instead. Other than that, it’s good to see him back, rather than that ugly monster showed up in the story mode.
The costumes were quite interesting as well. Many weren’t impressed with X and Zero’s, but I think nobody knew what it was. It’s my first time seeing Zero’s, but X’s costume is based from the figure made by TruForce ( http://www.rockman-corner.com/2015/02/new-reward-tiers-added-to-truforces.html ), so seeing this design was quite impressive to me. It’s also good to see Frank wearing the costume from his spinoff and non-canonical title, which is odd why they didn’t bring out his DR4’s costume. Captain Marvel’s previous outfit Ms. Marvel, Hiryu’s rival Hien’s outfit, Dante’s failed remake costume which nobody even wanted to see it again…the choices was interesting. But I do sense it wasn’t enough. If there would be more costumes in the future, then they should add in more unique ones if possible, like Frank’s DR4 costume, X’s Copy-X costume, Chris’s RE7 costume, Spidey’s Miles Morales costume…man, I can only think of Capcom side.
While the game was disappointed by fans from the start, at least the DLC brought a good sign of improvement. It’s possible that Capcom’s trying to put more surprise to the game, but we don’t know what’s coming up for Wave 2. There are rumors that leaks were found that the X-Men and Fantastic 4 might return, while the actual comics are trying to bring them back as well. I do not wanna believe in leaked infos as there’s possibility for being fake, and as I don’t want to get hyped too often for this case. But even then, I wouldn’t think it’ll be a bad thing to look forward for the next DLC as Capcom’s improving…IF they are in other words.