Marvel Cosmic Invasion

The folk over at Tribute Games have proven in the past their excellence at arcade beat em' ups with pixelated and retro-geared visuals to die for. You need only look at 2022's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge for an example of this, even if the developer has far more projects beyond this that also stand out. Next up is a partnership with Marvel, a game that combines what Tribute does best with a narrative somewhat inspired by the Annihilation comic series. Essentially, we're talking a story that pits Earth's Mightiest Heroes against Annihilus and its overwhelming bug army forces, and the end product is fittingly dubbed Marvel Cosmic Invasion.

Anyone who has played a beat em' up - and this isn't even just tailored to Tribute's examples - will be instantly familiar with what this game is looking to deliver as it treads a similar path. It's a retro and arcade presentation and setup, where you select characters from a diverse line-up and use their signature skills and playstyles to defeat a variety of enemies and bosses, while avoiding environmental hazards, all as you steadily plod along a level that is basically 2D. I say this because while there is depth in the level and you can move forwards and backwards as well as side-to-side, there isn't really any depth beyond this, and everything that warrants your attention is typically on the same, or a very, very similar horizontal plane first-and-foremost.

With this in mind, you punch and kick the enemies that stand in your way until they are defeated and evaporate out of existence using simplistic inputs or combos. The main difference in Marvel Cosmic Invasion compared to say, Shredder's Revenge, is that you can now easily take to the skies and utilise aerial combat assuming you have picked a character with flight skills, meaning there's even more depth to the combat and also the various enemy types that are thrown your way. Typically speaking, as far as the combat and the general mechanics go, they're refined enough and simplistic enough to not cause too much confusion in the heat of the battle. There is the typically rigidness of games like this, where you want a millisecond or two of improved responsiveness, or perhaps a more clearer presentation that makes it easier to tell if you're perfectly on the right plane of depth as the enemies, as the way it is it can feel as though the game is fighting you a tad. But these are more minor inconveniences that you learn to live with and even overcome as you progress onwards.

As per the character roster, I appreciate that there's a decent range of highly familiar characters like Captain America and Spider-Man but also more obscure individuals that many newer fans might not recognise, such as Phyla-Vell or Beta-Ray Bill. Each of the characters has its own pseudo archetype, where Wolverine is fast and agile and She-Hulk is slower but tougher, with this on top of their own attack skills, blocks/parries, abilities, special powers, passives, and even occasionally ranged attacks too. All this means that while you can only take two heroes into a level, the range of combat options is incredibly deep, especially when you factor in the tag system that adds extra layers to master by frequently swapping between your hero duo for new moves and skills. Marvel Cosmic Invasion is a rudimentary beat em' up on the surface, but when you peel back the layers there is much, much more here that can entertain fans of the genre.

And this is only exacerbated by the progression in Marvel Cosmic Invasion. Beyond the core storyline that spans different levels with unique threats to overcome and challenges to complete, every time you conclude a mission (successfully or not), your chosen heroes will be awarded experience that contributes to their levelling. It's a basic system that doesn't require much thought to understand but in practice makes all the difference as a Lvl. 1 character is rather weak and fragile, but a Lvl. 8 one will have extra health, better skill generation, maybe even a passive that reflects who they are. Bringing it back to Wolverine, his passive activates constant health regeneration, which is effectively a game changer for a title like this and makes the X-Men character a very powerful candidate.

So beyond completing the story levels (of which there aren't too many and typically they only require 10 minutes or so to overcome), you do have hero progression to work on. But beyond this, Marvel Cosmic Invasion is bitten a tad by the beat em' up bug, in that there's very little else that requires your attention. You can unlock art and character skins by completing the Cosmic Cube that is itself tied to the specific level challenges, and beyond that, there's a more authentic arcade mode that sacrifices the safety of the chapter-by-chapter format of the regular story to instead be a seamless permadeath-like setup. But this is about it, so you have to go into Marvel Cosmic Invasion understanding that there's quite a concise amount of content in store if you only intend to blast through the 'campaign' once. If you intend to master the mechanics and hunt for the elusive '100%', you'll be far more entertained, making it a fantastic option for beat em' up fanatics.

Whether you're a Marvel fan or an arcade/beat em' up lover, Tribute Games has once again proven that they are masters of the format with Marvel Cosmic Invasion. There's great variety and depth in this game and drop-in co-op, matched up with tons of references and fan-service that will make comic enjoyers grin from cheek-to-cheek. It may be brief and it may require a bit of practice to grasp, but once you do become familiar with the inputs, the trips to Genosha or Klyntar to fight Sentinel robots and Knull's symbiotes, or a voyage to free the Worldmind on Xandar or taking Thanos down a peg or two will stay with you and even encourage you to return for more. It's not rewriting the script for what a beat em' up should be in any sense, but it's good and solid fun that fans should appreciate wholeheartedly.