Team Up

Growing up, I knew Marvel Comics were obviously great. Spider-Man and X-Men were my favourites and as far as I was concerned, they walked over most of what I saw from DC, which was mainly Superman.

As I've gotten older, I've conceded DC put out some great works (Frank Miller's Batman and Denis O'Neil's The Question being two notable examples) but also stood by my Marvel favouritism, especially as they had the Punisher and Deadpool. Therefore, Marvel Ultimate Alliance on the Playstation 3 was an essential purchase but in the end, I felt a bit let down by the repetitive game play despite the excellent range of characters to choose from.

Nevertheless, I decided to give the sequel a shot, mainly as it used the Civil War storyline as it's core. In short: events lead to a political decision that all superheroes must register with the Government, a decision supported by Iron Man and Mr Fantastic. Opposing them are Captain America and Luke Cage, who believe the act to be unconstitutional. Or something. Whose side you join is up to you - oh, the decisions!

In terms of the gaming experience, they've not moved on a whole lot. The big addition is the ability to team up with another of your team of four to execute some pretty nifty moves that can clear a whole room of baddies in a few seconds, or even go a long way to sorting out one of the many bosses you'll come across. Part of the fun of the game is switching these around to see the various combinations on offer.

The roster has been tweaked, with the most notable new addition being the Hulk. But once again, for me, Deadpool steals the show with his fourth wall breaking antics, criticising the programmers choice of limiting story arcs and even noting on making a decision on where he'll side in the Civil War that he'll pick the other side on the next play through.

Storyline-wise, it starts off well enough by using the Secret War series as a tutorial, Nick Fury being in particularly fine arse-kicking mood before going into the Civil War. Sadly, this part seems over far too quickly and we're into a slightly silly climax which seems to have been lifted from the worst aspects of sci-fi. It also all seems to be over a bit soon, giving me the impression that we're expected to consider the fact we can play through it again on the other "side" as a motivation to do a lot of other missions again So far, it's not been the case for me.

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is a lot of fun, most of which is gained from playing in some of the stable's most famous teams (X-Men, Fantastic Four, the Avengers), but probably only for fans of the characters. Even available at a cheap(ish) price as it is now, it's not going to appeal to casual gamers. Nice cameo by Stan Lee, though!