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Platform: PlayStation 3, PlayStation 2, PSP, Xbox, Xbox 360, Wii, GameBoy Advance

Genre: Action RPG

Number of Players: 1 - 4 + Online

Support: HD 1080i

Peripherals: Broadband Ethernet

No one could have predicted back in the golden ages of comics that decades later, some of the world’s most popular heroes wouldn’t only still have their comics around, they would have become the things that television series, films, and even video games were based on. Marvel at one point really had become a sinking ship, but they’ve bounced back and released from of the biggest superhero blockbusters that the industry has seen, and the same has been true of video games.

Activision has already released some of Marvels hottest heroes with versions of Spider-Man and The X-Men, but their license covers a few more heroes that just these. Contrary to what the name might suggest, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance is not set in Marvel’s Ultimate Universe, but instead it’s the same, good old fashioned heroes and villains that many of us have grown up with. The game brings together some of the biggest names (and a few lesser known ones that actually surprised me) in what is being billed as an action role-playing game.

The nefarious Dr. Doom is putting together a new Masters of Evil (why the Masters of Evil is beyond me, but it’s Doom, so I guess he can do what he wants.) What this newly formed group wants is unknown, but they have started their assault by attacking the S.H.I.E.L.D helicarrier and the distress call has brought together Captain America, Thor, Spider-Man and Wolverine, but even their combined might isn’t nearly enough stop Doom and his henchmen. Nick Fury has put out an emergency call for all available heroes to join together and put a stop to the Master of Evil now the group is now temporarily calling Tony Stark’s headquarters their base of operations as they try and piece together what Doom’s ultimate objective is.

Ultimate Alliance brings together roughly 140 different personalities from the original Marvel Universe to interact with or play as, and with such a huge list on hand, only the biggest fans are going to recognize all of them. I may have spent a lot of my youth reading Marvel’s comic, but there were some that even I was a bit clueless as to who they were. While you will start with a mere four characters, the game will eventually provide you with 20 different heroes to choose from. Aside from the ones already mentioned, characters such as Blade, Ghost Rider, Spider-Woman, the Fantastic Four, Deadpool, and even Moon Knight are all playable, though you will find a few names that you will need to unlock in order to play. The list of villains is just as impressive and Doom has enlisted the aid of Arcade, Fin Fang Foom (a big surprise really), MODOK, Ultron, Winder Soldier, and even the underlings from A.I.M to do his bidding.

Much of the game is played out as an action title and you will have a total of four different characters at once in your group. You can switch between the four by using the D-pad at any point, and there certainly are characters that are more fun to play than others. For example, I didn’t find Iron Man to be a great asset to the team, though Colossus or Captain America on the other hand made gameplay quite easy. What ever character you’re currently playing acts as the leader and while you’re team members will act independently, and usually very good, you can also issue them commands. By holding L2 and using the D-pad, you can have your team act more aggressively, take on defensive stances, or simply act as they normally would. Giving directives may seem pointless, but it will come in handy in some battles.

You have a basic attack as well as a smash attack that can be used. You can also grab foes and either toss them aside or beat them into the ground. Since we are dealing with super powers here, you will discover that some characters simply jump while others can fly and hover. You may also charge attacks for more damage or even attempt to disarm enemies in some cases. Stages will also yield weapons, such as iron pipes, that can be picked up and used as a weapon. Each character also has their own powers of course which you can assign to different buttons. Holding R2 will bring up the powers menu where you can select what ability you’d like to use, but this will deplete your energy meter. This is easily refilled however with blue spheres that will be found by beating down villains or breaking open objects. Red spheres on the other hand will build back up health while S.H.I.E.L.D credits can be saved to purchase other costumes, power up your abilities, or unlock other special features in the game. Credits can be found by defeating enemies, but also destroy anything and everything you possibly can as this will generally yield more of these items.

During the course of fighting evil, you will gain experience points and eventually begin to level your characters up. Even those that are in reserve seem gain a bit of experience when not in combat, so they all tend to stay on a fairly even playing field. New levels mean more powers to choose from but you don’t necessarily have to worry about all of this on your own. Instead, you can set the game up to do auto-leveling and auto assigning of powers, abilities, and items. There are also comics that will be found that hold other features, solo missions, where you can gain not only some background, but perhaps a few other special things for your characters.

But, what if one, or many, of your heroes take a good deal of punishment during battle? That’s not too much of a problem, the situation depending of course. They will spend some tie out of battle to heal until you can bring them back in. The same is true of the Portal, a nice means to transport back to Stark Tower and switch characters or try and do a bit of information gathering.

Ultimate Alliance also uses the SIXAXIS controller. The whole problem with that however is that right now, no one really is using the controller to the degree that it would or could be, not like Nintendo is doing with the Wii. Then again, there are a lot of gamers who would say that’s nothing more than a gimmick, and to some degree it is. Activision made some fairly good use of the SIXAXIS on Call of Duty 3, and they didn’t overdo it. Here, you can use it to throw enemies around the screen, doge attacks, and a few other things, but overall, it’s not essential to gameplay, and while I tried it a time or two, I found myself instead just play the game the good, old fashioned way.

My biggest issue with this game however is that really; it’s got some good dieas, but bad things that drag it down. Let’s face it, not all of us are going to be interested in playing sports titles, and there’s got to be something else out there. Ultimate Alliance actually allows for up to four players to play the story mode and also features an online. The four-player ability really makes the game a good buy if you’re looking to have something you can enjoy when friends are over, and having the online play can help quite a bit as well. Not only will your powered up heroes be transferred over, but also your current unlocks. But, for the good, we also have bad, and that does come with the graphics.

This game at this point has been seen on just about every console on the face of the planet. It’s been on the PlayStation 2 and Xbox, the PSP and the GBA, and now the next generation consoles. However, I honestly don’t feel that this is next gen material. The game isn’t bad, and certainly has a home on the older consoles, but as far as those that have more graphic power, Ultimate Alliance doesn’t really showcase it nearly to the same level as many of the other PS3 launch titles. The characters actually are a bit too small for my liking and even though they do have indicators, they often tend to get lost and become indistinguishable from the villains. The look of each of the characters however look very good, and I certainly have to give compliments at least for that. The level designs are a bit half-hearted, using the same design throughout without much variation. The cut scenes are good, though they usually rely on replicating the in-game look, and in this case, it’s really too close to being like a “last generation” game and not so much “next gen.”

I really wanted to enjoy Marvel: Ultimate Alliance and I did for a time, but it soon was overtaken by monotony, the same variety that I found with Untold Legends. I don’t mind some mindless action, pointless beat ‘em up’s, but eventually, I grow to where I want a little bit more, and this wasn’t a game that delivered as much as I had hoped for. While I may be in the minority on this one, I still feel that Ultimate Alliance really wasn’t a game that was worthy to be considered a next generation title, and while it may be a good party game of sorts, the novelty quickly wore off and got old, almost as quickly as Marvel’s Ben Riley storyline from years past.

-mike-