Marvel and Netmarble release Marvel Future Fight, a third person beat-em up style mobile game available on Android and iOS. Future Fight seems to be loosely based on the incursion events from the comics. Earth’s mightiest heroes must team up not only with each other, but with villains to face off against heroes and villains from other earths. Like other recent Marvel initiatives, the X-Men and Fantastic Four are not in these games, but even without them the roster the playable characters and wide inclusion of NPC’s are still impressive.
Game play is very fluid, you can either choose a tap and attack style which is similar to MOBA style gaming or a control pad style which is more traditional and allows for more precision control. Players set up teams of three and complete levels. Each character has a unique set of special moves, as well as one of four character types: Blast (Blue), Combat (Red), Speed (Green), and Universal (Purple). The character types play out exactly like the three starter Pokemon Blue>Red>Green>Blue and Universal is essentially normal type not strong or weak against anything. Type matters a lot, I recommend having a team of each type to be ready for anything.
There are a two game modes: mission and arena. Arena is where players pit their teams and play against other players, and mission is where players complete the story and earn collectibles to strengthen their characters and acquire more. There are 4 different types of missions, the main being normal and elite. Normal is the main story line, elite is a more difficult version where you can earn better power ups for your characters.
Future Fight is by far my favorite Marvel mobile game. It’s the only one that seems to allows players the full range of the game without having to make purchases. Time is rewarded and the roster is deep. I think a big part of the satisfaction comes from getting the Hulkbuster character as a reward for logging in daily for a week. To level up and earn characters, players have to replay levels over and over again. However, the must unique feature of the game is that after beating a level a player is able to auto-play the level. The auto-play feature takes the monotony out of grinding, and allows players to level up without having to go through the repetitive task of playing something you’ve already beaten.
The game play is simple but enjoyable, very reminiscent of old school beat-em style game. It’s fun and intuitive and although repetitive, the slight differences in the levels makes for hours of fun game play. The graphics again are pretty impressive for a mobile game; character design, powers animation, and level design are all rendered beautifully. Lastly, the process of leveling and acquiring characters is simple and free.
The downsides to the game mainly revolve around the repetitiveness. Some levels are exactly the same except for enemy spawns and level bosses. However considering it is a free mobile game, this draw back is easily overlooked. The game is easily as fun and as deep as anything on the Gameboy systems, and I believe that is the standard in which we should judge free mobile gaming. The higher quality graphics also do a number on battery life. When it comes down to it, Marvel Future Fight is a well polished beat-em up full of Marvel goodies to put any fan in a tizzy. Marvel Future Fight is available for free in the App Store or Google Play Store.
Marvel Future Fight: 8/10
+ Great graphics and fluid game play
+ Wide inclusion of playable and non-playable characters
+ Auto-Play to help with repetitiveness
+ Does not feel like a cash grab
+ Free Hulkbuster
– Repetitive
– Rehash of level designs
